Compliance requirements
The bidder may be excluded if it or a person authorised to represent, manage or control it has, within the previous five years or while an exclusion period remains in force, been convicted of participation in a criminal organisation, corruption, fraud, terrorist offences, money laundering or terrorist financing, child labour or human trafficking. Exclusion may also apply for unpaid taxes or social security contributions; breaches of environmental, social or labour-law obligations; bankruptcy, insolvency, liquidation, creditor arrangements, court-administered assets or suspended business activities; serious professional misconduct; anti-competitive agreements; an unmanageable conflict of interest; involvement in preparing the procurement where an unfair advantage cannot otherwise be prevented; significant or persistent breach of a previous contract; false or misleading information, failure to provide required information or documents, or attempts to obtain confidential information or improperly influence the procedure. National grounds also include enabling the unlawful employment of a foreign national, being subject to an international sanction, and certain tax offences. The tax-arrears threshold is stated as EUR 0; the notice explains that an Estonian tax-debt certificate is not issued for debt below EUR 100, excluding interest not established by an administrative act, or where payment has been deferred. A bidder may provide evidence of remedial measures where applicable.
Qualification criteria and exclusion grounds
The bidder must be able to provide the team roles specified in the tender documents for performance of the framework agreement, and the team members must meet the requirements in the CV templates. CVs are not submitted in the procedure for awarding the framework agreement; team-member details and CVs must be provided in the mini-competitions held for performance of the framework agreement. The specific role and CV requirements are set out in tender document annexes 4.2–4.5.
By submitting a tender, the bidder accepts all tender-document conditions; conditional tenders are not permitted. The tender must remain valid for 4 months from submission. If awarded, the bidder must provide the company address, the contract signatory’s details and authority to sign, the contract-performance contact’s details, and the bank account number. The bidder must also identify representatives with authority to represent, make decisions for or control it who are not recorded in the commercial register, so that the contracting authority can check their exclusion grounds.
The bidder and any joint bidders and subcontractors must be established or resident in Estonia, another EU or European Economic Area country, or a country that is party to the World Trade Organization Government Procurement Agreement. For a joint tender, the parties must appoint an authorised representative and provide a power of attorney. By the start of contract performance, the contractor must provide each subcontractor’s name, registration number and contact details, information about its legal representatives, and the title, date, number and value of the subcontract. The same information must be provided for subcontractors added during performance.
The bidder must identify and justify any information claimed as a trade secret. The tender price and, for service contracts, numerical information describing the tender against the award criteria may not be classified as trade secrets. The bidder must confirm that its tender complies with the requirements; any equivalence must be explained and supported by evidence. The machine-readable notice does not specify the award criteria; these should be checked in the tender documents.