1. On 16 October 2018, the complainant wrote a letter to the Delegation of the European Union to Mauritania (the Delegation) concerning the termination of a contract under which his company provided audit services for EU-funded projects in Mauritania. In that letter, the complainant challenged the Delegation’s decision not to pay the remaining amounts and to recover all the funds paid for all the services already provided, on account of non-compliance with contractual obligations.

2.  As no reply was received, the complainant referred the matter to the European Ombudsman on 16 February 2019. The Ombudsman's team responsible for carrying out the inquiries contacted the Delegation through the European Commission. The Delegation then replied to the complainant on 8 April 2019 and apologized for the delay. While confirming its position that the termination of the contract and the recovery of the amounts already paid were well founded, the Delegation nevertheless informed the complainant of its intention to ‘do everything possible’ to settle the dispute between the parties amicably, and invited him to submit to the procedure laid down for that purpose under Article 40 of that contract.

3. As a reply has now been sent, this complaint has been settled ^[1] and I have decided to close the case ^[2].

Lambros Papadias

Head of Unit 3 - Investigations

Done at Strasbourg on 08/05/2019

[1] If the complainant considers that the institution’s reply is unsatisfactory, he or she has the possibility to lodge a new complaint with the Ombudsman.

[2] This complaint has been dealt with in the context of the delegation of tasks relating to the handling of complaints, in accordance with Article 11 of the Decision of the European Ombudsman adopting implementing provisions: https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/FR/TXT/?uri=CELEX%3A32016D0901%2801%29