Rafaj confirmed the fine for the Industrial School in Ostrov

Brno - The chairman of the Office for the Protection of Economic Competition (ÚOHS) Petr Rafaj confirmed a fine of 300,000 CZK for the Secondary Industrial School Ostrov. The educational institution violated the law in the tender for construction work on the Technical Education Center Ostrov, Rafaj told ČTK today. According to the antimonopoly office, the tender issuer incorrectly set the conditions for evaluating bids.
    The Karlovy Vary region, as the school's founder, is now considering whether to appeal the fine to the administrative court. The director of the Ostrov industrial school, Pavel Žemlička, stated in response to ČTK that the tender was organized by a specialized company hired by the regional office. "It is such a specialized matter that I do not dare to say myself whether the conditions were set correctly. The company claims that it made no mistake," he added.
    According to the antimonopoly office, the issuer awarded points to companies based on whether their bids met a specific criterion beyond the minimum requirements, exceptionally and to the full satisfaction of the issuer, beyond the minimum requirements, exceptionally with certain reservations, or only at the level of the issuer's minimum requirements.
    It could not be clear to the companies what the school considered minimum requirements. Thus, the applicants did not have any basic standard for evaluation on which they could infer what the issuer would evaluate and what they could potentially offer as above-standard. The individual submitted offers also significantly varied in content.
    According to Rafaj, the issuer of the contract is obligated to set the conditions of the procurement process transparently. "Only with transparently set evaluation criteria can it subsequently be reviewed whether the evaluation committee acted in accordance with the established rules," Rafaj stated.
    The construction of the school began in 2009 and was completed in 2011. 370 million CZK came from the Regional Operational Program, the city contributed 20 million, and the rest was provided by the region and the cohesion council. The Technical Education Center - Secondary Industrial School in Ostrov received the title of Best Investment in the TOP INVEST 2011 competition in 2012, organized by the Association of Entrepreneurs in Construction along with the Ministries of Industry and Local Development.