An economic entity may not be allowed to participate in the public procurement tender in case when it has a small financial liability. An economic entity operating in Lori marz of the RA reported this through Bizprotect website.

“Economic entities make a statement before participating in the public procurement tender informing that they have no obligation to the state, but for technical reasons if they have a liability of only 70 drams, it is considered to be false and are deprived of the opportunity to participate in the competition and in addition a fine is imposed. Such regulations hinder the development of business. We suggest that exclusions be made for minor deviations,” the economic entity wrote.

It should be noted that on 7 July, the RA Law on Whistleblowing System was adopted. The law envisages the creation of an anonymous information platform in 2018. However, within the framework of the “Evidence-based Advocacy for Reform” project, Bizprotect.am website has already been created. This is a platform to tackle any issues, risks and problems that hinder the business sector, including corruption. The website also provides opportunity to inform about a problem anonymously. Relevant steps are taken to verify the authenticity of these reports and to provide solutions.

Mariam Zadoyan, the Project Lawyer said that she had sent a note on this issue to the Ministry of Finance. Deputy Minister Armen Hayrapetyan replied, that this issue has been resolved by the new Law on Procurement, which came into force on 25 April of this year. Particularly, Article 6, paragraph 1, subparagraph 2 of the law provides that persons who have up to at least one percent of overdue liabilities, but no more than 50,000 AMD, of taxable revenues controlled by the tax authority, of the submitted price offer as of the date of submission of the application, have no right to participate in procurement procedures.

According to Government Decision 526-N of 4 May 2017, the fact that the tender participant has overdue tax liabilities is checked by the SRC.

“Please note that if the first placeholder, according to the information provided by the State Revenue Committee, as of the filing date, has no overdue liabilities of taxable revenues controlled by the tax authority, over the above-mentioned thresholds, then the latter is not deprived of further participation in the procurement process,” Deputy Minister Armen Hayrapetyan answered.