Analysts at the Accounts Chamber studied public procurement of software for government agencies for 2022–2025 and found that prices for identical products in different contracts can vary several times over. The audit covered five key categories: antivirus software, operating systems, database management systems, visualization tools, and office software.
Under comparable conditions and volumes of supply, the prices for purchased software in various government contracts can vary significantly, in some cases by two times or more.
The main reason, according to the agency, is the lack of clear requirements in the legislation for describing the subject of procurement. The wording in the documents often does not allow to accurately determine the software configuration, which opens up space for discrepancies on the part of suppliers. In addition, due to vague standards, it is impossible to automatically compare the cost in different purchases.
The Accounts Chamber concluded that the situation can only be corrected by introducing uniform requirements for the description of software in public procurement.