Mäntyharju reports suspected leak of school transport tender document

Mäntyharju municipality has filed a criminal report over the suspected leak of confidential documents related to a school transport tender, Yle reports. The leaked information included the successful bidders and route prices.

The suspected breach of confidentiality concerns a summary of the procurement process for school transport and service traffic. The information spread among transport operators as an image in a WhatsApp message.

Jari Hautamäki, director of the municipality’s education department, learned about the leak in mid-April, when the education committee and municipal executive board were handling the matter. An entrepreneur told him that the image was circulating among transport operators.

Only members of the education committee and the municipal executive board, along with their secretaries, had access to the document. Hautamäki estimates that 25 to 30 people could have seen it. He said the municipality does not know who is suspected of leaking it.

The tender, organised by procurement company Sansia, selected transport operators for 2026 to 2029. The procurement is worth 8 million euros.

According to Hautamäki, the leak could have led to the tender being annulled. The process had taken six months and hundreds of working hours, and would have had to be repeated. He estimated that a new tender would have cost at least 100,000 euros.

Hautamäki said the municipality was fortunate that none of the companies involved filed an appeal over the leak. The appeal period was 14 days from the end of the procurement process.

A new tender could not have been completed before the start of the school year. That would have required temporary contracts for 21 routes and could have caused several hundred thousand euros in additional costs.

Hautamäki said the leak had damaged internal trust in the municipality’s decision-making. However, no changes are planned to current procedures, and documents will continue to be distributed before meetings so that decision-makers can familiarise themselves with the issues.