Tambov OFAS obligated the Regional Construction Department to ensure access to the regional construction standards

Following FAS instructions, Tambov OFASinspected whether all interested persons have access to the regional costing standards applied to determine the estimated costs of on-budget construction.

As part of the inspection, the staff of the antimonopoly body analyzed a web-site of the Tambov Department for Construction and Investments. It was established that being an authorized executive body for pricing and construction, Tambov Department published the approved Tambov regional costing standards without an option to search and copy certain pieces of texts.

Putting the costing standards with restriction on the free use prevents companies’ access to the markets of developing and selling computer costing programs and design-and-estimate documentation of the Tambov region.

On the basis of the inspection, Tambov OFASissued a warning to theTambov Department for Construction and Investments to eliminate the antimonopoly violation by publishing the regional costing standards on the official web-site of the Department without restricted functions for searching and copying certain pieces of texts.

Issuing a warning is a mandatory stage in the course of exposing signs of violating Article 15 of the Federal Law “On Protection of Competition” (violations by the authorities). If the Department fails to execute the warning, FAS shall open a case on breaching the antimonopoly law.

“FAS continues its efforts on exposing and suppressing antimonopoly violations to provide access to the costing standards.  The antimonopoly remedies, in particular, issuing warnings to the specialized regional executive bodies to eliminate violations when publishing the standards will make the markets for developing and selling costing software and design-and-estimate documentation open and competitive”, pointed out the Head of FAS Anti-Cartel Department, Andrey Tenishev.

In August 2015 FAS found that Gosstroi [the Federal Agency for Construction and Housing & Utilities Sector], the Ministry of Economic Development of the Russian Federation, the Ministry of Construction, the “Federal Pricing Centre for Construction and Construction Materials Industry” Federal Autonomous Institution (“FTsTsS”), “Gosstoismeta” Ltd., the “National Association for Estimated Pricing and Cost Engineering” Non-Profit Organization (“NASI”), “Stroiinformizdat” Ltd. and “Gosnormativ” Ltd. violated Article16 of the Federal Law “On Protection of Competition”. Then FAS instructed its regional bodies to carry out investigations on the markets of developing and selling software to create construction costing documentation, developing and selling construction design-and-estimate documentation in the regions.