The government of Mexico City gave Seguros Azteca, owned by businessman Ricardo Salinas Pliego, the most expensive accident insurance contract for police and officers since 2013, which costs one million pesos per month than was spent in years Previous.
In addition, Grupo Salinas received it via direct award, after a tender declared deserted and in which the company itself had been disqualified.
This is the contract number DEAS-10-2019 “Insurance of Personal Accidents of Workers working in Public Way” signed with Seguros Azteca, which has a validity from May to December 2019, and whose monthly premium is 5 million 817 thousand 500 pesos per month.
The same insurance, with the same coverage, in both 2018 and 2017 cost 4 million 692 thousand pesos each month. Previously, in 2016, 4 million 468 thousand pesos were paid.
In no year had more than 5 million pesos been paid per month, as happened this 2019, when the annual price increase is 19%, in real terms. In fact, the increase in cost, considering inflation, had remained in virtually zeros year-over-year from 2013 until now.
The Finance Secretariat of Claudia Sheinbaum’s Government, in a written response when asked about the case, explained that this award and the amount of the contract were thus given after the failed tender, and that Azteca won it because it had been the most cheap of the listed ones.
Official documents confirm that, because of a difference of 500 pesos, Seguros Azteca was the lowest proposal. But they also show that that company received the invitation on April 15, 2019 while the other competitors had it a day later, on April 16, as can be seen here and here.
This becomes relevant when you take into account that the deadline for submitting a proposal was April 17.
Not only that, Seguros Azteca was the only one that received the request with the express request to quote the accident insurance item, which would eventually be contracted. This led to another company’s demand for “equal conditions” in the invitation.
Finally, the quote trade sent by Seguros Azteca to the city government does not even have a delivery date, unlike the proposal of its competitors.
On the increase in the cost of the premium compared to previous years, the Director of Material Resources and General Services of the City’s Ministry of Finance, Pedro Jesús Lara Lastra, said that it is due to two factors: the increase in accidents in the city and a greater number of people insured.
But the official data provided themselves show that accidents—and associated costs—actually decreased last year, and that the number of insured public servants had minimal growth, down from 1% in 2019.
As for the number of police and staff insured in 2019, 89,000 737 are reported, implying only 653 more people than last year.
Lara added that the capital government bought 21 different insurances, including accident insurance, and that, even with the increase in price for that insurance, the total spend was 300 million pesos cheaper than last year.
“There will be some items where the economy was not significant or that there was no economy but as a comprehensive project if there was 10% savings. A total package of 21 insurances was tendered and the sum of all were paid 2.6 billion when 2.9 billion were paid in 2018,” the official said.
Lara Lastra explained that the decision was limited to the technical and economic proposals submitted, after which Political Animal asked if the company’s experience was taken into account, as after a review at Compranet, no similar contract with Seguros Azteca was detected.
After the interview with Lara Lastra, the Ministry of Finance expanded its response, which can be found in full here.
Seguros Azteca, for its part, sent a response signed by Grupo Salinas in which it said that the contract amount was made based on the number of claims and international parameters of reinsurance.
The company defended the legality of the entire proceeding and when asked to specify the dates on which they submitted their proposal, it replied that everything was done “in a timely manner”.
The company also said that in the original tender they participated with a proposal for another insurance, the “institutional life”, whose ruling was not favorable to them. Finally, Grupo Salinas was given three insurances in total, by direct award, as confirmed by the official documents provided by the Ministry of Finance.
The failed tender
On February 20, the public tender SSCHA-DGRMSG-LP-05-19 for the “Contracting of the comprehensive program of insurance of property and persons of the Government of Mexico City, was published in the official gazette of the city, for the financial year 2019.”
This tender envisaged 21 different insurance items, including heading 5 “Public Road Workers’ Personal Accident Insurance” and heading 6 “Institutional Life Insurance”.
The failure to tender was made on 26 March 2019. The document of the same, obtained through transparency by this means, confirms that Seguros Azteca presented a quote under heading 6 but was disqualified due to failures in its technical proposal.
The same ruling does not mention that Seguros Azteca has submitted proposal for heading 5, which is accident insurance. In the market study carried out on the occasion of that tender, which was also obtained by transparency, there is also no quotation from Azteca for that heading.
This coincides with the positioning delivered by Grupo Salinas to Political Animal where they point out that they submitted a proposal for heading 6, but not by heading 5.
Other companies, such as Seguros Atlas, did submit a proposal for heading 5, but the Finance Secretary decided to disqualify them because of flaws in the technical proposal. In the end, both headings 5 and game 6 were declared deserted.
Direct hiring
After the tender was declared deserted, the city government carried out a direct award process under heading 5. To this end, according to Lara Lastra, three companies which had quoted for this heading in the tender.
The Secretary of Finance was requested for the informals with which companies were invited to participate in the direct award phase. The unit delivered invitations sent to Seguros Azteca, Seguros Atlas, and Pan American Mexico.
In the trade sent to Azteca, you are invited to quote directly for four items between them the 5, which is that of accident insurance. But Seguros Atlas was only invited to be quoted for heading 8 and Pan American for 7 and 9. Only Salinas’ company was asked for a proposal for 5.
Notwithstanding the above, the three companies decided to submit economic proposals under heading 5. Pan American expressed non-conformity about this situation in its response: “We request that all participants have a level playing field and that each and every one of our contributions be considered and evaluated,” says the document signed by Oscar Carmona Ramirez, legal representative of that company.
The contributions sent by the companies referred to confirm that Seguros Azteca was, in fact, the lowest, albeit with minimal differences. While Pan American proposed 40 million 121 thousand 195 pesos, The Salinas company budgeted 40 million 120 thousand 689 pesos: a difference of 506 pesos.
The trades with the economic proposals of Pan American and Seguros Atlas are dated April 17. Seguros Azteca, on the other hand, does not present a date of production.
The increase
The award for Seguros Azteca was formalized through the consolidated contract DEAS-10-2019 by the service of “Insurance of Personal Accidents of Workers who work permanently in public roads”. The amount of that contract already included in VAT was 46 million 540 thousand pesos, with a validity from May to December 2019.
This equates to a monthly premium of 5 million 817 thousand 500 pesos including VAT, representing an increase of 19% in real terms, compared to the 4 million 692 thousand 231 pesos of average monthly premium that were paid the previous year.
The other contracts
The accident contract was not the only one awarded directly to Seguros Azteca. According to the notification sent by the Ministry of Finance on 24 April last year, they were also awarded item 6 for institutional life insurance amounting to 697 million pesos and two more items for two and a half million pesos.
All those items were declared deserted in the initial tender in which Seguros Azteca, as referred to by the company itself in its statement, only presented a quote under heading 6 and was eliminated due to failures in the technical proposal. The official failure of that tender confirms this fact.
However, the Ministry of Finance invited them to quote them for four items in total by awarding them all contracts.
Salinas Group told Political Animal that Seguros Azteca is a “reliable and successful” insurer that can take care of all those services. Proof of this, he said, is his 4.8 million customers in the country and “current and concluded” contracts with various entities, of which he gave no details.
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