Examination of Tenders in Terms of Abnormally Low Price: The Contracting Authority's Perspective

In the latest edition of the European Procurement & Public Private Partnership Law Review, Katarzyna Kuźma, Head of the DZP’s public procurement team, along with Caroline Lagendijk, Partner from the Public Procurement and State-aid Department of Straatman Koster advocaten and Natalia Olmos, Partner from the Public Law and Litigation Department of Pérez-Llorca discuss the contracting authority's perspective on examination of tenders in terms of abnormally low price.

From the perspective of contracting authorities, the issue of abnormally low prices in public procurement is extremely important. This is not only because both the procurement Directives and national legislation in individual EU Member States require authorities to take certain steps to examine whether tenders submitted in a procedure contain an abnormally low price, but it is also important from a purely economic and organisational perspective. At the same time, the recent market instability has compounded the difficulties faced by contracting authorities in making rational decisions and pursuing pricing policies. This article takes the contracting authorities’ perspective, examining the powers and responsibilities that such authorities have when examining abnormally low prices and the practical difficulties of doing so.

The European Procurement & Public Private Partnership Law Review is an international quarterly peer-reviewed journal that provides the reader with detailed coverage of all significant legal and policy developments in the Procurement and PPP areas across the European Union and beyond in the form of articles, case-law annotations, country reports and more.

The full text of the article is available in the latest edition of the  European Procurement & Public Private Partnership Law Review (Volume 18 (2023), Issue 2, Lexxion).