Yongin City: "Paper Companies Won't Escape—Cracking Down on Public Construction Quality Decline"

[Suwon Ilbo=Reporter Park No-hoon] Yongin City announced on the 6th that it is changing the scope of "pre-emptive inspection of public construction bidders" to filter out sham contractors such as paper companies participating in construction bids issued by the city.

Some contractors with only paper-based registration requirements, such as paper companies, often win contracts at low bids despite deficient assets or technical capabilities, causing problems such as poor construction quality and wage arrears.

From May 1 through December last year, the city investigated top-ranked bidders in publicly funded construction projects with estimated prices between 20 million and 200 million won, excluding 8 contractors during the bidding process, thereby verifying the effectiveness of pre-emptive public bidding inspections in filtering out sham contractors.

Starting this month, the city has adjusted the inspection scope to cover projects with estimated prices of 80 million won or more and up to 200 million won.

In addition, along with projects issued by Yongin City Hall and its affiliated agencies, contracts issued by three district offices will be included in the scope of inspection.

The city plans to strengthen standards and increase investigative staff to conduct ongoing guidance and inspections in parallel.

A city official stated, "To raise the quality of public construction, it is necessary to ensure that sound contractors can compete fairly," and added, "We will continue to prepare supplementary measures to establish a fair competition system."