• The President of UOKiK initiated proceedings concerning bid rigging.

• Charges were brought against three entrepreneurs who may have influenced the results of public contract procedures concerning renovation and construction services.

UOKiK has received information about possible bid rigging, in which contractors providing renovation and construction services were involved. After a preliminary analysis of the case, Tomasz Chróstny, the President of the Office, initiated three proceedings in which he brought charges against three entities from the Wielkopolskie Voivodeship. The first proceedings concern possible collusion between entrepreneurs: Antczak Sprzątanie Remonty Handel from Kalisz and Tech-Fen from Gostyczyna. The second case is an illegal agreement between these entities and  Kamastra from Kalisz. In the third case, the President of UOKiK brought charges against Antczak Sprzątanie Remonty Handel and Kamastra.

The Office suspects that the entrepreneurs' actions were aimed to ensure that a more expensive tender is selected by the contracting authority. If their tenders were the most advantageous, then the winner of the tender procedure did not supplement its tender with the documents requested by the contracting authority or informed it of its withdrawal from the procedure. The tender procedure was then won by another participant in the collusion, who submitted a more expensive tender.

"This is a reminder that entrepreneurs participating in tender procedures should calculate their tenders on their own. Influencing tender procedures together with other entities and engaging in collusion in order for the contracting authority to select a more expensive tender are illegal, with financial penalties to be imposed being up to 10% of the annual turnover. Budgetary units use tender procedures to ensure the rational spending of public funds. Therefore, collusion between tenderers is not only a violation of competition law but also detrimental to the Polish economy," says Tomasz Chróstny, the President of UOKiK.

The Office also runs a programme aimed at acquiring information from anonymous whistleblowers. Please visit https://konkurencja.uokik.gov.pl/sygnalista/ and fill in a simple form. The European system that we use guarantees full anonymity, also towards the Office.

Additional information for the media:

UOKiK Press Office
Pl. Powstańców Warszawy 1, 00-950 Warszawa, Poland
Phone +48 695 902 088, +48 22 55 60 246
E-mail: [SCODE]Yml1cm9wcmFzb3dlQHVva2lrLmdvdi5wbA==[ECODE]
Twitter: @UOKiKgovPL