Price review and indexation clauses

Pricing · This guide was generated with the help of an AI system. Its legal references were checked against the official EU texts listed under Sources on 11 October 2026. Next review due by 11 October 2027, or sooner if the law changes. EU rules only. Not legal advice.

Short answer. Under EU law, the price you bid is the price you get, unless the procurement documents contained a clause that allows it to change. Article 72(1)(a) lets buyers write “price revision clauses” into the documents, with no monetary limit, but only if they are “clear, precise and unequivocal” and state the scope, nature and conditions of any change. Without such a clause, a price increase in your favour that the contract didn’t provide for is, as a rule, a substantial modification. It is lawful only if another route in Article 72 covers it: a small change below the de minimis limits, or circumstances a diligent buyer couldn’t foresee. Otherwise it needs a new procedure. So read the clause before you price. If there is none, put the risk in your price, or ask for a clause before the deadline. And never agree an informal price increase during the contract.

EU law · What a review clause can do

A contract or framework agreement may be modified without a new procedure “where the modifications, irrespective of their monetary value, have been provided for in the initial procurement documents in clear, precise and unequivocal review clauses, which may include price revision clauses, or options” (Article 72(1)(a)). The same provision sets three conditions:

1. In the initial procurement documents. A clause added after the award doesn’t qualify.
2. Clear, precise and unequivocal, stating “the scope and nature of possible modifications or options as well as the conditions under which they may be used”.
3. No change to the overall nature of the contract or framework agreement.

The recitals give price indexation as the first example. Buyers should be able to provide for review or option clauses, “but such clauses should not give them unlimited discretion”, and sufficiently clear clauses “may for instance provide for price indexations” (recital 111).

The Court has explained why such clauses exist. Where circumstances are foreseeable for a diligent buyer, it can provide in the documents for review clauses under which the conditions of performance may be adjusted if a specific circumstance occurs, “thereby making it possible to make changes which would otherwise require a new procurement procedure”. Because the option and its rules are in the documents from the start, all bidders know about it “and are therefore on an equal footing when formulating their respective tenders” (C‑441/22, paragraph 71).

Indexation and the caps on other changes

Where the contract includes an indexation clause, “the updated price shall be the reference value” when calculating the limits for small changes (Article 72(2)) and the 50% caps on additional work and unforeseeable circumstances (Article 72(1)(b) and (c); Article 72(3)). So indexation also raises the base against which other changes are measured.

Applying the clause is not a new award

Under the earlier Directive, the Court held that an adjustment to accommodate changed external circumstances is not a new award where the contract itself provided for it. Its examples were the conversion of prices into euros, a minimal reduction to round them off, and “the reference to a new price index where provision was made in the initial agreement to replace the price index fixed previously” (pressetext, C‑454/06, ruling point 2). Article 72(1)(a) now writes that logic into the Directive.

EU law · If there is no clause

A modification is substantial, and so needs one of the other routes or a new procedure, where among other things “the modification changes the economic balance of the contract or the framework agreement in favour of the contractor in a manner which was not provided for in the initial contract” (Article 72(4)(b)). A price increase without a clause is the typical example. Three routes may still apply:

Anything else requires a new procedure (Article 72(5)).

What “unforeseeable” means. Recital 109 refers to circumstances “that could not have been predicted despite reasonably diligent preparation of the initial award by the contracting authority, taking into account its available means, the nature and characteristics of the specific project, good practice in the field in question and the need to ensure an appropriate relationship between the resources spent in preparing the award and its foreseeable value”. In C‑441/22 the Court held that ordinary weather conditions and statutory works bans published in advance were not unforeseeable for a diligent buyer (ruling point 2; see changing a public contract after signature). The judgment doesn’t deal with prices. Its test, that foreseeable risks belong in a review clause, applies to them as much as to delays (paragraph 71).

A change to how you’re paid. In Polismyndigheten (C‑282/24), the Swedish police changed the payment model in two towing frameworks awarded on lowest price. The fixed-price radius went from 10 to 50 kilometres and the prices were adjusted, with the total value changing only marginally. Below the Article 72(2) values, such a change doesn’t alter the “overall nature” of a framework unless it changes the agreement’s balance fundamentally (ruling).

What the case law adds

On 11 October 2026 we searched the 198 judgments and orders that the EU Publications Office links to Directive 2014/24, or to Directive 2004/18 from 14 July 2016 (154 with an English text). Five mention review clauses, price revision or indexation. Only C‑441/22 says anything about them beyond quoting Article 72 (paragraph 71). No judgment in the set rules on the content of a price revision clause. The method is described in our analysis of the scoring formula.

National law · What stays national

National contract law may have its own rules on hardship or changed circumstances. National legislation or standard contracts may also require indexation in some sectors. Those rules are outside this page. Where they lead to a change of price, the change still has to fit one of the routes in Article 72, so take advice in the country concerned.

Our analysis · What a workable clause says

Article 72(1)(a) asks for scope, nature and conditions. In practice, a price clause that meets that standard usually answers these questions:

This table is our reading of what “clear, precise and unequivocal” demands in practice. It isn’t a list from the Directive.

A made-up example

A four-year services contract at €1,000,000 a year, bid at prices fixed at the start (index 100). The clause revises the price each year as:

price = base price × (0.2 + 0.8 × index ÷ base index)

so 20% of the price is fixed and 80% follows the index. The index then reads 103, 108 and 110 at the start of years 2, 3 and 4.

The clause moves €168,000 of cost risk from you to the buyer. Without it, a bidder who expects similar inflation has to build that risk into a fixed price. A bidder who doesn’t build it in can price lower and win, and then carry the loss. That is why the clause, or its absence, belongs in your pricing decision, not just in the contract file.

Article 72(3) then makes the updated price the reference for later changes. Here, the contract’s value after indexation is €4,168,000, so 10% is €416,800. If the buyer is a sub-central authority, the 2026–2027 threshold for its services is €216,000. That is lower, so it remains the binding limit for a small change (see EU procurement thresholds). Indexation raises the 10% figure, but here it doesn’t change the outcome.

Practice · Before you bid

1. Find the clause. It may be in the draft contract, a pricing annex or the instructions to tenderers. If there’s an option, read its conditions too.
2. Test it against the questions above. Index, base date, share, frequency, caps, symmetry, procedure.
3. If there’s no clause, or it’s unclear, ask before the deadline. The answer goes to every tenderer (see clarification questions). The buyer doesn’t have to add a clause, but it may clarify or amend the documents for everyone.
4. Price the risk you keep. Without indexation, decide how much cost increase you’re carrying and whether your price covers it. A fixed price that only works if costs stay flat is a bet, not a price.
5. Keep your workings. If your price is questioned as abnormally low, you’ll need to explain how it covers your costs over the term (see abnormally low tenders).
6. For frameworks, check which terms can be reopened at call-off stage. Your framework prices may be a ceiling or the final word (Article 33(4); see framework agreements).

Practice · During the contract

1. Apply the clause exactly as written. Use the index, dates and formula in the documents, and keep the published index values as evidence.
2. If costs rise beyond the clause, ask which route applies before agreeing anything. An increase outside Article 72 is a risk for you too: in some Member States the contractor can be fined as well as the buyer (see changing a public contract after signature).
3. Don’t agree informal increases. A substantial modification doesn’t need a signed amendment. Emails and other documents can show it (C‑441/22, ruling point 1).

What this page doesn’t cover

National contract law on hardship or changed circumstances. Payment periods and late payment. Utilities contracts (Article 89 of Directive 2014/25) and concessions. The modification rules in the Commission’s 2026 proposal, which aren’t law (see what the proposed Public Procurement Act would change).