Article 204

The authorising officer responsible shall appoint a committee to evaluate the proposals, unless the Commission decides otherwise in the framework of a specific sectorial programme. The committee shall be made up of at least three persons representing at least two organisational entities of the institutions or bodies referred to in Articles 62 and 208 of the Financial Regulation with no hierarchical link between them. To avoid any conflict of interests, those persons shall be subject to the obligations laid down in Article 57 of the Financial Regulation. In the representations and local units referred to in Article 72 of this Regulation and the delegated bodies referred to in Articles 62 and 208 of the Financial Regulation, if there are no separate entities, the requirement of organisational entities with no hierarchical link between them shall not apply. Outside experts may assist the committee by decision of the authorising officer responsible. The authorising officer responsible shall ensure that these experts satisfy the obligations laid down in Article 57 of the Financial Regulation. The authorising officer responsible shall, where appropriate, divide the process into several procedural stages. The rules governing the process shall be announced in the call for proposals. Where a call for proposals specifies a two-stage submission procedure, only those applicants whose proposals satisfy the evaluation criteria for the first stage shall be requested to submit a complete proposal in the second stage. Where a call for proposals specifies a two-stage evaluation procedure, only those proposals that pass the first stage, based on the evaluation against a limited set of criteria, shall go forward for further evaluation. The applicants whose proposals are rejected at any stage shall be informed in accordance with Article 133(3) of the Financial Regulation. Each subsequent stage of the procedure must be clearly distinct from the previous one. The same documents and information shall not be required to be provided more than once during the same procedure. The evaluation committee or, where appropriate, the authorising officer responsible may ask an applicant to provide additional information or to clarify the supporting documents submitted in connection with the application, provided that such information or clarification does not substantially change the proposal. In accordance with Article 96 of the Financial Regulation, in the case of obvious clerical errors, the evaluation committee or the authorising officer may refrain from doing so only in duly justified cases. The authorising officer shall keep appropriate records of contacts with applicants during the procedure. Upon completion of its work, the members of the evaluation committee shall sign a record of all the proposals examined, containing an assessment of their quality and identifying those which may receive funding. Those records may be signed in an electronic system providing sufficient authentication of the signatory. Where necessary that record shall rank the proposals examined, provide recommendations on the maximum amount to award and possible non-substantial adjustments to the grant application. The record shall be kept for future reference. The authorising officer responsible may invite an applicant to adjust its proposal in the light of the recommendations of the evaluation committee. The authorising officer responsible shall keep appropriate records of contacts with applicants during the procedure. The authorising officer responsible shall, after evaluation, take his decision giving at least: the subject and the overall amount of the decision; the name of the successful applicants, the title of the actions, the amounts accepted and the reasons for that choice, including where it is inconsistent with the opinion of the evaluation committee; the names of any applicants rejected and the reasons for that rejection. Paragraphs 1, 2 and 4 of this Article are not compulsory for the award of grants pursuant to Article 190 of this Regulation and to Article 125(7) of the Financial Regulation.

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Source: EUR-Lex (Cellar) · retrieved 2026-11-04 · Text as adopted (Official Journal); later amendments are not incorporated in this text.