OFFICE FOR THE PROTECTION OF COMPETITION is a central state administrative authority responsible for protecting competition, based in Brno it is conceived as a two-stage administrative authority the Chairman of the Office is appointed and recalled by the President of the Republic at the proposal of the Government the Chairman is appointed for six-year-term service, and may be reelected once the Chairman of the Office is represented by 3 Vice-Presidents

The main areas of competence of the Office protecting competition public procurement significant market power coordination and consultancy in the field of state aid

Organisation structure as at 31 December 2016 employee structure the total number of employees as at 31 December 2016 was 244 (+ Chairman of the Office) by division

Organisation structure

Total number of first-instance proceedings initiated

Public procurement legislation historically Act No. 199/1994 Coll., On Public Procurement Act No. 40/2004 Coll., On Public Procurement Act No. 137/2006 Coll., On Public Procurement Act No. 134/2016 Coll. on Public Procurement - effective from 1 October 2016 - transposes current directives on public procurement and concessions

the contracting authority's obligation to decide within 15 days Supplier's objections supplier's ability to object to the tendering procedure in the award procedure the necessity to submit them within a 15-day period from the day they learned of the alleged violation of the law they must indicate what the alleged violation of the law is, what the applicant is claiming and what is the risk of harm to the complainant the contracting authority's obligation to decide within 15 days

The dispute is often about whether the objections were filed in time „At the stage of selecting the most appropriate bid, it is no longer possible to call into question the content of the procurement documents, since this stage is devoted to the selection of the most suitable bid which is either the most economically advantageous one or offers the lowest price. At this stage of the award procedure, the content of the terms of reference must have already been clearly and unambiguously identified; for these purposes, the tenderers shall use the institute of objections against the terms of reference„ - Supreme Administrative Court Judgment no. 2 Afs 67/2010 - 105 of  25/1/2011

the decisions on objections must be comprehensible and verifiable Office's authority to cancel the decision of the contracting authority on objections the decisions on objections must be comprehensible and verifiable otherwise the Office will cancel it and the contracting authority is obliged to decide again from the explanatory report to the Act „if the contracting authority can not reasonably substantiate its objections to the contested procedure, it should first of all consider whether its tendering procedure, disputed by the objection, is correct and whether it should rather take remedial action“.

The proposal for revision of the acts of the contracting authority submitted to the Office must be submitted no later than 10 days after the receipt of the decision of the contracting authority on the objections the condition is to deposit the fee and submit the proposal with all the requisites name of the contracting authority what is the breach of the law caused damage evidence proposals what the petitioner claims

Proceedings before the Office in general it is very similar to court proceedings the procedure is mainly written (except for exceptions) requires thorough knowledge and vast professional expertise in the field corrective measures that the Office may impose: - cancellation of a particular act of the contracting authority - cancellation of the award procedure - ban on performance of the contract - otherwise the Office rejects the proposal the Office also deals with administrative offences, for which it then imposes a fine

Information activities publication of final decisions on the Office’s website publication of judgments of specialized courts concerning the Office's decision-making activities on the Office's website methodological assistance co-operation with the Ministry for Regional Development (another administrative authority in the field)

The Office for the Protection of Competition Thank you for your attention Iveta Pospíšilíková The Director of the Department of 2nd Instance Decision-Making Public Procurement The Office for the Protection of Competition Of the Czech Republic iveta.pospisilikova@compet.cz +420 602 387 499