Changes to Threshold for Solicitation of Bids

Procurement Bulletin 2019-6
Category: Contract
June 2019

The Governor in Council recently approved changes to the Government Contracts Regulations (GCRs). Changes are in line with the Federal Government’s commitment to a more modern approach to comptrollership and procurement and came into effect on June 10, 2019 as part of Phase 1 of the TBS Policy Reset.

Changes of interest for ESDC include:

  • The $25,000 threshold for soliciting bids for services and construction contracts was increased to $40,000 (including all costs and taxes). The objective is to update the threshold for inflation since 1996, when the threshold was last amended. The threshold for goods contracts was not increased, to remain consistent with the Canadian Free Trade Agreement (i.e. it is still $25,000 including all costs and taxes).
  • The definitions of a goods contract and a services contract were amended to identify printing as a service instead of a good.

Any contracts above these amounts must be competed, unless one of the other GCR exceptions apply. Continue to discuss procurement strategy and plan with the procurement specialist assigned to your file to ensure that ESDC respects the GCRs and other policy obligations.

This is in line with the policy suite reset changes to the departmental basic contracting limits, former public servants and accessibility announced in Procurement Bulletin 2019-3.

The Procurement Roadmap found on iService has been updated to reflect these changes as follows:

  1. Phase 1 “Procurement Strategy “, sections 1.1.3 “Full Solicitation” and 1.1.4 “Sole Source Contract” (reflecting revised relevant departmental basic contracting limits).
  2. Phase 2 “Requirement Definition” (insertion of the accessibility requirements).
  3. Phase 3 “Acquisition”, section 3.9 “Contracting with Former Public Servants” (aligning with revised requirements related to this type of contract).

For more information

Questions and comments of a general nature related to the contents of this bulletin can be sent to the Asset Management Policy and Procurement (AMPP) team by email at NC-PURCHASING_PORTAL-PORTAIL_D'ACHATS-GD.

Distribution:

  1. Directors General
  2. Directors of BMS/RMS
  3. Procurement Business Reference Network
  4. Requisitioners
  5. ESDC Procurement Team