Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael)
Link to this: Individually | In context

Question 151: To ask the Minister for Finance if his attention has been drawn to the fact that in tendering for debt recovery work, the Revenue Commissioners disqualify any applicant who does not already have an income of €200,000 per year from debt recovery work; and if he will access if this represents an unfair barrier to entry and result in unduly favouring incumbent providers when a more competitive bidding process should be encouraged. [29687/09]

Brian Lenihan Jnr (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context

I am informed by the Revenue Commissioners that they have entered into contracts with six firms of external solicitors to provide legal services associated with debt collection and the enforcement process. These contracts will cease, for new referrals, on 31 December 2009. Revenue is currently undertaking an open tendering process in order to select the most suitable firms of solicitors to award contracts to carry out this work commencing on 1 January 2010.

I am assured by the Revenue Commissioners that they have taken considerable care to ensure that the open tender process fully adheres to public procurement guidelines. The tender requirements do set out certain requirements on firms. The rationale for these requirements is to ensure that firms that progress to the evaluation stage in the tender process have clearly demonstrated, inter alia, their capability in terms of their track record and experience in this specific area of work and their capacity to handle large volumes of referrals, often involving complexity. It is essential that each firm that is awarded a contract will immediately be in a position to effectively and efficiently carry out both the nature and volume of work that Revenue will refer to the successful tenderers from 1 January 2010. In this context the requirement to have a debt recovery turnover of at least €200,000 per annum, on average, in the preceding three years is both reasonable and necessary.

The table below sets out the total number of referrals to the existing solicitors, the cost of their operations and the yield recovered over the last five years. This provides an indication of both the quantum of work involved and the important role of the solicitor referral process as part of Revenue's overall collection enforcement programme.