Voorbereidende studies en documenten (Colombia)
De estudios y documentos previos zijn het verargumentatiedossier dat een Colombiaanse aanbestedende dienst moet opstellen voordat zij een Proceso de Contratación opent: waarom zij het nodig heeft, wat het waard is, welke modaliteit van toepassing is en waarom, hoe de aanbieding wordt beoordeeld, en of een handelsverdrag op het proces van toepassing is. Ze zijn gedurende het gehele Proceso de Contratación openbaar en vormen het vroegste en meest nuttige document dat een inschrijver kan raadplegen.
What they are
Article 2.2.1.1.2.1.1 of Decreto 1082 de 2015, as replaced by article 1 of Decreto 399 de 2021, defines them precisely: the estudios y documentos previos are the support for drafting the draft pliegos, the pliegos de condiciones and the contract. They must remain available to the public throughout the Proceso de Contratación.
The duty behind them sits in Ley 80 de 1993. Numeral 12 of article 25, as amended by article 87 of Ley 1474 de 2011, requires that before opening a selection process — or before signing the contract where the modality is contratación directa — the studies, designs and projects required, and the pliegos, must be prepared. Where the object includes works, the entity must hold studies and designs establishing the project's viability and its social, economic and environmental impact, and that applies even where the contract itself includes design.
The eight things they must contain
Article 2.2.1.1.2.1.1 lists them:
1. The description of the need the entity intends to satisfy.
2. The object to be contracted, with specifications, and the authorisations, permits and licences required to perform it — plus the technical documents where the contract covers design and construction.
3. The selection modality and its justification, including the legal grounds.
4. The estimated value of the contract and its justification. Where value is set by unit prices, the entity must show how it calculated them. In concessions it need not publish the financial model.
5. The criteria for selecting the most favourable offer.
6. The risk analysis and how risks will be mitigated.
7. The guarantees the entity contemplates requiring.
8. A statement of whether the process is covered by a trade agreement.
The article expressly does not apply to mínima cuantía.
An oddity worth knowing
Colombia Compra Eficiente's public glossary runs to 98 headwords, and "estudios y documentos previos" is not one of them. The phrase appears only inside another entry — Documentos del Proceso, which the agency defines as: "(a) the estudios y documentos previos; (b) the aviso de convocatoria; (c) the pliegos de condiciones or the invitation; (d) the Adendas; (e) the offer; (f) the evaluation report; (g) the contract; and any other document issued by the State Entity during the Proceso de Contratación."
So the most decision-relevant document in a Colombian procurement is enumerated but never defined by the regulator's own glossary. If you are searching official sources for it, search the decree, not the glossary.
When they are not public
Two exceptions matter. Article 2.2.1.2.1.4.3 of Decreto 1082 provides that the estudios y documentos previos prepared for certain direct-contracting processes are not public. And article 2.2.1.2.1.4.2 provides that where the ground for direct contracting is urgencia manifiesta, the administrative act declaring it serves as the act of justification, and the entity is not obliged to prepare estudios y documentos previos at all.
Otherwise they are public, and the regulation tells you where to find them. The acto administrativo de apertura must state the physical or electronic place at which the pliegos and the estudios y documentos previos may be consulted (article 2.2.1.1.2.1.5). So must the act justifying a direct contract (article 2.2.1.2.1.4.1). In a SECOP II process, they sit with the rest of the Documentos del Proceso, publishable within three days of issue under article 2.2.1.1.1.7.1.
How to use them
Read item 3 first. The modality and its legal grounds determine everything downstream: the deadlines, whether price is scored at all, whether the RUP is required, and whether the national-industry points apply. If the justification looks thin — a selección abreviada dressed as a uniform-goods purchase for something plainly bespoke — that is the objection to raise, and the moment to raise it is during the draft-pliego comment window, which runs ten business days in a licitación pública and five in a selección abreviada or concurso de méritos.
Read item 4 next. The estimated value and the method used to reach it tell you whether the budget is realistic before you commit bid costs, and unit-price workings expose where the entity's own assumptions differ from yours.
Read item 8 if you are a foreign bidder. Whether the process is covered by a trade agreement is the flag that determines your entitlement to national treatment and to the minimum offer-preparation periods the agreements impose. Item 5, the criteria for the most favourable offer, then tells you what you are actually being scored on before the pliego formalises it.
Finally, treat the dossier as an early-warning system. It exists before the draft pliego, which exists before the call. A bidder reading estudios previos as they are published is working weeks ahead of one waiting for a notice.
Related terms
- Decreto 1082 de 2015: Colombiaans aanbestedingen
- Selectiemodaliteiten — Colombia's vijf procedures
- Ley 80 de 1993 — Colombia contractenwet
- Aanbestedingsdocumenten
- SECOP II versus SECOP I (Colombia)
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