SIEA 2018 Guidelines (OPSYS) - Version 1.

2 28/01/2021

SIEA 2018 Guidelines (OPSYS version)

These Guidelines complement section 3.5.1 of the PRAG and the OPSYS Online Wiki documentation
for internal and external users and are intended mainly to provide guidance to the European
Commission users but are also made available for information to the Framework Contractors.
The only legally binding provisions are those contained in the Special Conditions of the Framework
Contract and its annexes.

Users
The Contracting Authority for each individual Specific Contract may be the European Union
represented by the European Commission, acting on behalf of Third Beneficiary Countries1

Conditions of use
There are 5 main conditions of use:

a) Operations must be:

i. in the exclusive interest of Third countries benefiting from EU external aid or
ii. in the interest of the European Commission together with Third countries benefiting
from EU external aid (mixed interest) ;
b) Operations must be financed by external aid funds (Heading IV of the MFF or EDF);
c) The maximum amount for each Specific Contract, addenda included, cannot exceed 999 999
EUR
d) The total implementation period of a Specific Contract cannot exceed 3 calendar years,
addenda included.
e) The use of the dedicated IT Tool (OPSYS) is compulsory

Procedure

1. Availability of the funds

No request for services may be issued under the FWC SIEA 2018 if funds are not available to cover
the operation. No suspension clause may be added. Specific Contracts must be preceded by a
budgetary commitment.

2. Identification of the lot

Lot 1 – Sustainable management of natural resources and resilience

Lot 2 – Infrastructure, sustainable growth and jobs
Lot 3 – Human Rights, Democracy and Peace

1
The use of the FWC by Third countries under indirect management is not possible in the current version of
OPSYS.

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Lot 4 – Human Development and safety net

Lot 5 – Budget Support
Lot 6 – Innovative financing for Development
The detailed description of the lots is available on the SIEA 2018 internet webpage.

An assignment may cover any of the sectors of Part A “Expertise common to all lots” and Part B
“List of sectors”. The list of B sectors is not exhaustive and users may call on any additional
expertise falling within the sectors defined in the title of the lot.
The expertise may be required at any stage of the project cycle except financial audits (which
are covered by a dedicated framework contract) and may cover any sector(s) within a lot. The
expertise may also cover any geographic area of the world.
For multidisciplinary assignments, the choice of lot must correspond to the most important
sector for the given assignment.

3. Request for services

The SC contracting Authority sends to the Framework Contractors the following documents:

A. Request for Service

B. Specific Terms of Reference
C. Budget Breakdown + pricing methodology
D. Evaluation Grid

A. Request for service: specifies type (Fee-based/Global Price) and the deadline for
submission of offers (min. 14 calendar below 300 000 EUR min. 30 calendar days if
300 000 EUR or above).

B. Specific Terms of Reference: the templates to be used are available on the Internet
webpage.

The project manager will indicate under which EU External Aid Instrument the specific
contract will be financed which will determine the eligible nationalities of the consortium
members and possible subcontractors.

For Fee-based: The specific Terms of Reference must stipulate the expertise required from a
team or the profiles/skill per expert. In both cases, the specific Terms of Reference must
indicate the categories of experts and related input per category (number of working days
and expertise), the timing for reports, and the normal place(s) of posting of the specific
assignment (main location(s) where the specific assignment will be implemented).

A specific contract may have several experts and each expert may have a different normal
places of posting.

There is no limit on the input per expert (under BENEF 2013 it was 260 working days)

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For Global Price: The precise time inputs of the experts will be left to the discretion of the
Framework Contractor to recommend in the specific offer2. However, the Contracting
Authority may indicate an absolute minimum input in terms of working days and/or
qualifications for one or more experts.

The project manager will define whether or not the presence of a member of the
Management Team is required for the briefing and/or debriefing session.

C. Budget breakdown + pricing methodology

This document must be completed by the Framework Contractor.

For Fee-based, the provision for incidental expenditure and the provision for expenditure
verification will not be considered in the comparison of the financial offers.

The incidental expenditure must be included in the budget breakdown by the contractor.
When the specific Terms of Reference indicate a fixed amount for the incidental expenditure
(global amount or per type of incidental expenditure), the latter must be included unchanged
in the budget breakdown by the contractor.

The financial evaluation for a global price is performed on the total contract price.

For both fee-based and global price, contractors will provide in the specific offer a Pricing
Methodology regarding the fees of each category of expert by means of a separate
document (following the template available on the website) attached to the specific financial
offer.

D. Evaluation Grid

The evaluation grid contains the details and relative weights of the technical evaluation criteria
for the offers. The Grid indicates whether or not an interview of experts will be carried out as
part of the technical evaluation and fixes the indicative dates and the position for which the
interview is envisaged.

4. Sending the request

The request for service for a Specific Contract must be encoded in OPSYS. Please refer to the
wikis3 for a step-by-step guide.

For each assignment, a request for services is sent to 3 eligible Framework Contractors for
request for services with a budget under 300 000 EUR and to 4 eligible Framework
Contractors for request for services with a budget of 300 000 EUR or more.

2
the SC Contracting Authority may choose to evaluate an expert in a global price contract (this should remain
exceptional).
3
https://webgate.ec.europa.eu/fpfis/wikis/display/RelexInternalWiki/Request+for+Service#RequestforService-
2.2PreparationoftheRequestforService

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OPSYS automatically selects the framework contractors ensuring a fair balance between
them in the consultation. This selection should not be changed, with the following
exceptions:

 A professional conflicting interest that must be duly justified and

documented.
 In case no qualitatively and/or financially satisfactory offer is received, the
Authorising Officer must cancel the procedure. He may choose, after
redrafting the specific terms of reference, to re-launch a request for services
with the same framework contractors.

The conditions determining a professional conflicting interest must be assessed at the time
of the offer. However, before sending the request for service, the project manager might
already identify a professional conflicting interest (for example if the envisaged assignment is
incompatible with a contract executed by the contractor or by any member of the
consortium). In such case, before excluding any framework contractor for a conflict of
interest the framework contractor should be duly notified and given the possibility to provide
comments on the contracting authority’s decision.

If a professional conflicting interest is found during the submission period or during the
evaluation, the same procedure should be followed. The framework contractor should be
duly notified and given the possibility to provide comments on the contracting authority’s
decision. The Project Manager may continue the procedure with the remaining Framework
Contractors.

The Project Manager submits the Request for Service to the FWCs, which will receive it via
the Funding and Tender Portal (SEDIA - Single Electronic Data Interchange Area).

The Framework Contractors contacted must send an acknowledgement of receipt and their
confirmation of the intention to submit an offer by the next working day. If the
acknowledgement is not received, the Project Manager must contact the Framework
contractor concerned.

5. Receiving the Offer: Content, validity and clarifications

5.1 Content of the Offer

Unless stated otherwise in the specific Terms of Reference, the Framework Contractor will
submit via the Funding and Tenders Portal:

A. The Financial Offer, including the Price Methodology document.

B. The methodology. The methodology will identify the consortium members involved in
the assignment and all sub-contractors with their tasks and nationalities. All must respect

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the eligibility rules of the EU External Aid Programme under which the Specific Contract
is being financed.4
C. The CVs of all the experts proposed with their statements of exclusivity and availability.
D. The data for contacting the experts in case of interview during the offer validity period.

The statement of exclusivity and availability is necessary for all experts proposed in the offer.
The statement is specific to the assignment and therefore cannot be a general overall
commitment signed prior to the Request.

The Request for Services and/or the Specific Terms of Reference may not foresee experts
to be identified and added at a later stage during the implementation period of the specific
contract.

The Contracting Authority will acknowledge the receipt of the offer.

5.2 Validity of the Offer

The Offer is valid 14 calendar days after the final date of submission for Request for Services
with a budget under 300 000 EUR and 30 calendar days for a budget of EUR 300 000 EUR or
more.

The framework contractors must be notified of the results of the evaluation within the
validity period of the offers. Notifying the results outside of the validity period of the offers
is contrary to the Global Terms of Reference of the SIEA Framework Contract.

The specific contracting authority may request a one-off extension of the validity of the
offers submitted in response to Request for Services before the original validity period has
expired. For Request for Services below 300,000 EUR, the period a validity can be extended
for maximum 14 days. For Request for Services equal or above 300,000 EUR, the period of
validity can be extended for maximum 30 days.

If one of the participating Framework Contractors does not agree with the extension of the
validity period, the Contracting Authority may proceed evaluating only the offers of those
whose validity has been extended.

5.3 Clarifications

Any of the Framework Contractors consulted may ask for clarifications during the submission
period.5 The Project Manager will answer sending the question/request for clarification and
the answer to all Framework Contractors consulted simultaneously. The deadline for
submission must be extended if a substantial change is introduced by the clarification.

4
See annex a2a of the PRAG
5
Addressing the e-mail to the functional mailbox indicated

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The Framework Contractor who raised the question should not be identified in the reply.

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6. Evaluation of the offers

6.1 Evaluators.

In case of a Request for Services of 300 000 EUR or more, the Contracting Authority formally
appoints an Evaluation Committee comprising a chairperson, a secretary and an odd number
(usually 3) of evaluators. A simplified SIEA 2018 evaluation report must be completed, signed
by the evaluators and uploaded in OPSYS - My Workplace

In case of a Request for Services below 300 000 EUR three evaluators are required. All
evaluators must sign the statement of confidentiality and impartiality.

6.2 Administrative conformity.

The following criteria of admissibility are checked:

a. The deadline for the submission has been respected
b. The offer complies with the eligibility rules of the EU External Aid programme under
which the Specific Contract is financed
c. The fee rates (expert fees + management fees) do no exceed the maximum global
fees. This applies in the case of a global price too.
d. The maximum budget is not exceeded.

Even if only one offer is received or is admissible, the evaluation process may continue with
that offer.

If the pricing methodology document is not included in the offer sent by the framework
contractor, the CA will request it by e-mail and indicate a deadline by which the document
must be provided. If the framework contractor does not provide the document by this
deadline, that particular offer shall be rejected.

6.3 Technical and Financial Evaluation

The Technical Quality of the offers is assessed following the evaluation grid. Any offer falling
short of the technical threshold of 75 points is rejected.

The other offers receive points calculated using the following formula:

Technical score = (final score of the technical offer in question/final score of the best
technical offer) x 100.

As a consequence of this formula, the best offer is always awarded 100 points.

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The Financial Evaluation

Fee-based:

The Evaluation Committee proceeds with the financial comparison of the fees (and lump
sums if applicable) between the different financial offers. The provision for incidental
expenditure and the provision for expenditure verification will not be considered in the
comparison of the financial offers.

The tender with the lowest total fees (+ lump sums if applicable) receives 100 points. The
others are points according to the following formula:

Financial score = (lowest total fees + lump sums (if applicable)/total fees + lumps sums (if
applicable) of the tender being considered) x 100.

Global price:

The total price will be considered in the comparison of the financial offers. The offer with the
lowest amount receives 100 points. The other offers receive points in accordance with the
following formula:

Financial score = (lowest offer amount/amount of the financial offer in question) x 100.

6.4 Contract

The offer that obtains the highest weighted score (80% for the technical score and 20% for
the financial score) will be awarded the Specific Contract.

6.5 Time for evaluation

The SC Contracting Authority has 14 calendar days in the case of a request for services with a
budget under 300 000 EUR or 30 calendar days for those with a budget of 300 000 EUR or
more, to evaluate and notify the results to Framework Contractors that submitted an offer.
Those periods correspond to the validity of the offer.

If the Contracting Authority does not notify within that period, the Framework Contractor is
no longer bound by his offer and may disband the team proposed.

6.6 Notification of the results.

The Project Manager notifies the successful and unsuccessful Framework Contractors.

Following this notification, the validity of the offer of the selected Framework Contractor is
extended automatically by 14 calendar days to allow for the signature of the Specific
Contract. The notification does not commit the Contracting Authority to award the Specific
Contract to the Framework Contractor selected by the evaluation committee. Expenses
incurred prior to the signature by both parties of the Specific Contract are ineligible.

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By default the Contracting Authority will provide to unsuccessful contractors:

o Their own global technical scores.

o The name of the winner

Upon request the Contracting Authority will provide to each contractor:

o their specific scores given for each element of the evaluation grid: organisation and
methodology, expert(s), rationale, strategy, etc.

The Contracting Authority will not provide:

o Any information about the other contractors’ results, characteristics and relative
advantages (only the name of the winner)
o The financial score of the other contractors
o The price of the specific contract

6.7. No qualitatively and/or financially satisfactory offer received

If, after the evaluation, there is no qualitatively and/or financially satisfactory offer received,
the relevant Authorising Officer may cancel the consultation and:

 Re-launch with different framework contractors under unchanged terms of reference

 Re-launch with the same framework contractors a request for services after
analysing/redrafting the specific terms of reference.
 Initiate a negotiated procedure with one or more framework contractors of its
choice, from among those that took part in the request for services with a view to
obtaining improved offers (the terms reference cannot be altered substantially).
 Initiate the relevant procurement procedure outside the framework contract.

6.8 Various

Regardless of the specific contract type (global price or fee-based), the evaluators’ checks
should cover inter alia:

 The per diems,

 The arithmetical calculations,
 Incidental costs / other details: these must correspond to the services set out in the
specific Terms of Reference.

The specific contract is based on the best offer. This offer cannot be negotiated. The only
corrections allowed before the signature of the specific contract are:

 Arithmetical errors,
 Per diems over the limit published on the website

Such corrections require an updated offer from the framework contractor who is not
permitted to modify any other item/element of his offer.

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If an offer proposes additional expertise not required by the specific Terms of Reference, the
evaluators may not consider it in the context of the evaluation. If this expertise is needed, a
new request should be launched.

7. Expert confirmation procedure and the specific Contract

Experts’ confirmation and replacement procedure
The SC Contracting Authority notifies all Framework Contractors simultaneously:
• The tenderer with the highest score (1st) should confirm the availability of the expert (s)
by the end of the next working day.
• If any, the next-best tenderers (2nd, 3rd, 4th) are informed that the SC Contracting
Authority reserves the right to notify them of award in case the contract cannot be
signed with the tenderer with the highest score (1st).

If availability of all experts is confirmed by the tenderer with the highest score, the Specific
Contract is signed with this tenderer and other tenderers are informed of the signature.
If the availability of any of the experts is not confirmed by the tenderer with the highest score:
• The tenderer has a maximum of 3 working days, counting from the date on which the
tenderer has informed the Contracting Authority of the unavailability of one or more
expert(s), to propose replacement expert(s). The tenderer may propose up to 3 choices
of experts’ profiles for each expert to be replaced.
• a justification for the change of the expert shall be given and the Contracting Authority
has to accept or reject it.

In case the profile(s) of the expert(s) to be replaced has/have been subject to a scoring during
the evaluation:
• The replacement expert(s) must meet the minimum requirements described in the
Specific Terms of Reference.
• The Contracting Authority will assess the profile(s) of the replacement expert(s) and
her/his/their total score(s) must be at least as high as the total score(s) of the
corresponding expert(s) to be replaced.
• The replacement expert(s) may not have been proposed as key expert(s) by any of the
other tenderers.

In case the expert(s) to be replaced has/have only been subject to a verification of compliance
with minimum requirements set in the specific Terms of Reference:
• The replacement expert(s) must meet the minimum requirements described in the
Specific Terms of Reference.
• The replacement expert(s) may not have been proposed as key expert(s) by any of the
other tenderers.

In case the expert(s) to be replaced has neither been subject to a scoring during the evaluation,
nor to a verification of compliance with minimum requirements set in the specific Terms of
Reference, the Contracting Authority shall only verify that the replacement expert(s) has/have
not been proposed as key expert(s) by any of the other tenderers.
If the replacement(s) proposed is/are accepted, the specific contract is signed and other
tenderers are informed of the signature.

The Specific Contract will enter into force on the day that it is signed by both parties. The
expenses are eligible from that day.

The Financial Offer, methodology and CVs of the experts proposed together with the Specific
Terms of Reference, form an integral part of the Specific Contract and will compose its
Annexes.

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After the signature of the Specific Contract, the unavailability of an evaluated expert may
qualify as an error which affects the Specific Contract award procedure and leads to the
termination of the Contract. The wish of a Framework Contractor to use an expert on
another project or a change of mind on the part of an expert will not be accepted as a
justification for replacement of any of the experts.

The period between sending the Specific Contract to the Framework Contractor and the start
of the implementation must be a minimum of 10 calendar days. A shorter period may be
defined if accepted by the Framework Contractor.

8. Modifications to the Specific contract

In all cases:

 Modifications cannot alter the subject matter of the specific contract and/or alter the
award conditions prevailing at the time when the specific contract was awarded;
 No increase can lead to a total contract value that exceeds 999 999 EUR;
 The total period of implementation of a specific contract cannot exceed 3 years;
 No amendment either by means of addendum or through administrative order shall
lead to decreasing the amount allocated to expenditure verification.

8.1 Addendum

Any amendment to the contract affecting its object or scope, (e.g. total contract amount,
change of the period of implementation) shall be formalised by an addendum. Both parties
may request an addendum according to the following principles:

 An addendum may be requested only during the period of execution of the specific
contract;
 Any request for an addendum shall be submitted in writing to the other party at least
30 days before the date on which the intended addendum is required to enter into
force. In case of special circumstances duly substantiated by the Contractor, the
Contracting Authority may accept a different notice period.

The requested party shall notify the requesting party of its decision concerning the request
within 30 days from its receipt. There is no automatic amendment without written
confirmation by the requested party.

a) The Contractor and the Project Manager agree on the nature and the form of the
proposed modification.

b) The Contractor submits to the Project Manager a draft amendment (addendum or

administrative order) detailing :
a) The measures required to comply with the requested modification;

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b) An updated timetable for implementation of the tasks;

c) If necessary a proposed financial adjustment to the budget of the contract,
using the contractual fee rates when the tasks are similar. When the tasks
are not similar, the contractual fee rates shall be applied when reasonable.

c) If the Project Manager decides that the amendment shall be implemented, it shall notify
the Contractor through an administrative order stating that the Contractor shall implement
the amendment at the prices and under the conditions given in the Contractor’s proposal or
as modified by the Project Manager in agreement with the Contractor.

 For fee-based contracts administrative orders that have an impact on the contractual
budget are limited to transfers within the fees, or transfers from the fees to the
Incidental Expenditures.
 For global price contracts administrative orders cannot have an impact on the
contractual budget.

8.2. Increase of the value of Specific contracts.

The value of specific contracts may be increased, during their execution period, by means of
addendum in the following cases:

A. Additional services by the original contractor that have become necessary, if

the following cumulative conditions are fulfilled:
a. They were not included in the initial procurement (i.e. not similar to
those provided for in the initial specific contract);
b. Changing contractor is unfeasible for technical reasons (e.g.
Compatibility with existing services);
c. Changing contractor would cause substantial duplication of costs for
the Contracting Authority;
d. Any increase in price, including the net cumulative value of
successive modifications, does not exceed 50% of the initial specific
contract value.

B. Modification needed because of circumstances which a diligent Contracting

Authority could not foresee, provided that any increase in price does not
exceed 50% of the initial specific contract value;

C. Where the value of the modification is below 10% of the initial specific
contract value (the net cumulative value of several successive modifications
must not exceed this threshold).

8.3 Administrative order (modification not affecting object or scope of the contract)

An administrative order may be given by the Project Manager (OIA in charge of the specific
contract). The Project Manager or the contractor may encode in OPSYS an administrative
order (that is a sub-type of addendum) which may take the form of additions, omissions,

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substitutions, changes in quality, quantity, specified sequence, method or timetable of

implementation of the services.

Examples of amendments not entailing an addendum but a written administrative order:

 Change of expert, if the new expert has at least equivalent qualifications and
experience as his predecessor;
 A modification of quantities in incidental expenditure, such as an additional
international travel, that does not entail an increase of the total budget;
 Non-substantial changes in the distribution of days worked among the experts or
planning/sequence of implementation of activities, including authorisation to work
during the weekends for a fee-based contract.

9. Various topics

LUMP SUMS
A fee-based Specific Contract may include activities paid on the basis of lump sums. If
activities paid by lump sums are required, these must be described in the Specific Terms of
Reference by the Contracting Authority and budgeted by the Contractor.

Services will be paid on the basis of the delivery of the specified outputs. Payments might be
totally or partially withheld if the contractual results have not been reached in conformity
with the specific Terms of Reference. Payments are based on the approval of the
deliverables. Partial payment has to be determined according to the partial implementation
of the outputs.

Examples of lump sums:

Studies, evaluations, organisation of events such as conferences and training sessions.

EXPERTS
The following categories of experts: Category I, II, III and administrative assistants (for the
evaluation of grant proposals) may be required.

The Specific Terms of Reference may not impose years of experience that exceed those
defined for each category; (Category I: 12 years, Category II: 6 years, Category III: 3 years).

Unless otherwise specified in the Specific Terms of Reference, knowledge of a language may
be replaced by an interpreter/translator the cost of which will be added to the total fees.

For Fee-based contracts: The Specific Terms of Reference may indicate either the
profile/skills per expert or the overall expertise required from the team; in the latter case,
the Framework Contractor is responsible for proposing a team covering all the expertise
required. In both cases the Contracting Authority must specify the input per category in

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terms of expertise and number of working days. If not specified in the Specific Terms of
Reference, the Framework Contractor will identify the Team Leader.

If any expert does not fulfil the minimum criteria, the entire offer will be rejected.

For Global price contracts:

As the purpose of the global price contract is to focus on outputs, not on inputs:

- The time inputs of the experts under a Global price are decided by the Framework
Contractor in its specific offer
- the experts are not assessed (marked with points). during the evaluation of a global
price contract

However:

The specific Contracting Authority may establish some minimum requirements in terms of
qualifications or minimum number of working days for the experts in the Terms of Reference.
In this case, compliance (yes/no answer) with the requirements will be checked, but there
will be no marks given to the expert. In exceptional cases6, there is the possibility to foresee,
within the evaluation grid, the scoring of one or more experts even in a global price. In this
case, the evaluation grid template must be adapted accordingly and the CV(s) will be
assessed and scored.

Management and Support Team

Each Framework Contractor has a Management Team composed of minimum one
permanent Project Director and one substitute. All costs of the Management Team, the
backstopping mechanism and the quality control are already included in the fee rates. No
costs of this nature may be charged in addition.

The Framework Contractor’s Project Director has the overall responsibility for the running of
the Framework Contract.

It is not permitted to propose a Management Team Member as an expert for an individual

assignment. A Management Team member may be required for the briefing/debriefing
session of an individual assignment. In that case the related costs must be budgeted in the
Specific Offer.

Location, per diems and duration

The experts’ inputs are expressed in working days. The contractual periods in calendar days.
The assignment must be clearly defined in terms of days, location and number of experts.

The Contracting Authority must clearly define, in the terms of reference under article 4, the
normal place of posting of the specific assignment. It is possible to define one main location

6
It is recommended to limit the use of this option to only when strictly necessary.

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for the complete team of experts or to have different main locations of assignment.
However, each expert may have maximum one (or in very exceptional cases two) main
location of assignment.7 The CA should also identify the additional mission locations where
the expert will be required to work and for each location indicate the working days needed.

In the normal place of posting: no per diems are paid to the experts .

(Under BENEF 2013 per diems were due per night requiring an overnight stay away of the
expert's place of residence)

Intra-city transportation costs (taxi, car rental and/or public transportation) are covered by
the fees.

Per diems will be paid only for missions i) outside the normal place of posting ii) clearly
indicated in the Terms of Reference iii) of a duration of 12 hours or more. (cumulative
conditions).

For fee-based contracts travel costs of experts related to inter-city journeys, both
international and inside the country, (on the basis of the most economically advantageous
transport possibilities) will be a reimbursable expense and this may include the travel to and
from the main location of assignment from the expert’s place of residence.

The total duration of the assignment, cannot exceed 3 years, addenda included.

(In BENEF 2013 it was 730 calendar days)

Incidental Expenditure
The Contracting Authority for both fee-based and global price contracts must identify and
describe all authorised reimbursable costs in the specific Terms of Reference.

For fee-based, the Project Manager may choose:

- to indicate a global fixed amount of incidental expenditure

- to indicate a fixed amount per type of expenditure
- not to indicate any values for the incidental expenditure

In addition, for fee-based specific contracts, the Contracting Authority may also define a
fixed global amount or indicate a fixed amount for each type of incidental expenditure.

7
Exceptionally one (or more experts) may have two normal place of posting. This is possible when the expert
must work for a long duration in different locations, for example, 6 months in Town A and 6 months in town B.

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Neither the Offer nor the related Specific Contract may contain any unidentified expense
such as a “Contingency” or a “Reserve”.

In any case, incidental expenditure is reimbursed based on the real costs incurred by the
contractor, as proven through the supporting documentation.

No supplies (e.g. equipment and material) may be purchased.

No consultancy services (experts) may be recruited under incidental expenditure or lump

sums.

If an expenditure verification report is requested, the amount shall be indicated in the

budget. The cost for specific security measures must be included under the incidental
expenditure provision.

Budget calculation
The offer needs to have a maximum budget. It is not possible to have an estimated budget.
The financial offers above the maximum budget are rejected.

The budget is calculated on the average of the maximum fees for a given category of the
Framework Contractors and for the given lot.

A budget simulation will be added in ARES, but not sent to the contractors for the
justification of the total budget of the request (including incidental expenditure and
expenditure verification report if applicable).

Fees
The Global fee rate covers, among other items:

(-) the remuneration actually paid to the expert per working day;

(-) the administrative costs of employing the expert, such as relocation and repatriation
expenses and accommodation;

[NB: the cost of the travel to and from the place of assignment is not included
in the global fees and shall be budgeted under incidentals]

(-) the expatriation allowances, taxes, leave, medical insurance and other employment
benefits accorded to the expert;

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(-) the Framework contractor’s costs of the management and support team providing
backstopping facilities for the expert;

(-) the margin, covering the Framework Contractor’s overheads and profit;

(-) the report reproduction costs (in 10 hard copies and in electronic format);

(-) the office facilities, secretariat, communication costs etc. in the home office and at the
location(s) of the assignment;

(-) the equipment for the expert (individual laptop computers, calculators etc.);

Financial Guarantee
When the pre-financing requested for a specific contract is above EUR 300 000, a pre-
financing guarantee is required. The contractor is always entitled to request a pre-financing
below 300 000 EUR, even if he is entitled to a higher amount.

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