Poland fines seven grid contractors PLN 13.5m for rigging PGE Dystrybucja auctions

Poland's competition authority has fined seven grid contractors a total of more than PLN 13.5 million for rigging 11 electronic auctions run by PGE Dystrybucja for building and upgrading grid infrastructure. The decision, announced on 29 September by the President of the Office of Competition and Consumer Protection (UOKiK), found that the bidders agreed among themselves who would win rather than competing on price, according to the authority's statement.

A week later, from 7 to 8 October, UOKiK hosted workshops with the OECD and the European Commission for contracting authorities and law enforcement bodies on how to detect and prevent bid rigging, followed on 9 October by a session for judges and adjudicators of the National Appeals Chamber, the authority said.

Two agreements, eleven tenders

The first agreement concerned a tender to upgrade the Garwolin to Żelechów 15 kV medium-voltage grid. EnergoTech of Lublin, Przedsiębiorstwo Techniczno-Usługowe Elektra of Lublin and Przedsiębiorstwo Handlowo-Usługowe Kurpiewski of Łomża agreed that the contract would go to Kurpiewski, while the consortium of Elektra and EnergoTech was to "stay out of the way" and not lower its price, according to the decision summary. In return, as one recorded conversation put it, "the bread would be returned". Fines in that case total PLN 3,419,938.78, including PLN 2,081,814.87 for Kurpiewski.

The second set of tenders concerned radio-controlled switching points. EnergoTech, ZPUE of Włoszczowa, Elektra, Ekto of Zaścianki, Elmo of Żelków-Kolonia and Przedsiębiorstwo Wielobranżowe Farad of Józefów agreed by phone who would win each auction, UOKiK said. One participant asked a competitor "not to go for ice cream tomorrow", which the parties understood to mean not submitting further bids, and the others agreed to appear to compete on price at most, so as not to threaten ZPUE's leading position. In another tender the participants suggested raising prices "by five each" over their bids in the previous round, which they considered too low against the contracting authority's budget, and agreed that a company allocated a contract would refrain from bidding for later ones, the statement says.

Fines in the switching-point tenders total PLN 10,176,777.57, of which ZPUE's is PLN 7,642,588.80. The other fines are PLN 463,074.43 for EnergoTech, PLN 460,440.13 for Elektra, PLN 302,358.71 for Ekto, PLN 605,265.70 for Elmo and PLN 703,049.80 for Farad, according to UOKiK. The decision is not final and the companies may appeal to the court.

The contractor in each case was supposed to be chosen on the basis of the best bid in an electronic auction, the authority noted. The recorded conversations show how an auction format designed to drive prices down can be neutralised when the bidders talk to each other beforehand.

Prevention through tender design

The October workshops, titled "Combating bid rigging in public procurement: improving compliance and enhancing competition", brought together experts from UOKiK, the OECD, the Commission's competition directorate and Poland's Public Procurement Office, with representatives of competition authorities from the Czech Republic, France, Ireland, Latvia and Portugal, according to the authority. Participants worked through cases using OECD tools such as checklists for indicators of collusion, looked at how the preparation of a tender can reduce the risk of collusion, and covered the rules for excluding contractors from proceedings and how to report suspected collusion to the competition authority.

The workshops were part of a project to strengthen the detection of and reporting on bid rigging in the Czech Republic, France, Ireland, Latvia, Poland and Portugal, run with the OECD and the European Commission, and described on the OECD's project page.

The PGE Dystrybucja case is one of several procurement investigations on the authority's books. Its decision page links earlier tender-collusion cases, including charges against four businesses over gas meter supplies, announced on 2 October 2025, and allegations of tender collusion over city buses in the Silesian agglomeration, announced on 16 June 2025, according to the UOKiK page.

For procurement officials in emerging markets that run electronic reverse auctions, the case shows the limits of the format on its own. The same small group of regional bidders meeting repeatedly across tenders is the setting in which the parties in this case allocated contracts and agreed to step back in turn.