Riga, 19 August 2013.
After reviewing a claim submitted by SIA “Rīgas Karte”, the committee of the Public Monitoring Bureau decided to suspend tender announced by the Liepāja Municipality Council, as lobbying of SEB banka interests was detected.The decision taken by the Public Monitoring Bureau on 19 August 2013 forbade the Liepāja Municipality Council to conclude procurement contract in the negotiated procedure “On the rights to provide use of contactless payment cards” without making amendments to the invitation to negotiated procedure.
It was decided to cancel requirements prescribed in the invitation to the negotiated procedure included in the technical specification as regards application of the status of commercial secret, as well as specific requirements that include direct indications of AS “SEB banka” as service provider.
To hide the agreement between SEB banka and the City Council of Liepāja, the status of commercial secret was applied to the technical specification, although the Public Procurement Law stipulates that all procurement documentation, except for applicants’ proposals, has to be publicly available. Moreover, the text of technical specification included direct indications to SEB banka, as contractual party, and in general the specification was prepared for the needs of the specific credit institution.
As it was previously mentioned by another market participant – SIA “Transporta telemātikas sistēmas” – in order to develop the newly-established electronic payment system for trips in public transport, SEB banka was lobbying it on the state level and a year ago the electronic payment system of SEB banka was implemented in Jelgava without announcement of a specific procurement, as it could happen in Liepāja. Currently, to use the discounts in public transport provided by the municipality, pupils, as well as pensioners in Jelgava are forced to become clients of SEB banka. The benefits obtained by people as a result of the new discount policy was also doubted.
Thanks to adequate action of state institutions, the procurement was suspended and currently inhabitants of Liepāja are free to choose the credit institution. At the same time, inhabitants of other cities are exposed to the same risk.
SIA “Rīgas Karte” has expressed concern about the destructive influence of political decisions on the competition and invited cities, which plan to implement the electronic payment system for public transport, to consider carefully the basis of applicants’ proposals, as well as the range of technical functions, when selecting contractors for implementation of such systems.
Full version of decision is available at the Internet website of the Procurement Monitoring Bureau. http://www.iub.gov.lv/files/lemumi/lem327127.pdf
As is was announced earlier, in the beginning of June, in the final stage of the “European Business Awards” competition, the company “Rīgas Karte” was awarded “Ruban d’Honneur” medal as one of the Top 10 European companies in the category “Information system business with turnover under 25 million euro of the year”. 15,000 companies from 28 European countries took part in the competition. The jury award was presented to “Rīgas Karte” as the company has an original business model in the sphere of the intelligent transport systems and it is considered praiseworthy to the company for the innovative approach in the sphere of transport cards. In the majority of cases, transport cards work only as payment cards in the public transport, in Latvia “Rīgas Karte” has developed the E-ticket (E-talons) as a multi-functional card, in addition to transport function providing also availability of service at schools, institutions subordinate to municipalities and paid municipal parking lots.
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Information by SIA “Rīgas Karte”
Additional information:
Ilona Zaiceva
Telephone: 67326300
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