Doffin

Doffin (database for offentlige innkjøp) is the official Norwegian database for public procurement notices. It also carries notices from the utilities sector, which includes among others water, energy, transport, ports and airports, and postal services. DFØ (the Norwegian Agency for Public and Financial Management) runs and develops Doffin on behalf of the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Fisheries (Nærings- og fiskeridepartementet).

The contracting authority publishes the notice from its e-tendering system (konkurransegjennomføringsverktøy, KGV), the online system it uses to run the competition, and Doffin mirrors it. Since the new notice forms (eForms) were introduced in 2023, contracting authorities can no longer create notices directly in Doffin. Doffin is not the sender and is not responsible for the content, so questions about a competition go to the contracting authority. Doffin shows only the notice itself. The tender documents and everything else about the individual competition are in the contracting authority's e-tendering system, which the notice links to. Tenders are usually submitted there as well, and the notice and the tender documents say how.

At or above NOK 1.3 million excluding VAT, a competition must as a rule be advertised in Doffin (§ 5-1, § 8-17, § 21-1 and § 30-5 of the Public Procurement Regulations (anskaffelsesforskriften); the § references on this page are to the Regulations). For health and social services, the duty only applies at or above NOK 8.7 million. Purchases connected to a utility activity follow the Utilities Regulations (forsyningsforskriften) instead, which only require a notice at or above their EEA thresholds: NOK 5 million for supply and service contracts, NOK 11.6 million for special services and health and social services, and NOK 62.9 million for works contracts (forsyningsforskriften § 5-1 and § 5-2). At or above the EEA thresholds (for special services (særlige tjenester), above NOK 8.7 million), Doffin forwards the notice to TED, the EU's database for procurement notices, where it is published first (§ 21-1). Between NOK 500,000 and NOK 1.3 million there is no duty to advertise, but the contracting authority may advertise voluntarily in Doffin. The exceptions from the duty, and what a notice must contain, are on the page on the contract notice.

Doffin is open to everyone, with no login. You can search by free text and link the search to CPV codes, contracting authorities or suppliers, and filter by, among other things, notice type, status and place of performance. Doffin advises you to include both planned procurements and active competitions in your search, because several contracting authorities use the planning stage close to the competition. Prior information notices (veiledende kunngjøringer), in which the contracting authority makes planned purchases known, can also be published in Doffin.

Doffin no longer has logins, saved notices or alerts. Instead, Doffin suggests that you save the address of a search as a bookmark in your browser, so the search shows the latest results each time you open it. If you want alerts, you have to use an external service. Several offer alerts based on data from Doffin, among them several of the providers of e-tendering systems.

Doffin does not show everything you can bid for. Purchases between NOK 500,000 and NOK 1.3 million appear there only if the contracting authority advertises voluntarily, and contracts under a framework agreement are awarded without a new notice. Advice: also follow the contracting authorities you want to sell to.

Doffin is also a source of market insight. Contract award notices (kunngjøringer av kontraktsinngåelse) show who won, and Doffindata shows, among other things, contracts per contracting authority and per supplier. The figures are incomplete; see the last question below.

A furniture company in Trondheim wants to follow public purchases of office furniture in Trøndelag, the region around the city. The managing director searches Doffin for office furniture, links the search to the CPV code for office furniture, filters on place of performance and includes both planning and competitions. She saves the address of the search as a bookmark and opens it every Monday.

A county authority (fylkeskommune) advertises a purchase of office furniture for NOK 4 million excluding VAT. That is above NOK 2.5 million, the EEA threshold for county authorities' supply contracts, so the notice is published first in TED and then in Doffin. If it is an open procedure, the minimum time limit for tenders is counted from the day the notice was sent to TED, not from the Monday she found it. A municipality that buys furniture for NOK 900,000 has no duty to advertise. That competition is only in Doffin if the municipality advertises voluntarily. Otherwise she has to follow the municipality's own channels or be asked directly.