Labor Department RFI: EBSA Form 5500 Bulletin Statistical Reports

Notice ID: OAA-24-00067

The Office of the Senior Procurement Executive (OSPE), on behalf of the Employee Benefits Security Administration, is seeking to better understand the population of qualified and capable vendors that produce EBSA’s annual Form 5500 statistical reports. These include Private Pension Plan Bulletins Abstract of Form 5500 Annual Reports, Form 5500 Direct Filing Entity Bulletin Abstract of Form 5500 Annual Reports, Schedule C Bulletin Abstract of Form 5500 Annual Reports, and Group Health Plans Reports Abstract along with corresponding user guides, datasets, and necessary coding programs. In addition, the contractor will provide statistical support for the EBSA Office of Research and Analysis (ORA) in conducting regulatory impact analysis and responding requests for statistical research support from various EBSA offices.

The Contractor shall produce each of the three Form 5500 bulletins consistent with previous statistics, data and bulletins published on EBSA’s website from the most complete year of Form 5500 Series filings covering (1) all retirement plans, (2) direct filing entities holding investments by retirement plans, and (3) group health plans. The Contractor shall include data for the plan year that is most recently filed by all private sector employee benefit plans in the United States and include tables with time series data starting as early as possible for bulletins on retirement plans and direct filing entities. In addition, the Contractor shall also create supporting documentation file packages for each bulletin that include the dataset created to produce the bulletin, documentation on the creation of the data used for the bulletins and an explanation on how to use the data, and helpful materials for researchers.

EBSA’s overall objective is as follows:

1. Clean and analyze annual Form 5500 data filings in order to produce the Private Pension Plan Bulletin and the Historical Tables and Graph, using the most complete year of Form 5500 Series filings on all retirement plans. These reports shall be consistent with previous statistics, data and bulletins published on EBSA’s website, https://www.dol.gov/agencies/ebsa/researchers/statistics/retirement-bulletins/private-pension-plan
2. Clean and analyze annual Form 5500 data filings in order to produce the Form 5500 Direct Filing Entity Bulletin and Historical Tables using the most complete year of Form 5500 Series filings on direct filing entities holding investments by retirement plans. These reports shall be consistent with previous statistics, data and bulletins published on EBSA’s website, https://www.dol.gov/agencies/ebsa/researchers/statistics/retirement-bulletins/direct-filing-entity
3. Clean and analyze annual Form 5500 data filings in order to produce the Group Health Plan Bulletin using the most complete year of Form 5500 Series filings on all group health plans. This report shall be consistent with previous statistics, data and bulletins published on EBSA’s website, https://www.dol.gov/agencies/ebsa/researchers/statistics/health-and-welfare-bulletins/group-health-plans
4. Create supporting documentation file packages for each bulletin that include the dataset created to produce the bulletin, documentation on the creation of the data used for the bulletins and an explanation on how to use the data, and helpful materials for researchers. This documentation will serve as a “User Guide” to generating the tables reported in the bulletins.
5. Provide on-site technical and statistical support for EBSA staff. Tasks may include analyzing unedited Form 5500 data and research files that are stored in EBSA’s internal servers in order to provide statistical support for regulatory impact analysis and other duties; assist in responding to public inquiries about the data or the various publications. The contractor is expected to spend on average 5 hours a week on this task.

Scope:

The contractor shall provide services analyzing and tabulating Form 5500 series filings each year in order to develop tables summarizing the aggregate data for the Private Pension Plan Bulletin, the Direct Filing Entity Bulletin and the Group Health Plans Bulletin and their supporting documentations and Historical Tables, consistent with previous publications. Services include cleaning and editing Form 5500 data to produce separate “research files” for retirement plans, direct filing entities and group health plans; classifying the types of filings by employer type: “single,” “multiple employer” and “multiemployer;” providing tabulations, or summary tables, by populations of interest of the data including but not limited to plan assets, participants, contributions, benefits, income, expenses, and various plan features; including in the bulletins highlights of the tabulations; producing supporting documentation of the creation of the data used in the bulletins, how to use it and additional helpful materials for researchers; and  statistical support for EBSA. The contractor shall present their reports to EBSA staff and incorporate recommended changes.  The contractor shall accomplish the timely completion of bulletins free of typographical errors and logical inconsistencies.

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