What is the service contract?

Well, let's break it a little and talk clearly. A services contract is basically the pact between two: the one that offers the service (the "contractor", what formal name) and the client, which in this tenders is usually the government or some public entity. The roll is simple: you do the work, they pay you - and hopefully they pay you in time, that in the public sector is sometimes another issue.

These contracts are everywhere when the government needs something that cannot be (or does not want) to do with your own people. It can be everything: from legal advice not to put the leg, people who clean the buildings, to support for computers that never work well. The variety is infinite, because if there is something that the public sector likes it is to hire others to solve their lives.

Now, the famous LCSP (the Public Sector Contract Law, which sounds like a novel but is rather legal brick) is the one that puts the rules. The key here: the important thing is the service, not the physical goods. That is, if yours is to deliver things, that is supply, but what you sell is your time, your coconut or your hands, there we already talk about services.

The contract has to make clear what service you will give, what requirements must be met, how much they will pay you (hopefully enough for the paperwork to be worth it) and how and when they pay you. They also tell you how much the contract lasts and what happens if one of the parties gets bored or does not comply.

If you are a company and want to get into this tenders, you better read the contracts well. It is not to scare, but there is a small print, deadlines to meet, quality requirements and sanctions if you get ready or late delivery. Come on, it is not to sign and forget.

By the way, a detail: the government has to do everything "transparent, competitive and without discrimination." In theory, everyone has the same opportunities, and contracts should occur following fair criteria. You know, in practice there is sometimes controversial, but the law says.

In short, service contracts are every day bread in public procurement. If you want to enter that game, study well how they work, prepare proposals that stand out and, above all, meet what you sign. That the brown then come and nobody wants to end up in the blacklist of the town hall.