Circular No. 17/2001/TT-BTC dated March 21, 2001 of the Ministry of Finance guiding the regime of management and use of fees for evaluation of bidding results

CIRCULAR

GUIDING THE REGIME OF MANAGEMENT AND USE OF FEES FOR EVALUATION OF BIDDING RESULTS

Pursuant to the Governments Decrees No. 87/CP of December 19, 1996 and No. 51/1998/ND-CP of July 18, 1998 detailing the responsibility division, management, elaboration, execution and final settlement of the State budget;

Pursuant to the Governments Decree No. 04/1999/ND-CP of January 30, 1999 on charges and fees belonging to the State budget;

Pursuant to the Governments Decree No. 88/1999/ND-CP of September 1, 1999 promulgating the Bidding Regulation and Decree No. 14/2000/ND-CP of May 5, 2000 amending and supplementing a number of articles of the Bidding Regulation, issued together with Decree No. 88/1999/ND-CP of September 1, 1999;

The Ministry of Finance hereby guides the management and use of fees for evaluation of bidding results as follows:

I.FEE-LIABLE OBJECTS AND COLLECTION LEVELS

1. Fee-liable objects:

a) Bidding packages for which bidding must be organized as prescribed and the bidding results must be evaluated by competent agencies and/or units. The investors or the project owners (bid solicitors) shall have to pay fees to the agencies that evaluate the bidding results.

b) The following cases shall not be subject to payment of fees for evaluation of bidding results:

- The bidding packages with their results approved by the heads of agencies which directly undertake the investment and procurement, on the basis of evaluation reports of the concerned assisting sections in such agencies;

- The bidding packages with their results approved by the Managing Boards of the Corporations (established by the Prime Minister) on the basis of evaluation reports of assisting sections under the Corporations.

2. Collection levels:

Fees for evaluation of bidding results shall be calculated into the total cost of the investment projects or the value of procured goods and represent 0.01% (one ten thousandth) of the bidding packages value, but must not exceed VND 30 (thirty) million.

The bidding-result evaluation fee shall be paid together with the submission of dossiers of application for the approval of bidding results.

II. MANAGEMENT OF FEE COLLECTION, PAYMENT AND USE

1. The bidding result-evaluating agencies:

After completing the dossiers of application for approval of bidding results, the investors or the project owners shall have to send all dossiers to the competent agencies for the latter to evaluate the bidding results before submitting them to the competent persons or competent authorities for approval.

a) The agencies responsible for the evaluation of bidding results are prescribed in Article 53 of the Bidding Regulation issued together with the Governments Decree No. 88/1999/ND-CP of September 1, 1999, and Article 1 of the Governments Decree No. 14/2000/ND-CP of May 5, 2000 amending and supplementing a number of articles of the Bidding Regulation, issued together with Decree No. 88/1999/ND-CP of September 1, 1999.

b) Particularly for bidding packages for the procurement of utensils, materials, equipment and working facilities of State agencies, armed forces units, mass organizations and State enterprises using State budget sources with the bidding results approved by the presidents of the provincial/municipal Peoples Committees, the responsibility to evaluate the bidding results shall be assigned to the provincial/municipal Finance-Pricing Services.

2. Spending contents: The State agencies assigned the task of evaluating bidding results shall be entitled to deduct 25% (twenty five percent) of the total collected amount of fees for evaluation of bidding results before remitting it to the State budget to cover expenses for the evaluation of bidding results and the fee shall be collected according to the following spending contents:

- Payment of remuneration and remuneration-related allowances to laborers hired from outside (including specialists and consultants) to carry out the collection of fees for evaluation of bidding results;

- Payment of bonuses (including overtime pay) to officials and employees who additionally undertake the evaluation as well as fee collection and remittance as extra work beyond their assigned functions and tasks according to the prescribed regime;

- Expenses for office supplies;

- Expenses for conferences and seminars with concerned agencies during the evaluation process;

- Deduction of fund to reward officials and employees, who directly perform the work of evaluation, as well as fee collection and remittance. The maximum average deduction level shall not exceed 3 (three) months paid wages for each person/year.

- Other expenses related to the evaluation work.

The above-mentioned expenses shall be made according to current financial expenditure regimes.

3. Monthly, the agencies which collect fees for evaluation of bidding results shall declare and remit to the State budget 75% of the amount of bidding-result evaluation fee actually collected in the period according to corresponding chapter, category and clause of Item 045 as prescribed in the State Budget Index.

4. The State agencies which collect fees for evaluation of bidding results shall have to issue the fee-collection receipts to fee payers strictly according to the Finance Ministry’s regulations and fully reflect such collected amounts on their accounting-book systems.

5. At the quarter- and year-end, the State agencies which collect bidding-result evaluation fee shall have to make reports on the final settlement of fee collection and spending strictly according to the State accounting regime and current financial regimes.

In cases where at the year-end, the collected amount of fees for evaluation of bidding results is not used up, it shall be remitted to the State budget.

6. The local tax bodies shall have to issue receipts of collection of fee for evaluation of bidding results, guide and inspect agencies in conducting the collection thereof.

III. IMPLEMENTATION ORGANIZATION

This Circular takes effect 15 days after its singing.

Agencies and units being payers of fees for evaluation of bidding results and concerned agencies shall have to implement this Decision.

In the course of implementation, if any difficulties and troubles arise, agencies and units are requested to promptly report them to the Ministry of Finance for study and settlement.