Public Procurement

The need for an accelerated public procurement procedure to help in boosting local economies during the financial crisis has been recognised by the European Commission.

The agreement would allow a more rapid delivery of major public investment projects by considerably reducing the overall time limit of the procedure from 87 to 30 days. It is also suggested that this accelerated procedure should stay in place throughout 2009 and 2010 for all major public projects.

Under the current procedure there is a certain time frame for potential bidders for major public investment projects to decide whether to participate and to draw up their tenders. There is also a standstill period between the award decisions and the conclusion of the contract to allow for review of the award decisions. In the accelerated procedure bidders first have to request to participate, then selected candidates are invited to submit their tender.

The current regime allows 37 days from the date on which the contract is sent for lodging requests to participate, and another 40 days for the selected candidates to submit their tenders.

Under the accelerated restricted procedure contracting authorities can shorten the time limit for requests to participate from 37 days to 10 and subsequent time limit for selected candidates to submit their tenders from 40 days to 10. The obligatory standstill period of 10 days still remains.

Further details about public procurement legislation can be found at:

http://ec.europa.eu/internal_market/publicprocurement/index_en.htm

Last Updated: 05/03/2009 01:28:32 By Richard Perry