Compliance requirements
A bidder will be excluded if the company or a person with management, supervisory or representation authority has been convicted of participation in a criminal organisation, corruption, fraud, terrorism-related offences, money laundering or terrorist financing, illegal use of child labour, or human trafficking. Exclusion also applies to convictions for employing a foreign national residing in the country unlawfully or breaching the conditions for employing a foreign national in Estonia, outstanding taxes, payments or environmental charges, or circumstances in which awarding the contract would breach an international or Government sanction. The contracting authority may also exclude a bidder for a serious or repeated breach of a previous public contract, false information, or failure to submit required information or documents. The bidder must provide declarations confirming the absence of exclusion grounds using the HD Annex 5 form; in a joint tender, each joint bidder must provide the declarations.
Qualification criteria and exclusion grounds
The bidder must be registered, where required by the law of its country of establishment, in the commercial register of a European Union Member State, a European Economic Area contracting state, or a country that is a member, not merely an observer, of the WTO Government Procurement Agreement. A valid register certificate must be provided at the contracting authority’s request; a bidder registered in Estonia does not need to provide it if the information is publicly available to the contracting authority.
The bidder’s net turnover must have been at least EUR 500,000 excluding VAT in each of the last three financial years completed before the tender was launched, namely 2023, 2024 and 2025. If the financial year does not run from 1 January to 31 December, the figures for the bidder’s corresponding financial years must be provided. Turnover must be stated in the HD Annex 5 form and, at the contracting authority’s request, supported by an extract from the annual accounts or another document.
During the 60 months preceding the launch of the tender, the bidder must have completed, under one or two railway construction contracts on a public railway, a total of at least 100 metres of railway track installation or major renovation and the installation of at least one railway turnout. The works must have been accepted and completed without material breaches. The removal of an existing turnout for renovation followed by its reinstallation is also acceptable. Details must be provided in the HD Annex 5 form and, at the contracting authority’s request, verified by a confirmation from the client.
If the bidder relies on another entity’s resources to demonstrate its economic and financial standing or technical and professional capacity, the bidder must provide that entity’s details in HD Annex 5 and submit the entity’s declarations using HD Annex 5.1.
The tender must include the participation application using the HD Annex 2 form. The tender price must be submitted in euros according to the required structure and in the HD Annex 7 price schedule, with all relevant fields completed. The price schedule must not be amended or supplemented with additional remarks. Conditional tenders are not permitted; the tender must comply with the procurement documents, and any equivalent solution must be explained and supported by evidence. Joint bidders must submit a power of attorney signed by all joint bidders using HD Annex 4 and confirm joint and several liability. The bidder must also identify trade secrets in the tender or state that the tender contains no trade secrets.