Insights
Commentary on tender procedures, contract performance and disputes, published with its sources and last review date.
The Question of Participation in Tenders by Persons Convicted of the Offence of Causing Injury
In this article I set out information on whether a person convicted of the offence of causing injury arising from an occupational accident at the workplace may participate in tenders. I also seek to address the subject concretely through an actual case.
20 February 2025
The Question of a Contractor Providing Consultancy on the Subject Matter of a Tender Participating in the Tender for That Same Work
In this article I set out information on whether contractors providing consultancy on the subject matter of a tender may participate in the tender for that same work. I also address the subject concretely through an actual case and discuss the precautions that contracting authorities and tendering firms should take.
17 February 2025
Significant Errors Made by Contracting Authorities When Requesting Abnormally Low Tender Explanations in Service Tenders
Article 5 of Public Procurement Law No. 4734, headed Fundamental Principles, provides that contracting authorities are responsible for ensuring transparency, competition, equal treatment, reliability, confidentiality, public scrutiny, the meeting of requirements on appropriate terms and in good time, and the efficient use of resources. In this context, contracting authorities are required to act in accordance with the fundamental principles in all their procedures throughout the tender process, from the tender notice until the signature of the contract. The inquiry into and assessment of abnormally low tenders must likewise comply with the fundamental principles.
14 February 2025
Is the Participation in a Tender of Several Companies That Have Downloaded the Documents from the Same IP Address a Prohibited Act or Conduct?
This article assesses, from the standpoint of the procurement legislation, the downloading of tender documents by prospective tenderer companies from the same IP address. It also addresses matters that the tens of thousands of tenderers submitting tenders each year should avoid.
07 November 2024
Applying to the High Technical Board in Public Procurement Contracts
In contracts concluded under public tenders, contractors have doubts as to applying to the High Technical Board in disputes they encounter with contracting authorities. The subject of this information note is to explain how an application to the High Technical Board is to be made.
07 October 2024
What Can a Tenderer Do Where, as a Result of a Fundamental Mistake, It Has Submitted an Abnormally Low Tender in a Goods Procurement Tender and the Tender Has Been Awarded to It?
In service and works tenders, an abnormally low tender inquiry is carried out in respect of tenderers offering a price below the threshold value (well below market prices), and the tender is not awarded to a tenderer that is unable to provide an explanation. In goods procurement tenders, however, no procedure has been laid down for the calculation of a threshold value. For that reason, the tender may be awarded to a tenderer that has offered a very low price as a result of a fundamental mistake. Where the tenderer to whom the tender is awarded does not sign the contract, debarment proceedings are taken and its security is forfeited.
07 October 2024
How Are Tenderers Invited to Contract to Provide the Performance Bond?
As is known, the performance bond is the security taken in order to ensure that the contract signed by the contractor is performed in accordance with the tender documents. In works tendered on the basis that a price difference will be paid, it is also the additional security taken at a rate of 6% of the amount to be paid as a price difference, where an increase occurs in the contract price.
19 September 2024
Officials of Contracting Authorities Who Fail to Carry Out Debarment Checks Commit an Offence
Debarment from tenders is a sanction imposed by judicial authorities or contracting authorities that prevents the persons concerned from participating in tenders for a specified period. Debarment imposed by judicial authorities applies to real persons, while debarment imposed by contracting authorities applies to real and legal persons and to the controlling shareholders of capital companies.
21 December 2023
Pitfalls in Tenders for the Procurement of Kits Together with Devices Supplied Against Kits
Tenders for “the procurement of kits together with the temporary supply of devices against kits” are generally held by provincial health directorates and universities. Tenders of this kind may be defined as “the delivery of kits to the contracting authority in accordance with the work programme, and the maintenance in working order, at the authority's facilities for the duration of the contract, of the devices in which the kits delivered are used”. In such procurements we observe that some authorities make unilateral arrangements contrary to the procurement legislation.
19 December 2023
Resolution of Disputes Between Contractors and Construction Supervision Officers
It cannot be said that the tender documents prepared by contracting authorities in works contracts are complete in every respect. Many tender documents are cancelled by the Public Procurement Authority while still at the tender stage, on the ground that they have been prepared with deficiencies and defects, or are made the subject of a corrective action decision requiring their amendment. In most cases, however, companies participating in the tender refrain from raising the defects they observe at the notice and tender stage as a complaint, and encounter problems after signing the contract.
14 December 2023
Adding an Overseas Trip at the Contractor's Expense to the Tender Documents
Contracting authorities using public resources are able to include, in the tender documents they prepare for the works they will carry out, provisions to the effect that the contractor will bear the costs of an overseas trip. Such a situation may be construed as the expenditure of public resources for personal benefit. It also becomes impossible for the authority's personnel to take decisions in the interests of the State vis-à-vis the contractor financing the overseas trip. Yet our legislation provides for travel allowances and appropriations allocated to public officials for duties outside the city or abroad.
08 December 2023
Shareholding Ratios Not Uploaded to EKAP Cannot Be Completed After the Tender
Where capital companies participate in a tender without having uploaded their shareholding details to EKAP, they are excluded from the evaluation on the ground of missing documentation.
07 December 2023