New Hes­s­ian Pub­lic Pro­cure­ment and Col­lec­tive Bar­gain­ing Act: What is chang­ing and what is impor­tant

On March 9, 2026, the Hes­s­ian state gov­ern­ment sub­mit­ted the draft amend­ment to the Hes­s­ian Pub­lic Pro­cure­ment and Col­lec­tive Bar­gain­ing Act (HVTG) to the state par­lia­ment. The cab­i­net approved the draft on the same day. The reform is based on the coali­tion agree­ment between the CDU and SPD and pur­sues two clear­ly defined goals: Reduc­ing bureau­cra­cy through sig­nif­i­cant­ly high­er val­ue lim­its on the one hand, and stricter com­pli­ance with col­lec­tive agree­ments through new con­trol mech­a­nisms on the oth­er. The explana­to­ry mem­o­ran­dum to the law states unequiv­o­cal­ly that the cur­rent law from 2021 no longer meets the require­ments of a mod­ern state.

The bill was dis­cussed in the first read­ing in the state par­lia­ment. Many details will be reg­u­lat­ed by sub­se­quent ordi­nances.

Scope of appli­ca­tion: New val­ue lim­its

One of the most sig­nif­i­cant changes con­cerns the mate­r­i­al scope of appli­ca­tion. Pre­vi­ous­ly, the HVTG applied uni­form­ly to all types of ser­vices above a con­tract val­ue of EUR 10,000. In future, thresh­olds spe­cif­ic to the type of ser­vice will apply:

• Sup­plies and ser­vices: from 100,000 euros (net)
• Con­struc­tion ser­vices: from 750,000 euros (net)

By way of dero­ga­tion, a low­er thresh­old of EUR 20,000 (net) applies to col­lec­tive bar­gain­ing and min­i­mum wage oblig­a­tions as well as the new mon­i­tor­ing and sanc­tion options. This reg­u­la­tion also applies to legal enti­ties under pri­vate law with­in the mean­ing of Sec­tion 99 No. 2 GWB — i.e., for exam­ple, munic­i­pal util­i­ty com­pa­nies, inso­far as they pro­cure out­side of their sec­tor activ­i­ty.

Col­lec­tive bar­gain­ing: Con­sti­tu­tive oblig­a­tion instead of mere dec­la­ra­tion

The exist­ing col­lec­tive bar­gain­ing regime will be tight­ened con­sid­er­ably. The HVTG 2026 autho­rizes the respon­si­ble min­istry to issue bind­ing sec­tor-spe­cif­ic min­i­mum wages based on sec­toral col­lec­tive agree­ments by means of a statu­to­ry order. These ordi­nances are to be reviewed every two years to ensure they are up to date.

For areas in which no such ordi­nance is issued, the pre­vi­ous col­lec­tive bar­gain­ing regime con­tin­ues to apply: con­trac­tors must then at least ful­fill the con­di­tions of the Min­i­mum Wage Act and gen­er­al­ly bind­ing col­lec­tive agree­ments. The oblig­a­tion to com­ply with col­lec­tive agree­ments also express­ly extends to all sub­con­trac­tors and rental com­pa­nies.

New pre­qual­i­fi­ca­tion tar­iff for con­struc­tion ser­vices

A new instru­ment is the so-called pre­qual­i­fi­ca­tion tar­iff (Sec­tion 10 HVTG‑E). In future, bid­ders and appli­cants will no longer have to prove their com­pli­ance with the tar­iff for con­struc­tion ser­vices indi­vid­u­al­ly for each ten­der, but rather by reg­is­ter­ing in a pre­qual­i­fi­ca­tion list tar­iff with the Vere­in für Präqual­i­fika­tion von Bau­un­ternehmen e.V. (Asso­ci­a­tion for the Pre­qual­i­fi­ca­tion of Con­struc­tion Com­pa­nies) or a com­pa­ra­ble body. The reg­is­tra­tion must not be old­er than three years.

The pre­qual­i­fi­ca­tion tar­iff is inde­pen­dent of the exist­ing suit­abil­i­ty pre­qual­i­fi­ca­tion pro­ce­dure and must be com­plet­ed sep­a­rate­ly by each poten­tial bid­der. Proof must already be pro­vid­ed when sub­mit­ting a request to par­tic­i­pate or when sub­mit­ting a ten­der.

The dec­la­ra­tion of com­mit­ment in text form remains valid for the award­ing of sup­ply and ser­vice con­tracts.

This does not apply to work­shops for peo­ple with dis­abil­i­ties, inclu­sive busi­ness­es, rec­og­nized work­shops for the blind and pris­ons — they are auto­mat­i­cal­ly pre­qual­i­fied.

A tran­si­tion­al peri­od applies for the first six months after entry into force: dur­ing this time, the oblig­a­tion to com­ply with col­lec­tive agree­ments for con­struc­tion ser­vices can still be ful­filled alter­na­tive­ly by means of a dec­la­ra­tion of com­mit­ment or pre­qual­i­fi­ca­tion that has already been com­plet­ed.

Pro­cure­ment pro­ce­dures: More flex­i­bil­i­ty below the EU thresh­olds

Pre­vi­ous­ly, the choice of award pro­ce­dure in the HVTG was linked to cer­tain con­tract val­ue cor­ri­dors. This oblig­a­tion will no longer apply in future. Below the EU thresh­olds, pub­lic con­tract­ing author­i­ties can choose between the stan­dard pro­ce­dures (pub­lic invi­ta­tion to ten­der, restrict­ed invi­ta­tion to ten­der with a call for com­pe­ti­tion), restrict­ed invi­ta­tion to ten­der with­out a call for com­pe­ti­tion, direct award and nego­ti­at­ed award. The spe­cif­ic scope of the com­pe­ti­tion to be estab­lished is still based on the UVgO and the VOB/A in the ver­sion applic­a­ble in Hesse.

Best bid­der prin­ci­ple

The best bid­der prin­ci­ple is new­ly intro­duced (Sec­tion 16 HVTG‑E). In future, manda­to­ry dec­la­ra­tions and evi­dence — with the excep­tion of tar­iff pre­qual­i­fi­ca­tion and dec­la­ra­tions of com­mit­ment — must only be request­ed from the poten­tial suc­cess­ful bid­der. The con­tract­ing author­i­ty sets a dead­line of up to sev­en cal­en­dar days for this. If the doc­u­ments are not received by the dead­line, the ten­der will be exclud­ed and the next high­est ranked bid­der will be invit­ed.

If bid­ders already sub­mit the doc­u­ments with the bid, this does not lead to exclu­sion.

Sub­con­trac­tor chain: Max­i­mum of three links

§ Sec­tion 5 HVTG‑E lim­its the sub­con­trac­tor chain to three links for the first time: com­mis­sioned com­pa­ny — sub­con­trac­tor 1 — sub­con­trac­tor 2. This is not about the num­ber of sub­con­trac­tors used in par­al­lel, but about the depth of the chain: the sec­ond sub­con­trac­tor is the last link that may pass on the same sub­ject mat­ter.

The con­tract­ed com­pa­ny must also obtain the pri­or con­sent of the con­tract­ing author­i­ty for each use of a sub­con­trac­tor or rental com­pa­ny.

Con­trols and sanc­tions

The law has been giv­en a new sixth part with com­pre­hen­sive con­trol pow­ers. From the start of con­tract per­for­mance, con­tract­ing author­i­ties are enti­tled to enter con­struc­tion sites, facil­i­ties and oper­at­ing sites of the con­tract­ed com­pa­nies and their sub­con­trac­tors, even unan­nounced, to inspect proof of iden­ti­ty and to ques­tion employ­ees about their employ­ment rela­tion­ship.

A new­ly estab­lished con­trol group at the respon­si­ble min­istry sup­ports the clients in these con­trols on request.

The law pro­vides for the fol­low­ing sanc­tions in the event of vio­la­tions:

• Con­trac­tu­al penal­ty of up to 5% of the invoiced amount (net) per cul­pa­ble breach; the total amount of all con­trac­tu­al penal­ties is lim­it­ed to 10% of the invoiced amount
• Right to ter­mi­nate with­out notice in the case of con­tin­u­ing oblig­a­tions
• Exclu­sion from award­ing con­tracts for up to three years by the con­tract­ing author­i­ty con­cerned

Dis­con­tin­u­a­tion of the Frank­furt infor­ma­tion cen­ter

The pre­vi­ous infor­ma­tion office at the Frank­furt am Main Region­al Finance Direc­torate will no longer exist. The pos­si­bil­i­ty of object­ing to breach­es of pro­cure­ment reg­u­la­tions before the com­pe­tent author­i­ties will be retained — but only for awards with an esti­mat­ed con­tract val­ue of more than 750,000 euros for con­struc­tion ser­vices and more than 100,000 euros for sup­plies and ser­vices.

Entry into force

The law comes into force on the day after its pro­mul­ga­tion. A six-month tran­si­tion­al peri­od applies to proof of com­pli­ance with col­lec­tive agree­ments in the con­struc­tion sec­tor.

Sources: Draft law of the Hes­s­ian state gov­ern­ment, print­ed mat­ter 21/4029 of March 9, 2026 (Hes­s­ian state par­lia­ment, 21st leg­isla­tive peri­od); press release of the Hes­s­ian Min­istry of Eco­nom­ics, Ener­gy, Trans­port, Hous­ing and Rur­al Areas of Jan­u­ary 14, 2026.