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The submission period is too short. The submission period starts with contracting documents being available to potential suppliers and ends with the submission deadline for expressions of interest or bids.

Methodology

For each contracting process, the submission period is calculated as:
(/tender/tenderPeriod/endDate - /tender/tenderPeriod/startDate) in whole days
A contracting process is flagged if the submission period is shorter than the threshold of 15 whole days.
Example: The National Rail Service publishes a tender notice on March 15 with a submission deadline of March 20. The submission period is 5 days, which is less than the default threshold of 15 days, so this contracting process would be flagged.
Why is this a red flag?A corrupt buyer can give the pre-determined bidder an unfair advantage by privately informing the pre-determined bidder of the opportunity in advance, and by giving other bidders less time to prepare competitive bids.

Output

The indicator’s value is always 1.0 when a contracting process is flagged.

Configuration

All configuration is optional.
threshold
integer
default:"15"
The minimum number of whole days required for the submission period. Contracting processes with shorter periods are flagged.Add to your settings file:
[R003]
threshold = 15
procurement_method_details
object
Set different thresholds based on procurement method details (/tender/procurementMethodDetails). Useful for aligning with jurisdiction-specific legislation.Add a [R003.procurement_method_details] section where property names are /tender/procurementMethodDetails values:
[R003.procurement_method_details]
Cotización = 7
Licitación = 10
Licitación de Seguros = 10
procurement_methods
string
Calculate this indicator only for specific procurement methods (/tender/procurementMethod). Provide as a pipe-separated list.
[R003]
procurement_methods = open|selective|limited

Example Output

Input (OCDS JSONL):
{"ocid": "ocds-213czf-000-00001", "tender": {"tenderPeriod": {"startDate": "2024-03-01T00:00:00Z", "endDate": "2024-03-06T23:59:59Z"}}}
Command:
ocdscardinal indicators --settings settings.ini --no-meta data.jsonl
Output:
{"OCID":{"ocds-213czf-000-00001":{"R003":1.0}}}

Implementation Details

From src/indicators/r003.rs:27-49: The indicator:
  1. Checks if the tender has a tenderPeriod with both startDate and endDate
  2. Calculates the duration in whole days using num_days()
  3. Determines the applicable threshold (custom per procurement method details, or default)
  4. Flags the process if duration < threshold
  5. Only processes tenders matching configured procurement methods (if specified)