(Chinhphu.vn) – For a joint venture or consortium contractor, only one partner must buy or receive the bidding documents, even if the partnership has  not yet been formed when purchasing or receiving the bidding documents.

Mr. Pham Minh Hoan (in Kien Giang Province) would like to ask authorities to answer questions of consultants in the process of organizing contractor selection, specifically as follows:

Bidder A purchases the documents, by the time of bid closure and submiting the bid, contractor A submits the documents as a contractor A - contractor B, but does not notify the procuring entity on change of bid status. In the bid, there is a joint venture or consortium agreement between contractor A and contractor B.

Mr. Hoan would like to ask, is it valid in cade of not informing the change of bid status?

In the codeshare agreement, contractor A is in partnership with contractor B, contractor A leads the joint venture but only takes 25% of the volume, contractor B undertakes 75% of the volume. So, in case of contractor A leading the partnership but only undertake 25% of the bid is it valid or not?

In addition, in the evaluation of bid, the procuring entity shall base itself on the bid volume and the unit price set by the construction contractor to have the bid price. However, in the analysis of factors such as labor costs, construction machines, material coefficients, general costs, other direct expenses, camp costs, it is necessary to adjust those coefficients to be the same as in the project. If the bid package is approved or not, if the bidder offers those coefficients that be different in the cost estimate?

Regarding this issue, The Ministry of Planning and Investment has the following opinions:

Clause 2, Article 14 of the Decree No. 63/2014 / ND-CP of the Government stipulates, The bidding documents are released for contractors to participate in the open bidding or for those who are short-listed bidders. In case of bidders as joint ventures or consortiums, only one of the partners is required to purchase or receive the bid solicitation, even if the joint venture or consortium has not been founded yet when purchasing or receiving the bid solicitation;

In case the bid invitation dossier has not been purchased, the bidder must pay the procuring entity an amount equal to the selling price of the bidding dossier before the bid is received.

For Mr. Hoan's problem, the contractor does not have to notify the change of bid participation status, but must meet the above requirements.

There is no requirement on the work rate of the head of the partnership

Concerning the workload that the leading member of the partnership undertakes, the bidding law only stipulates the contractor's partnership agreement must clearly state the specific work contents and estimate the corresponding value that each of them members in the partnership will perform without requiring the workload ratio of the head partner to undertake.

Concerning bid prices of contractors, Clause 17, Article 4 of the Law on Bidding stipulates, Bid price is the price stated by the bidder in the bidding application, including all expenses for the performance of the bidding package as required by the bidding documents.

Accordingly, when participating in tenders, contractors may base on advantages, business strategies, competitive strategies in bidding to set bid prices.

The bid unit price of a contractor may be higher or lower than the unit price set by the State and may differ from the unit price in the estimate.