Krajowa Izba Odwoławcza (KIO) — Poland's procurement appeals chamber

The Krajowa Izba Odwoławcza is the body that hears appeals against the decisions of Polish contracting authorities. An appeal — odwołanie — must be filed within days, not weeks, and carries a fee of between 7 500 zł and 20 000 zł payable up front. If the Chamber rules against you, a further complaint lies to the Warsaw regional court sitting as the procurement court, within 14 days.

What the Chamber does

The Krajowa Izba Odwoławcza, universally KIO, hears appeals in Polish public procurement. It publishes its hearing list (wokanda) and its case law (orzecznictwo), and provides model forms for parties. Its rulings are the working body of interpretation for the Act — Polish practitioners argue from KIO decisions the way common-law practitioners argue from cases.

Who can appeal, and against what

Art. 505 ust. 1 opens the remedies to a contractor, a contest participant, or another entity that has or had an interest in obtaining the contract or the prize and has suffered or may suffer damage as a result of the contracting authority's breach of the Act. Both limbs are required. Art. 505 ust. 2 extends standing in relation to notices and procurement documents to listed organisations and to the Ombudsman for small and medium-sized enterprises. Art. 505 ust. 1a restricts remedies for entities from third countries not covered by the relevant international agreements.

Art. 513 defines what can be challenged: an act of the contracting authority in the procedure that is inconsistent with the Act; the omission of an act the authority was obliged to take; and the failure to run a procurement procedure at all where the authority was obliged to run one. That third limb is how an unlawful direct award is attacked.

Deadlines

Art. 515 sets them, and they are short.

For contracts at or above the EU thresholds: 10 days from transmission of the information, where it was transmitted by electronic means, and 15 days where another method was used. For the content of the notice or the procurement documents: 10 days from publication.

For contracts below the EU thresholds: 5 days and 10 days respectively, and 5 days from publication of the notice for its content.

For other circumstances, the period runs from the day the appellant knew or, exercising due care, could have known of the facts giving grounds — 10 days above the thresholds, 5 below. Longer windows apply where the required notices were never published, running to 15 or 30 days from OJEU publication, or to one month or six months from contract conclusion depending on which publication failed.

The practical consequence: if you receive a rejection or an award notification by email in a below-threshold tender, you have five days. Decide fast.

The wpis

The filing fee is set by the Rozporządzenie Prezesa Rady Ministrów z dnia 30 grudnia 2020 r. w sprawie szczegółowych rodzajów kosztów postępowania odwoławczego, ich rozliczania oraz wysokości i sposobu pobierania wpisu od odwołania (Dz.U. 2020 poz. 2437).

Supplies, services and contests below the EU thresholds: 7 500 zł
Supplies, services and contests at or above the EU thresholds: 15 000 zł
Works below the EU thresholds: 10 000 zł
Works at or above the EU thresholds: 20 000 zł
Social and special services: 7 500 zł in the art. 359 pkt 2 case, 15 000 zł in the art. 359 pkt 1 case
Appeals against the failure to run a procedure: 7 500 zł for supplies, services or a contest; 10 000 zł for works

UZP publishes the payment account: NBP 60 1010 1010 0081 3622 3100 0000, IBAN PL 60 1010 1010 0081 3622 3100 0000, SWIFT NBPLPLPW. The same regulation governs how the costs of the proceeding are settled between the parties.

Note the structure: the fee depends on whether the contract is above or below the EU thresholds and on whether it is works or not. You need to know the estimated value before you can pay the right amount, and paying the wrong amount is a formal defect.

How fast it moves, and what comes after

Art. 544 provides that the Chamber examines the appeal within 15 days of its delivery to the President of the Chamber, with the period starting again where the appeal has to be formally corrected under art. 518. By the standards of litigation this is extremely quick, which is the point — procurement disputes have to resolve before the market moves on.

Art. 580 gives the onward route. A complaint (skarga) against a ruling of the Chamber goes to the Sąd Okręgowy w Warszawie sitting as the procurement court, within 14 days of service of the ruling, filed through the President of the Chamber, who forwards it with the case file to the court within 7 days.

The Chamber's own pages flag procedural changes taking effect on 13 March 2026 covering technical standards for remote hearings and the rules for electronic correspondence in proceedings. Check those before filing.

What to do about it

Diarise the deadline the moment you receive any adverse communication, and diarise it as five days unless you have confirmed the contract is at or above the EU threshold. Establish the estimated value early, because it fixes both your deadline and your fee. Budget the wpis as a real cost of a serious bid in this market. And read KIO's published rulings on the issue you are contemplating — the Chamber's case law tells you, better than any commentary, whether your argument has ever worked.

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