TED Publication Office

The TED Publication Office is not a separate organisation but rather the Publications Office of the European Union acting in its specific capacity as the operator and publisher of TED (Tenders Electronic Daily). The Publications Office, based in Luxembourg, is the official publisher of the European Union, responsible for producing the Official Journal of the European Union (OJEU) and operating the digital publication systems that accompany it, of which TED is the most significant for the public procurement community.

What is the TED Publication Office?

The Publications Office of the European Union operates TED as a public service under the authority of the EU procurement directives, which require above-threshold procurement notices to be published in the Official Journal's supplement. In its TED operational role, the Publications Office performs several functions:

• Notice receipt and validation. The Publications Office receives notice submissions from contracting authorities via the eSender Portal and accredited eSender intermediaries. Notices are validated against the applicable schema (standard forms for legacy notices, eForms from October 2023) before acceptance.
• Publication within statutory deadlines. The Publications Office is required to publish accepted notices within five calendar days of receipt, or within two calendar days for accelerated procedures. Meeting these deadlines is a legal obligation under the directives.
• Archive maintenance. The Publications Office maintains the complete TED archive, including notices dating back to the 1990s, and makes this archive available through TED Search, TED Viewer, the TED API, and TED Data Download.
• eForms governance. The Publications Office led the EU's transition to eForms as the mandatory notice format, developing the schema, operating the eSentool (TED eSender Validation) test environment, and providing guidance and support to eSender systems making the transition.
• Developer support. The Publications Office publishes technical documentation for the TED API, eForms schema, and eSentool for developers building integrations with TED.
• SIMAP maintenance. The Publications Office collaborates with DG GROW on the maintenance of SIMAP (Information System for Public Procurement), the reference information portal for EU procurement.

The Publications Office is an interinstitutional body of the EU, meaning it serves all EU institutions (Commission, Parliament, Council, Court of Justice, and others) as their official publisher, not only the Commission.

Why it matters for bidders

The TED Publication Office's role as the authoritative publisher of TED means that notices published on TED carry legal weight: a contracting authority that fails to publish a required notice on TED, or that publishes a materially incorrect notice, risks having its procurement challenged under national remedies law. Bidders who identify material errors or omissions in a published notice (for example, a deadline that contradicts the directive's minimum time limits, or missing CPV codes) can bring these to the attention of the contracting authority and, if not corrected, to the national supervisory authority.

For suppliers tracking TED systematically, the reliability of the TED Publication Office's systems is essential to their business development process. Publication delays or system outages directly affect bidding windows.

Example

A contracting authority in the Netherlands submits a contract notice via the eSender Portal. The TED Publication Office's validation system rejects the notice because a mandatory field for the place of performance (NUTS code) is missing from the eForms submission. The authority corrects the notice, resubmits, and the Publication Office publishes it within five calendar days of the corrected submission.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I contact the TED Publication Office if a notice contains an error?

The TED Publication Office publishes a contact form for reporting technical issues with TED. However, errors in the content of a notice (as opposed to technical system errors) must be corrected by the contracting authority itself, through a corrigendum submitted via the eSender Portal or eSender.

Does the TED Publication Office translate notices into all EU languages?

The Publications Office provides machine translation for all TED notices into all 24 official EU languages. The legally binding text is always the notice in the original language submitted by the contracting authority. Machine translation is provided as a convenience and does not carry legal weight.

Who can I contact for TED API or eForms technical questions?

The Publications Office provides a developer helpdesk and documentation for TED API and eForms technical questions. Contact details and documentation are published on the TED developer resources section of ted.europa.eu.