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Ethical Misconduct

Part 1

There are various types of ethical misconduct in public contracting. Studies indicate that ethical misconduct, especially in government projects are increasing due to the involvement of incompetent individuals in the contracts. A real-life example of ethical misconduct is corruption. It is crucial to acknowledge that corruption occurs in many forms. The first form of corruption is bribery. It is crucial to acknowledge that bribery is usually the most common form of corruption in public contracting. In the case, a bidder wants to be awarded a tender but he or she has the knowledge that upon evaluation he or she may not be selected to conduct the project in question, he may want to offer money or non-money support to the tenderers for him to be considered. Giving of money or gifts to tenderers in unethical and it is a vice that should be dealt with seriously.

Additionally, another form of corruption is fraud (Chan & Owusu, 2017). Studies indicate that are various fraudulent activities that take place in public contracting. The first form of fraud is colluding the financial accountants to balance the financial records to match the expected expenditure of the project when in reality the cost of the project is much lower. The surplus amount is often shared with the top management officials. The other form of fraud is overbilling. Overbilling involves increasing the unit prices for the activities that are set to take place to accrue some funds for personal gains. Moreover, other form of corruption is bid-rigging. It is crucial to acknowledge that bid rigging is a common scenario in public contracting. Bid rigging involves an illegal conspiracy in which competitors collude to raise the prices of a bid. Raising the prices of a bid makes it less attractive to various bidders and thus the competitors that have raised the price

automatically wins the tender.

Change order games is also another form of corruption in public contracting. There are many instances where an individual or rather a contractor presents a low bid to win the tender in question and later on present changes in the project to accrue his or her desired profits. Change order games have been used in public contracts over the years and there is a dire need to bring it to a halt. Moreover, claim games is also another form of corruption where an individual makes additional earnings by presenting false claims. A good example is where the contractor colludes with the tenderer or the supervisor present false information about the project to make more money.