Purpose:

The Social Security Administration (SSA) is conducting market research to identify organizations capable of providing all necessary services to support the ongoing and expanded deployment of the SSA Access to Financial Institution (AFI) Project.

Introduction:

SSA's eligibility rules require that an individual's liquid assets must be under a specified limit. Currently, there are over 7 million SSI recipients on the SSA rolls, and approximately 2 million individuals apply for SSI each year. In addition, SSA conducts periodic re-determinations of eligibility which include obtaining account balance information maintained by individual financial institutions (FI). The Foster Care Independence Act of 1999 permits SSA to require SSI applicants and beneficiaries to provide authorization for access to their respective FI, in order to provide verification of their financial assets. In most states, SSA's current process for obtaining asset verification is paper-based. The form SSA-4641-U2, "Authorization for the Social Security Administration to Obtain Account Records From a Financial Institution and Request for Records", is mailed to the FI and asks the FI to provide account balance information over specified time periods. The purpose of the AFI is to convert to electronic media the information exchanges (e.g., form SSA-4641-U2) that now occur in paper form between FI and SSA; obtain titling, balance and related information on all types of accounts or certificates held by the SSI applicant, recipient or deemor in addition to verifying the account balance and interest income revealed by the applicant, recipient or deemor; detect unreported accounts in financial institutions located in proximity to the home address of the SSI applicant, recipient or deemor and to automate the process whereby FI are reimbursed for the cost of account verification. Interested parties must be able to deliver a web-based application that allows for the electronic transfer of account information between SSA and FI. The application would be used to verify eligibility for SSA's means-tested program, the Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program. Background: Accuity, a SourceMedia Company, has previously created and deployed a web-based application that electronically transfers asset information between FI and SSA on a geographically-limited (i.e., California, New Jersey, and New York) basis since 2005. The current SSA AFI project successfully verifies financial information exchanges and detects undisclosed financial accounts to all 110 Field Offices (FO) in the states of New York and New Jersey and to a limited number of users in the Office of Quality Performance (OQP) 15 regional sites. SSA has previously conducted extensive market research and published multiple sources sought notices to identify alternative sources of supply for these services. To SSA's knowledge, Accuity is the only company that has the capability for detecting unreported depository accounts at financial institutions using the customers, name and social security number as the identifying information.

 Response Instructions:

SSA is requesting any responsible organization that feels it has the capabilities and resources to meet the requirements listed within the Draft SOW to respond in writing. SSA is accepting questions, concerns, and /or suggestions related to the Draft SOW. Interested parties shall respond by email to traci.leach@ssa.gov no later than December 4, 2009. Telephone calls regarding this matter will not be accepted, nor will they be returned. All responses shall be marked AFI DRAFT SOW. The Government will not pay for, nor will it return, information provided in response to this notice. Information received will be considered solely for the purpose of determining whether or not to conduct a competitive procurement. A determination by the government not to compete this requirement based upon responses, or lack thereof, to this notice is solely within the discretion of the Government.