What is bid-rigging?

In fact, bid-rigging is not only a mob game, but also a standard game for general companies, and there is even a standard way to play it. For example, an A is responsible for the advertisements to see the version of the business, the company requires at least three companies to find a price comparison, a A will be familiar with the B company to talk about the B company to find out the other two companies together with the offer, the other two companies offer are higher than the B company, the B company naturally won the selection. Of course, in the future, when the other two companies need Company B's help, it will be Company B's turn to help. In addition, Company B may also set up several companies specifically to "accompany the bidding", so that when someone opens a bunch of companies, it will be useful when they have to bid. (In particular, we can observe that some people have opened many companies, but all of them are operating the same kind of business, which is suspicious.) ? In general, public organizations or public utilities are required to adopt open bidding when their procurement amount reaches a certain amount, so as to avoid unfairness in the process. Since there is a policy at the top, naturally there are countermeasures at the bottom, so as in this case, the oil bidding appeared, and the result of the bidding is that only one of the pre-agreed bidder can win the bid, and other people may be able to get a share of the winning company's remuneration, or access to small packages or subcontracting opportunities. This result, of course, is the bidding company does not want to see, because if the public bidding still can not get a lower and reasonable price, bidding is not redundant and more costly? "Bid-rigging" is a typical joint venture. According to Article 14 of the Fair Trade Act (hereinafter referred to as the Fair Trade Act), "undertakings shall not be joint ventures". And Article 7 of the same law: "The joint behavior referred to in this law is the behavior of a business to determine the price or limit the quantity of goods or services, technology, products, equipment, trading objects, trading areas, etc., and to bind the business activities of the business to each other by means of a contract, an agreement, or any other form of consensual agreement." Therefore, "bid-rigging" is a kind of "joint behavior", which is prohibited by the Fair Trade Act. However, the Fair Trade Act adopted the principle of administration before judiciary after the amendment of the Act in 1988, therefore, "joint behavior" must be ordered by the central competent authority to stop, correct its behavior or take necessary corrective measures in a limited period of time, and will be subjected to substantive penalties if it still pays no attention to the matter after the expiration of the period of time. In this case, the "bid-rigging" behavior has not been notified by the central competent authority to correct its behavior, therefore, it is difficult to punish it by fair law. Currently, such cases are investigated in accordance with the Government Procurement Law. Article 87 (3) of the Government Procurement Law states: "Anyone who, with the intent to influence the final bid price or to obtain undue advantage, by contract, agreement or other means of collusion, causes a vendor not to bid or not to compete on price shall be sentenced to imprisonment for six months to not more than five years, and may be fined not more than one million New Taiwan dollars. Therefore, "bid-rigging" is currently regulated by the Government Procurement Law and not by the Fair Law. Furthermore, what is "bid-rigging"? In fact, if there is violence involved in the bidding process, it may be the act of "bid-tying", and "bid-tying" is a more serious crime than "bid-rigging". According to Article 87, Paragraph 1 of the Government Procurement Law, "Anyone who, with the intent of causing a vendor to refrain from bidding, or bidding contrary to his or her intent, or causing a vendor who has been awarded the bid to give up the award, or who has been awarded the bid, or who has been awarded the bid, subcontracts or subcontracts and who has been given the right to bid and who has been given the right to bid and who has been given the right to subcontract or subcontract by means of rape, duress, drugs, or hypnosis, shall be sentenced to imprisonment of one year to not less than seven years. shall be punished by imprisonment for not less than one year and not more than seven years and shall be liable to a fine of not more than NT$3 million." Therefore, "bid-tying" is a more serious crime than "bid-rigging", but sometimes bid-tying and bid-rigging are mixed together, both "bid-tying" and "bid-rigging", and then there is the problem of "competing laws and regulations", which is punished according to Article 55 of the Criminal Law, i.e., according to the same law, Article 87, Paragraph 1 (bid-tying). It is important to note that the Government Procurement Act only regulates the procurement of government agencies, public schools, and public utilities, and general companies handle their own tenders and are not subject to this law. If there is a bid-rigging or bid-tying, it is still necessary to solve the problem by the fairness law of "joint behavior" and the criminal law of "intimidation," "obstruction of liberty," "fraud," and other crimes.