Slovenian Business Portal

VI. PUBLIC PROCUREMENT

Slovenia’s public procurement legislation is harmonised with EU legislation (Directive 2014/24/EC; Directive 2014/25/EC etc.). The Public Procurement Act regulates contracts on supplies of goods, services and works in the general area (i.e. contracts awarded by traditional contracting authorities, such as central government, regional and local authorities and other bodies governed by public law) as well as in the utilities sector (i.e. contracts awarded by public, semi-public and private entities with special or exclusive rights operating in the utilities sectors). Supplies of goods, services and works in the defence and security sector are regulated by the Public Procurement for Defence and Security Act. The procedure for revision is regulated by the Legal Protection in Public Procurement Procedures Act.

Main principles

The main principles of the public procurement regime are the free movement of goods and services and the freedom of establishment in the EU; and the principles of economy, efficiency, effectiveness, transparency, proportionality, free competition and equal treatment of the bidders.

Public contracts must comply with the applicable environmental, social and labour law.

Treatment of foreign bidders

The law prescribes the equal treatment of domestic and foreign bidders. Foreign bidders can submit a tender on the same conditions as domestic ones. The legislation strictly forbids any form of discrimination. Actions by a contract authority which would discriminate against foreign bidders are prohibited.

Thresholds

Public procurement procedures are only required for contracts whose estimated value exceeds certain thresholds.

Thresholds in general procurement are:

  • EUR 40,000 (goods, services and design contests);
  • EUR 80,000 (works);
  • EUR 750,000 (social and other specific services).

Thresholds in the utilities sector are:

  • EUR 50,000 (goods, services and design contests);
  • EUR 100,000 (works);
  • EUR 1,000,000 (social and other specific services).

Thresholds in the security and defence sector are:

  • EUR 40,000 (goods and services);
  • EUR 80,000 (works).

For procurements with a value below these thresholds, the contracting authorities do not need to use the public procurement procedure, but must still follow the principles of general public purchases and keep records of such procurements.

Information on all contracts exceeding EUR 10,000 must be published on the national public procurement portal.

Types of public contract procedures

The Public Procurement Act provides for the following procedures:

  • a low-value contract procedure, which can only be used for public contracts with an estimated value up to certain thresholds: for supplies of goods, services and works up to the threshold for mandatory TED publication (see below);
  • an open procedure in which every bidder can submit a tender in the response to a call for competition;
  • a restricted procedure, which is a two-phase procedure: in the first phase, the capability of the bidders is evaluated, while the second phase is reserved for commercial aspects of the bid;
  • a competitive dialogue as a procedure intended for very complex procurements;
  • an innovation partnership, which is used when a contracting authority wants an innovative product, service or works that cannot be achieved by purchasing products, services or works already available on the market;
  • a negotiated procedure (in three forms, i.e. competitive procedure with negotiation, negotiated procedure with publication, and negotiated procedure without prior publication). General procedural rules for the negotiation are prescribed; contracting authorities have in certain degree a free choice in realising the negotiated procedure, but must announce the number of all phases or the last phase so that the bidders know when the last phase of negotiations will commence.

The Public Procurement Act also regulates the techniques and instruments for electronic and aggregated procurement, i.e. qualifications system in the utilities area, framework agreements, electronic auction and a dynamic purchasing system.

The Public Procurement for Defence and Security Act provides for special procedures.

Information about public contracts

The Slovenian public procurement portal

All procurements whose estimated value exceeds the thresholds for the public procurement procedure must be published on the Slovenian public procurement portal (single information portal) which is available at www.enarocanje.si.

Tenders Electronic Daily – TED

Contracts whose estimated value exceeds the thresholds set by the EU regulation must also be published at TED (Tenders Electronic Daily), the online version of the Supplement to the Official Journal of the EU for public contracts (www.ted.europa.eu).

These thresholds are:

  • EUR 140,000 for goods and services in general procurement (EUR 215,000 if the contracting authority is not budget financed);
  • EUR 431,000 for goods and services in the utilities sector and in the defence and security sector;
  • EUR 5,382,000 for works in general procurement, the utilities sector and in the defence and security sector;
  • EUR 750,000 and EUR 1,000,000 for social and other specific services in general procurement and in the utilities sector.

The Slovenian public procurement portal and TED provide all necessary information without cost to all interested bidders from Slovenia, the EU and third countries.

Other sources of information in Slovenia

Contracting authorities sometimes publish their contract notices on their web pages as well.

Bidders can request information on published contract notices from certain specialised advisory companies in Slovenia (some provide this service in English as well) and can thus follow public contract information on their websites.

Language

The publication of contract notices on the Slovenian public procurement portal is made in the Slovenian language only. In TED, a summary of the publication is also available in English and other European languages.

The procurement documentation is generally in the Slovenian language only.

The contracting authority may provide that tenderers may submit their tender in whole or in part in a foreign language, especially the part relating to technical characteristics, quality and technical documentation, such as brochures, propaganda and technical material and others. In this case, the submitted documentation must indicate related details.

In exceptional cases, where there is insufficient appropriate Slovenian terminology in a specific technical field or when required by the subject of the public contract, the contracting authority may prepare documentation or part of the documentation in a foreign language.

The public contract procedure is conducted in the Slovenian language.

Content of the publication

The publication of a contract notice consists of information about the contracting authority, the subject of the contract, the selection criteria, the award criteria, information about the availability of documents relating to the call for tender, the time for submitting a tender etc. The publication of contract notice also includes a link to the application via which an e-bid can be submitted.

Tender documentation

Any person interested in submitting a tender in Slovenia has the right to acquire tender documentation. Tender documents are available without cost. Contracting authorities must (except in special cases) public tender documentation on the national public procurement portal.

Upon publication of a public tender, potential bidders may request an explanation of the tender documentation. Answers and additional explanations concerning the documentation are published on the public procurement portal.

Submission of a bid

All public contract procedures must be conducted electronically (except in special cases, e.g. if physical models must be attached to the documentation etc.).

Bidders submit their bid using the electronic system. Several different e-submission systems exist (state-owned system e-JN and various commercial systems). The contracting authority chooses the e-submission system and provides a link to it in the contract notice.

For proving non-existence of exclusion grounds and compliance with selection criteria contracting authorities demand an European Single Procurement Document – ESPD in the tender. During the procedure, the contracting authority can call on bidders to submit documents related to the statements contained in the ESPD (unless they can obtain them free of charge by directly accessing the national database of a member state).

A bid bond may be requested. If requested in the form of a bill of exchange, the same cannot be submitted in electronic form. Electronic bills of exchange do not exist in Slovenia.

The deadlines for submitting bids are stated in the published contract notice and cannot be shorter than the deadline stipulated by law for individual types of procedures (e.g. 30 days for an open procedure with electronic bid submission). The contracting authority will only accept bids that have arrived by the date and time prescribed for submitting tenders.

Bidder selection criteria

Bidders must meet the selection criteria stipulated in the tender regarding their suitability to pursue the professional activity, their economic and financial standing as well as their technical and professional ability.

The law stipulates the mandatory grounds for excluding a bidder (criminal offences and misconduct in the area of commercial and labour law, unsettled tax obligations, inclusion on the list of negative references) and optional grounds for excluding a bidder (e.g. distortion of competition, an attempt to influence the tender, start of insolvency proceedings etc.).

Participation of foreign bidders in Slovenian public contracts

Foreign bidders can participate in a Slovenian public contract independently, jointly with a Slovenian partner, or with the assistance of an advisory company specialised in public contracts.

Foreign bidders can submit a bid by themselves but, since the tender documentation is generally only available in the Slovenian language and the bid documentation must also be submitted in the Slovenian language, they must translate the tender documentation into their language, then prepare a tender and translate it back into the Slovenian language, which is time-consuming and entails additional translation costs.

Another possibility is to connect up with a local Slovenian partner to submit a joint bid. In practice, this solution is widely used, especially if the foreign bidder already has a business relationship with the Slovenian partner.

Foreign bidders usually engage a Slovenian advisory company to examine the tender documentation, prepare the bid and the pertaining documentation and submit a tender in an e-submission system on behalf of the bidder.

Bid opening

In the state-owned e-procurement information system e-JN, at the time set as the deadline bids are automatically opened in an e-system and pro forma invoices are published. After the bids have been opened, anyone can see the results of the bid opening. The law stipulates exceptional situations when the opening of a bid is not public (in a negotiated procedure without prior publication etc.).

Selection

Contracting authorities select the most advantageous offer on the basis of the award criteria described in the tender documentation. These criteria must not be discriminatory. They must have a logical connection with the subject of the public tendering procedure.

The general awarding criterion is that of the most economically advantageous bid. This means the best price/quality ratio that is assessed according to the award criteria. The criteria can include technical merit, aesthetic and functional characteristics, social, environmental and innovative characteristics, trading conditions; the organisation, qualification and experience of the staff assigned to performing the contract, where this might significantly relate to the quality of performing the contract, after-sales service and technical assistance, the delivery conditions such as the delivery date, delivery process and delivery period or period of completion.

In relatively simple public tendering procedures, the main criterion for awarding a contract is typically the lowest price.

If the contracting authority believes the price is abnormally low, it must require the bidder to explain the price or costs in the bid and, in specific cases, it may reject it.

The contracting authority is obliged to reject a bid when it establishes the requirements of environmental, social and labour legislation have not been met.

A special rule applies to public contracts in the utilities sector: where there are several equivalent bids in terms of the award criteria, the contracting authority must give priority to those bids where the share of products originating from third countries is less than 50% of the total value of products included in the bid. Bids are considered equivalent when the difference in prices does not exceed 3%.

The contracting authority must decide on the result of the tender within 90 days at the latest and publish a notice of its decision in the same manner as the public procurement was published (national portal). The decision can be appealed against by the statutory deadline. After this stand-still period, the contract is awarded to the selected bidder and the contract award notice published in the same manner as the tender (TED and/or national portal). Contracting authorities must also publish contracts and their amendments on the public procurement portal.

Challenges to tender documentation or a public procurement decision in Slovenia are regulated by the Legal Protection in Public Procurement Procedures Act. If a bidder believes the award criteria were discriminatory, that some mistakes were made during the public tender procedure or that the public procurement acts have not been respected, they may have recourse to the National Review Commission for Reviewing Public Procurement Procedures which is a public authority for supervising the lawfulness of public tendering procedures in Slovenia.

Certain limitations apply. Complaints about the content of the contract notice, the invitation to tender or the tender documentation are not allowed if the complainant could have alerted the contracting authority about the alleged infringement via the public procurement portal, but did not do so.

A request for an audit of the content of the contract notice, an invitation to tender, or a tender documentation is generally not allowed to be submitted after the deadline for the receipt of bids. A request must be filed electronically through the eRevizija portal. A link to that site is published on the Slovenian public procurement portal where the public contract is published.