The general award criterion applicable to all public procurement procedures is the "most economically advantageous tender". In the tender specifications, the contracting authority can define in three possible ways what it deems to be economically most advantageous for the intended procurement:

• first, a contract can be awarded on the basis of the exclusive criterion of the lowest price;
• secondly, a contract can be awarded on the basis of the lowest costs, taking into account the cost-effectiveness such as the lifecycle costs; this is broader than the price-criterion and encompasses also other economic costs related to the procurement, for example usage costs such as energy, maintenance costs, transport costs, removal costs, as well as pollution and recycling costs;
• thirdly, a contract can be awarded on the basis of the best price-quality ratio; this shall be assessed by the contracting authority on the basis of sub-criteria such as functional quality, design, organisation, delivery, accessibility or after-sales services.

Sub-criteria defining cost-effectiveness or price-quality ratio need to relate to the subject matter of the contract at stake. They may not result in an unlimited freedom of choice for the contracting authority and need to be accompanied by specifications that allow the information in the tenders to be effectively evaluated.

For contracts with an estimated value equal to or above the European thresholds, contracting authorities have to specify the relative weight which they give to each of the identified sub-criteria. When this is not possible, the sub-criteria need to be ranked in order of decreasing importance. Below these thresholds, this is not required. Consequentially, if the sub-criteria have not been weighted or ranked, they are presumed to each have similar value.

Yes. If a price appears to be abnormally low or abnormally high, the contracting authority must to request a written clarification from the relevant bidder. If the contracting authority considers that the clarification given does not offer a satisfactory economic explanation, it must reject the tender. Otherwise, the tender can continue to be taken into consideration in the procurement procedure but the contracting authority needs to motivate in the award decision why the offered bid price of the concerned tender is not abnormal.

Unless specified differently in the procurement documents, the above obligations are not applicable in the competitive negotiated procedure, the simplified negotiated procedure with prior publication nor in the negotiated procedure without prior publication for supplies or services contracts below the European thresholds or for works contracts with a value of less than EUR 500,000.

Yes. In the regulation, additional alternative bids are called "variants". Variants can be requested or authorized in the procurement documents, which then need to state the applicable minimum requirements and how they need to be submitted. Variants which have not been explicitly requested or authorized by the contracting authority, are only allowed for contracts below the European thresholds.