WRITTEN QUESTION E-1663/97 by Glenys Kinnock (PSE) to the Commission (20 May 1997)

Subject: Payments under Phare and Tacis programmes

Under Article 31 of the General Regulation for Service Contracts financed from Phare/Tacis funds, the payment terms for consultancy contracts under both programmes are usually 60 days from date of invoice.

1. What percentage of invoices is currently being paid within 60 days in the following categories:

- under ECU 50 000

- ECU 50 001 - 250 000

- ECU 250 000 - 500 000

- ECU 500 001 - 1 000 000

- ECU 1 000 000

(Paid within 60 days means funds transferred to contractors bank accounts within 60 days.)

2. What percentage of invoices are paid only after 100 days or more?

3. What action can be taken by the Commission in order to ensure one hundred percent of payments are made in less than 60 days or at least within 60 days?

4. Could the Commission explain why, particularly in recent months, there appear to be a higher number of invoices not being paid?

5. Given the fact that the Commission supports SMEs, should not the terms under the General Regulations for Phare and Tacis be amended to include automatic payment of interst for late payment?

Answer given by Mr Van den Broek on behalf of the Commission (7 July 1997)

1. & 2. The requested breakdown of payments under headings B7-5000 and B7-5200 from 1 January 1997 to 10 June 1997 is given by number of transactions and cost in the tables sent directly to the Honourable Member and Parliament's Secretariat. The payment periods commence on the date the Commission receives an invoice and end on that on which the amount is debited from its bank account. In most cases it takes another two or three working days for funds to be credited to a recipient's account. It should be noted that these statistics do not distinguish between different types of financing and it is quite likely that the number of invoices settled is higher than the number of transactions (3 092) as a payment order can cover more than one invoice.

3. The new financial management structure, created within the department responsible, in the context of SEM 2000, has been given responsibility for tackling, as a priority, problems regarding payments. Action has been taken to ensure that Phare and Tacis payments are effected within the normal 60 days time limit; the effect of these measures should soon be apparent.

4. Technical reasons relating to approval of internal rules for implementation of the 1997 budget resulted in delays in the final settlement (transfer to contractors) of invoices at the beginning of the year. Once the technical difficulties were resolved in mid-March, payments proceeded normally. Owing to the fact that the invoices have now been paid, the delays have now become apparent in the statistics.

5. The Commission agreed on 10 June to the principle of payment of interest on demand after an unjustified delay of more than 60 days to creditors having a contractual relationship, which will obviously include small and medium-sized enterprises.

However, it should be understood that the relevant law on which the individual contract is based in general provides for interest payments in the case of unjustified delays.