Uruguay's public procurement
Price flags
Contracts where the unit price departs sharply from what the state usually pays for the same item. A flag is not an accusation: it marks something worth a look.
How it is calculated
For each combination of item, currency and unit of measure, a price baseline is built from the last 36 months. Each award's unit price is then scored against that baseline using a robust measure in log space: it uses the median rather than the mean, so a huge contract cannot mask its own anomaly.
At least 10 comparable items are needed to score a price, and 30 to assign the highest severities.
There are legitimate explanations: urgent purchases, different specifications under the same catalogue code, or items misclassified at the source.
PAROXETINA (COMPRIMIDOS) comprimido
Centro Departamental de Salud Pública de Colonia · SZABO SA
No apparent explanationUnexplained62%
Paroxetina 20 mg comprimidos (SZABO) se pagó a 124,50 UYU/comprimido, ~21,7 veces el techo habitual (p95=5,74 UYU) para ese código, sin que la concentración, la presentación en blíster de 10 comprimidos ni la cantidad adjudicada (220, no una compra mínima) justifiquen una diferencia de esa magnitud.
Paid$ 125Usual range$ 4 – 6LORATADINA (COMPRIMIDO) comprimido
Centro Departamental de Salud Pública de Colonia · LABORATORIOS CELSIUS S A
No apparent explanationUnexplained55%
Precio de loratadina 10 MG en blíster estándar de 30 comprimidos, apenas por encima del techo habitual (p95=31,22 vs 33,00 pagado), sin ninguna característica especial, cantidad baja, urgencia o servicio adicional que lo justifique.
Paid$ 33Usual range$ 1 – 29