Be informed and appeal in case of rejection of the tender to a public contract

Verified 01 April 2026 - Entreprendre Public Service / Directorate of Legal and Administrative Information (Prime Minister)

In order to award a public contract, the public purchaser must evaluate the offers it has received from the companies. It shall sort and note the tenders received in accordance with the criteria laid down in consultation regulation. It eliminates certain offers. Following the competitive tendering procedure, the buyer must choose the most economically advantageous tender and then inform the unsuccessful bidding companies. They then have the opportunity to seek redress.

To award a contract, the public purchaser evaluates and analyses the bids received.

Before any ranking or rating, it must rule out irregular, unacceptable or inappropriate offers.

Bids are therefore automatically eliminated without being examined in the following cases:

  • Irregular offer : incomplete offer that does not comply with the requirements set out in the consultation documents (e.g. some requested supporting documents are missing, several headings in the unit price slip are not filled in). It is also an offer that does not comply with social and environmental legislation, or with subcontracting or taxation. One abnormally low offer (OAB) may also constitute an irregular offer. This is an offer whose price is significantly undervalued compared to economic reality. The purchaser then has the obligation to request, in writing, details of the composition of this proposed price may jeopardize the proper performance of the contract.
  • Offer unacceptable : tender whose price exceeds the budgetary appropriations established for the contract before the start of the procedure. If the buyer's budget allows him to accept the offer received, he cannot reject it even if its price is much higher than the estimated amount of the contract.
  • Inappropriate offer : Offer that meets a need other than that expressed by the buyer (e.g. offer offering desktop computers while the subject of the contract is laptops)

The candidate company must therefore read carefully all consultation documents to prevent his offer from being rejected. Indeed, only the admissible tender shall be examined by the public purchaser.

FYI  

Irregular offers and offers which are unacceptable in certain procedures may be regularized.

The offer is abnormally low when the price proposed by the bidder is manifestly undervalued and does not appear to allow for proper performance of the contract. In this case, the buyer must ask him to justify the proposed price.

The justifications that may be taken into account include the following:

  • Method of manufacturing the products, methods of providing the services or construction process
  • Technical solutions adopted or exceptionally favorable conditions of the candidate to provide the products or services
  • Environmental or social regulations applicable at the place of supply

The buyer who requests clarification is obliged to seriously check the composition and quality of the offer against the justifications. After verification, the buyer rejects the offer if the candidate does not satisfactorily justify the low price or costs he has proposed. On the other hand, if the candidate has properly justified the price of the tender, it is reclassified as a tender normal.

Where the applicant company makes use of the outsourcing, the buyer must carry out a check in order to ensure, based on the subcontracted services announced, that the amount is not abnormally low. Where the amount appears to be abnormally low, the purchaser must require the holder to provide details and justifications on the amount of the subcontracted services. If, after verification, the information and justifications provided by the owner do not allow the buyer to explain the price applied, the offer will be considered abnormally low and the public purchaser must reject it.

When a company applying for a public contract submits a tender, it is sometimes ‘irregular’ or ‘unacceptable’. The public purchaser may (but is not obliged to) ask him to regularize his offer.

Regularization must not lead to changes in the substantive characteristics of tenders. It is used to correct material errors or to compensate for minor omissions. For example, a price indicated over the total duration of the contract, when it was requested on an annual basis, may give rise to regularization.

Where the public purchaser wishes to authorize the regularization of tenders, it must do so for all the applicant companies whose tender is regularizable on the basis of the principle of equal treatment of candidates.

The type of offer that can be regularized depends on the procedure.

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Adapted procedure contract (Mapa) without negotiation or tendering procedure

Only offers irregular can be regularized. This is not the case for unacceptable or inappropriate offers.

The regularization of supply must not lead to a change in the substantial characteristics of the supply. Where irregularities are clearly too large to be regularized without a significant change in supply, regularization is not possible. An offer that does not include an important document such as the technical brief cannot be regularized.

Example :

The following offers may be regularized:

  • Offers with a simple hardware error
  • Offer of which the unit price slip (BPU) mentions a cleaning product that does not comply with environmental regulations
  • Offer transmitted in paper format while transmission in electronic form is required.

Adapted procedure contract (Mapa) with negotiation, or procedure with negotiation, or competitive dialog

Inappropriate offers are eliminated. Offers irregular or unacceptable may be subject to negotiations to become regular or acceptable.

At the end of the negotiations, if certain offers are still irregular, they may be regularized at the buyer's request.

Warning  

An abnormally low offer (OAB) cannot never be regularized.

The public purchaser shall first reject irregular, unacceptable or inappropriate tenders and then classify the tenders as admissible.

After selecting the most economically advantageous tender, it informs the unsuccessful candidates of the rejection of their tender.

The information transmitted depends on the procedure:

Répondez aux questions successives et les réponses s’afficheront automatiquement

Adapted procedure contract (Mapa)

In Mapa, the buyer shall notify each applicant of the rejection of his offer.

On the other hand, in order to ascertain the reasons for the rejection of its tender, the applicant company must written request to the public purchaser.

The purchaser shall transmit the reasons for rejection of the tender within 15 days of receipt of the request. This is the final ranking and ratings given in the implementation of the judgment criteria. Simply communicating the scores obtained without explanation is not enough.

Where the offer was not inappropriate, irregular or unacceptable, the buyer must also inform the applicant company of the characteristics and advantages of the successful offer and the name of the successful candidate.

Formalized procedure

The buyer notified each candidate shall be informed of the rejection of his tender and of the reasons for that rejection.

It shall also specify the name of the successful candidate and the reasons for choosing his tender and the expected date of signature of the contract.

In addition, at the request of any candidate (also called bidder) whose rejected offer was neither irregular nor unacceptable or inappropriate, the buyer shall, within 15 days of such request, communicate the following:

  • Information on the progress and progress of negotiations or dialog, where not yet completed
  • Features and advantages of the selected offer

Notification of the rejection of an application shall give rise to the expiry of the time-limits for bringing proceedings. It is also the starting point for formalized procedures. standstill delay.

The unsuccessful candidate company is informed by the public purchaser of the the following way :

  • For public procurement below €60,000 HT, it is the operational services that inform the unsuccessful candidate by mail or by post with AR
  • Where the public contract is equal to or greater than €60,000 HT, the application file and the offer must be transmitted through a dematerialization platform called “ buyer profile ». The candidate who is not selected is informed through this buyer profile.

A candidate who considers that he or she has been unfairly ousted may challenge the rejection of his or her offer. It can exercise so-called “emergency” procedures: it can exercise a pre-contractual referral before the signature of the contract or a contractual referral after its signature.

Please note

It is recommended to approach a lawyer to refer the matter to the administrative judge even if it is not an obligation.

Before the contract is signed: pre-contractual summary

Pre-contractual interim measures allow the signature of the public contract to be automatically suspended until the administrative court has ruled. It can be filed as long as the contract is not signed. As soon as the administrative court is seized, the buyer has the obligation to suspend the signature of the contract.

Where the public contract is awarded in formalized procedure, the buyer must comply with a standstill period before the signature of the public contract. He has to wait at least 11 days between the date on which the notification was sent to the unsuccessful candidate and the date on which the contract was signed. This period is 16 days if the information was sent by paper mail.

The time limit for standstill does not apply in the following cases:

  • When the contract is awarded in Mapa procedure.
  • When the contract is awarded to the only operator who participated in the consultation.
  • For specific markets based on a dynamic purchasing system (DAS)

Once seized, the judge has 20 days to render judgment.

The powers of the pre-contractual interim relief judge are very broad. For example, it may require the reinstatement of an unsuccessful candidate, require disclosure of the reasons for rejection, order the buyer to comply with its obligations to publicize the contract, remove certain clauses from the contract, and restart the entire procedure.

After signing the contract: interim contract

The contractual referral procedure is an emergency procedure that can be exercised by an unsuccessful candidate after the signing of the contract. It punishes the most serious irregularities.

This remedy is available only in the following situations:

  • Failure to comply with advertising rules (e.g. failure to publish in the Official Journal of the European Union (OJEU) if it is mandatory)
  • Non-compliance with the waiting period between the date of notification and the signature of the contract (standstill delay)
  • Violation of the suspension of the signature of the contract following a pre-contractual interim order

The application for interim measures must be lodged in the time limits following:

  • 31 days from the publication of theaward notice for formalized procedures
  • Either 6 months after the conclusion of the contract, if no award notice has been published or if no notification of the contract has been made.

Once seized, the administrative judge has one month delay to rule.

He verifies that the failures invoked by the ousted candidate have “affected his chances of obtaining the contract”.

The judge can take one of the decisions next: suspend the performance of the contract during the duration of the proceedings, order the cancelation or termination of the contract., or a financial penalty (for example in case of breach of the standstill period).

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