“Moscomexpertiza” received a FAS warning
“Moscomexpertiza” received a FAS warning
The costing standards should be published timely, in full and without intermediaries
On 25 January 2016, the Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS Russia) issued a warning to “Moscomexpertiza” [Moscow Committee on Pricing Policy in Construction and State Expert Appraisal of Projects]. The Committee must eliminate elements of violating the Federal Law “On Protection of Competition”, providing full access for construction companies to costing standards.
During an unscheduled inspection in 2015, FAS revealed that “Moscomexpertiza” was publishingtheterritorial costing standards for Moscow late and not in full, therefore, complicating estimates of construction costs.
FAS also established that “Moscomexpertiza” transferredits functions for setting the costing standards to private organizations.
“Transferring the powers to devise the costing standards and the rights to publish them to private companies diminished state control and could have created serious corruption risks”, pointed out Stats-Secretary, Deputy Head of FAS Andrey Tsarikovsky. “To find out about the costing standards, construction companies had to approach a lot of organizations, although the costing standards should be publically available and must be published in full on the web-site of “Moscomexpertiza””.
At the moment, FAS has postponed the case against “Moscomexpertiza”. It will be continued, factoring in the actions to be undertaken by “Moscomexpertiza” to execute the warning.
Reference:
The case against “Moscomexpertiza”was opened upon elements of violating Part 1 Article 15 of No.135-FZ Federal Law “On Protection of Competition”.
An excerpt from the Law:”Federal executive bodies, the authorities of the constituent territories of the Russian Federation, local self-government bodies, other bodies or organizations exercising the functions of the above bodies, involved in rendering state or municipal services as well as state extra-budgetary funds, the Central Bank of the Russian Federation prohibits to pass acts and (or) exercise actions (omissions) that lead or can lead to preventing, restricting, eliminating competition, except cases of adopting acts and (or) exercising such actions (omissions) provided for by the federal laws”.