Several contractors monopolise state construction projects: study

[webfact]

Several contractors monopolise state construction projects: study 
By The Nation

 

File photo: Tippatrai

 

BANGKOK: -- There is a lack of competition for government construction projects, Tippatrai Saelawong, a senior researcher at the Thailand Development Research Institute, said on Monday.

 

Five contractors had won up to 60 per cent of total projects auctioned by some state agencies, Tippatrai said. Even worse, the same few contractors were awarded projects worth 80 per cent of total project values in many provinces. He was speaking at the TDRI annual academic conference 2017.

 

Tippatrai, who conducted a study on state building projects, also found that e-bidding had saved more money for the government than e-auctions.

 

Full story: http://www.nationmultimedia.com/news/business/EconomyAndTourism/30308977

 

-- © Copyright The Nation 2017-03-14

[jaywalker]

Same thing happens in the USA.

 

To even BID on a US Federal gov't project, you need to have been in business a decade & have 97 lawyers review the contract etc. 

 

You better have a staff of at least 25+ also to get them to figure out the mountains of paperwork, just to submit the bid.

 

I used to be deeply involved in many government contracts, both US and Thai.

 

The Thai contracts were won with a brown envelope...I have seen it with my own two eyes.

 

My Thai boss once told me he wished he could pay me more, but he had to bribe too many people for that contract.

 

It's almost impossible for any small company to edge in against any big company = the same companies get the same gov't contracts forever.

 

 

[jerojero]

Same thing happens in the USA.
 
To even BID on a US Federal gov't project, you need to have been in business a decade & have 97 lawyers review the contract etc. 
 
You better have a staff of at least 25+ also to get them to figure out the mountains of paperwork, just to submit the bid.
 
I used to be deeply involved in many government contracts, both US and Thai.
 
The Thai contracts were won with a brown envelope...I have seen it with my own two eyes.
 
My Thai boss once told me he wished he could pay me more, but he had to bribe too many people for that contract.
 
It's almost impossible for any small company to edge in against any big company = the same companies get the same gov't contracts forever.
 
 

And your company name has to be Haliburton.

[whatawonderfulday]

To my knowledge some of those 5, ( but perhaps all  ), have some extremely good connections, and have had since start-up.  Which is how they got a foot on the ladder in the first place ?

[jaywalker]

7 minutes ago, jerojero said:

And your company name has to be Haliburton.

Pretty close. This was a Thai company & I helped them edge into a few Thai contracts when I was working for a US company.

 

I got lot's a wining and dining but no brown envelopes. They are a good company, but they have to PAY to get any kind of contract.

 

There were 3 US companies in the industry I was in and they were/are engraved in stone.

 

They're all HUGE, as in GM/Ford/Chrysler huge.

 

Zero chance of an outsider getting in.

 

----------

I worked for the Thai guy on a contract basis about a decade after I met him, and he just supplied parts to supplement the end product.

 

He had an office slap full of people cranking out mountains of paperwork just so he could even bid on the contract, next the brown envelopes...

 

These were military trucks, and he recently emailed me, asking if I could locate some "Factory New" parts for a truck built in 1988!

 

It's like trying to buy "Factory New" parts for a 1964 Maserati.

 

They don't exist.

 

I did find him a reconditioned parts source though.

 

[jaywalker]

25 minutes ago, jerojero said:

And your company name has to be Haliburton.

I forgot to tell you my Halliburton story.

 

I was in Kuwait, checking every new armored $100,000 truck that went to Iraq, & my boss showed up.

 

We ate at the Army mess hall, which Halliburton provided.

 

Great chow. Indians & Bangladeshi's getting maybe $1,000 a month working there.

 

My boss told me he'd heard that after Halliburton had jumped thru 19,752 (just a guess...I'm sure Cheney helped) bureaucratic hoops, it cost the US taxpayer $67 per meal to feed us, and there were around 35,000 people on that base any given day.

 

 

[robblok]

I can understand partly why there would only be 5 that get most of the big contracts.. You need to be a company of a certain size to be able to handle contracts like that. I am sure there are only a few big companies in my country that get the contracts. Its not like every small company can do the same stuff. Having said that I am sure there is a lot of corruption 

[Emster23]

Sounds more like the Russian model to me

[jaywalker]

12 minutes ago, Emster23 said:

Sounds more like the Russian model to me

No shortage of oligarchs in the USA nor Thailand...Just like Russia.

 

Same same, but only a little bit different.

 

That's what has the US media in such a "whatever-it-is-tizzy" because Trump paid for his own campaign.

 

He doesn't owe any special interest groups that "contributed" (bribed) him into office.

 

Sorry. Didn't mean to get too political, just speaking the truth.

[whatawonderfulday]

2 hours ago, jaywalker said:

I forgot to tell you my Halliburton story.

 

I was in Kuwait, checking every new armored $100,000 truck that went to Iraq, & my boss showed up.

 

We ate at the Army mess hall, which Halliburton provided.

 

Great chow. Indians & Bangladeshi's getting maybe $1,000 a month working there.

 

My boss told me he'd heard that after Halliburton had jumped thru 19,752 (just a guess...I'm sure Cheney helped) bureaucratic hoops, it cost the US taxpayer $67 per meal to feed us, and there were around 35,000 people on that base any given day.

 

 

Well it certainly helps when you have an ex CEO in your pocket.  I expect Exxon-Mobil now will similarly undergo advantageous awards, and/ or major environmental relaxations now that  Rex Tillerson is now Secretary of state

[Lupatria]

4 hours ago, webfact said:

Five contractors had won up to 60 per cent of total projects auctioned by some state agencies

...and only one person in the country would be surprised if the names of owners and share holders would be announced. 

[funandsuninbangkok]

7 minutes ago, Lupatria said:

 

Thank goodness corruption has been ended in Thailand. 

[jaywalker]

2 minutes ago, funandsuninbangkok said:

Thank goodness corruption has been ended in Thailand. 

Just like Thaksin declared a decade ago that the country was drug free!

 

BTW - I neither hate nor love Thaksin. Just saying 99.99999% of anything a gov't says is complete BS.

[mtls2005]

List the five contractors, detail the management/structure, show any links to the junta, follow the money.

 

Or don't.

[Srikcir]

1 hour ago, robblok said:

I am sure there are only a few big companies in my country that get the contracts.

And it will stay that way when the government will not allow projects to be subdivided to enable smaller companies to bid - recent train projects are a case in point where the Prayut government consolidated all the projects into one. The problem of a few major companies monopolizing projects is that there is greater potential for collusion among the few bidders themselves (ie., price fixing) and with the government (ie., kickbacks), and the government favoring companies through nepotism as is more likely to occur within big companies. 

[robblok]

Just now, Srikcir said:

And it will stay that way when the government will not allow projects to be subdivided to enable smaller companies to bid - recent train projects are a case in point where the Prayut government consolidated all the projects into one. The problem of a few major companies monopolizing projects is that there is greater potential for collusion among the few bidders themselves (ie., price fixing) and with the government (ie., kickbacks), and the government favoring companies through nepotism as is more likely to occur within big companies. 

No discussion here, totally agree... though dividing stuff up is not always a solution too because they all need to work together. A great example of what can go wrong when things are divided up is the missing link on the purple line. 

[Estrada]

35 minutes ago, Srikcir said:

And it will stay that way when the government will not allow projects to be subdivided to enable smaller companies to bid - recent train projects are a case in point where the Prayut government consolidated all the projects into one. The problem of a few major companies monopolizing projects is that there is greater potential for collusion among the few bidders themselves (ie., price fixing) and with the government (ie., kickbacks), and the government favoring companies through nepotism as is more likely to occur within big companies. 

There are a lot of contracts sub-divided by the Government, for instance, the Orange Line.

[jaywalker]

3 hours ago, mtls2005 said:

List the five contractors, detail the management/structure, show any links to the junta, follow the money.

 

Or don't.

Doing that, IE: TELLING THE TRUTH will get you arrested in Thailand.

[Redline]

4 hours ago, jaywalker said:

No shortage of oligarchs in the USA nor Thailand...Just like Russia.

 

Same same, but only a little bit different.

 

That's what has the US media in such a "whatever-it-is-tizzy" because Trump paid for his own campaign.

 

He doesn't owe any special interest groups that "contributed" (bribed) him into office.

 

Sorry. Didn't mean to get too political, just speaking the truth.

Are you saying he has never paid bribes?  I think he only pays bribes to foreigners, not Americans.

[tracker1]

And there is a contractor that makes the same mistakes on nearly every project he builds and fails to rectify it or learn from his mistake ! A wheelchair ramp with a step at each end !!!!!