September 15, 2025 -
The Individual Contract policy has been revised to reflect the increased procurement thresholds and daily fee scales requiring different levels of approval, accounting for inflationary impacts since 2018, reflecting updated minimum and maximum amounts across various contract types. These policy changes affect competitive procurement processes, direct contracting, and selection procedures, clarifying financial limits and approval requirements and reflecting systematic adjustment to procurement authority within the organization, as follows:• Increased daily fee minimums: The daily fee requiring Bureau Director's approval has been raised from $1,350 to $1,800 across multiple paragraphs (
September 15, 2025 -
The Individual Contract policy has been revised to reflect the increased procurement thresholds and daily fee scales requiring different levels of approval, accounting for inflationary impacts since 2018, reflecting updated minimum and maximum amounts across various contract types. These policy changes affect competitive procurement processes, direct contracting, and selection procedures, clarifying financial limits and approval requirements and reflecting systematic adjustment to procurement authority within the organization, as follows:• Increased daily fee minimums: The daily fee requiring Bureau Director's approval has been raised from $1,350 to $1,800 across multiple paragraphs (paragraphs 17, 18, 20, 40 and 66) standardizing approval thresholds.
• Higher procurement and approval limits: Thresholds for competitive procurement processes, direct review by CAP Chairperson have been increased from $100,000 to $150,000 (Paragraph 34), and standard Delegated Procurement Authority (DPA) for Resident Representatives has been increased from $150,000 to $300,000 (Paragraph 36).
• Updated daily fee scales by specialist level: Fee scales for Junior Specialists remain at $200, for Specialists the fee scales have been increased from $350 to $450 (Paragraph 66), and for Senior Specialists from $650 to $900 (Paragraph 66), increasing both minimum and maximum daily fees to reflect updated fee standards.
• Revised selection and contracting thresholds: Minimum and maximum amounts for selection of individual contractors without competition have been increased from $5,000 to $7,000 (min.) and from $10,000 to $15,000 (max.) if approved by the Bureau Director with at least three candidates, along with contract thresholds requirements for international advertisement which have been increased from $100,000 to $150,000 (Paragraph 69). The same minimum and maximum increases are applicable to direct contracting limits (Paragraph 112), sourcing from rosters (Paragraph 172) and pre-approved rosters (Paragraph 173).
The Consultancy Duration and Daily Fee Approval Form template and the Justification for Engagement of an Individual Contractor Based on a Direct Contracting Modality template have been updated to reflect the new daily fee scales and procurement thresholds.
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November 08, 2023 -
This update is to alert all UNDP country offices and business units that following the introduction of the I-PSA and the N-PSA which replaced all international and local individual contracts as of 31 March 2022, except those which are of lumpsum deliverable-based arrangements, the use of individual contracts is restricted to lump-sum deliverable-based arrangements only. However, the Individual Contract policy is still available in its current form, covering both daily and lump-sum based individual contracts for use by all other UN Agencies until 31 December 2024.
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January 09, 2023 -
The policy has been updated to reflect UNDP's transition to its new cloud-based management platform Quantum in January 2023, replacing its previous ATLAS system.
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January 14, 2022 -
This update is to alert all UNDP COs and BUs that the I-PSA and the N-PSA will replace all international and local ICs as of 31 March 2022 (extended from 31 December 2021), except those which are of lumpsum deliverable-based arrangements. After this date, the use of ICs will be restricted to lump-sum deliverable-based arrangements only. However, the IC policy is still available in its current form, covering both daily and lump-sum based ICs; for use by all other UN Agencies until 31 December 2022.
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April 30, 2021 -
The Statement of Health template (for Individual Contract) is now available in the POPP templates library.
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April 05, 2021 -
The Statement of Health template in Spanish (for Individual Contract) is now available in the POPP templates library.
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February 16, 2021 -
Changes made to the Individual Contract policy are in alignment with similar changes in United Nations Security Management System (UNSMS) policies. With the abolishment of the Security Level System and replacement with the Security Risk Management (SRM) methodology, relevant security related insertions in the policy have been modified. These insertions include replacing terminologies on “Security Levels” with “Security Risks”, including ICs within the security warden system as per UNSMS applicability policy, and local UNSMS arrangements, including “evacuation procedures” as a “risk avoidance” measure, and including IC’s personal responsibility to submit Security Clearance requests via the TRIP platform prior to travel.
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January 12, 2021 -
The Security Charges to Individual Contracts policy is now available in French. The document is linked under related policies on the Individual Contract page, section 2.0.
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November 17, 2020 -
The Consultancy Duration and Daily Fee Approval Form (POPP-11-3371) is now linked to the Individual Contract policy in clauses 18, 28, and 40.
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June 23, 2020 -
The Security Charges to Individual Contracts policy is now available in Spanish. The document is linked under related policies on the Individual Contract page, section 2.0.
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July 02, 2019 -
The Individual Contract Procurement Notice template is now available in Spanish. It is linked in clause 81 of the Spanish IC policy and found in the POPP templates library (document ID POPP-11-3027). To access the document, click on the Spanish language tab.
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June 12, 2019 -
The template, Individual Contract On Behalf of a UN Agency, is now available in English (document ID POPP-11-3021) and Spanish (document ID POPP-11-3020). These are available in the POPP templates library.
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May 14, 2019 -
The Individual Contract main policy is available in Spanish. To access the document, click on the Spanish language tab.
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April 15, 2019 -
The Individual Contract main policy is available in French. To access the document, click on the French language tab.
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September 25, 2018 -
In the Individual Contract main policy, Selection of Individual Contractors (section 69) and the Direct Contracting provision (section 112) were updated to reflect that the threshold of no-competition for ICs can be increased to $10,000 if approved by the Bureaus. The direct contracting template for Individual Contractors was updated accordingly.
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September 12, 2018 -
The Letter of Invitation to Submit an Offer template is now available in French. The document is available in the POPP library templates (document # POPP-11-2828).
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September 12, 2018 -
The Individual Contract Procurement Notice template is now available in French. The document is available in the POPP library templates (document # POPP-11-2829).
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August 03, 2018 -
The updated policy reflects the procedure for increasing the no-competition threshold for ICs to $10,000. Other changes include the removal of P11, an updated template for Offerors’ Letter; updates on reference checks and the change of the required age for medical examination to 65 from 62.
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October 18, 2017 -
[Updated] Individual Contractors policy (IC): Restrictions concerning former staff members in receipt of a pension benefit. The policy was updated to align it with the new HR policy on maximum compensation to be paid to former staff members on pension benefit. 120. Employment of former staff members who are in receipt of a pension benefit from the UNJSPF shall be subject to the following restrictions: a) Former staff members may not receive compensation of more than US$ 50,000 for up to six months of employment or engagement, without suspension of his or her UNJSPF retirement benefit.
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October 02, 2017 -
[Updated] Individual Contractors Policy (IC): Determining a competitive process for Individual Contractors (ICs). The policy was changed to align the requirements of a competitive process for ICs with that of RFQ/ITB/RFP- Sourcing of candidates: 70a. An individual contractor selection process is considered competitive, even if it results in less than three responsive bids. An award may still be made, but approval depends on due diligence to ensure that sourcing was properly conducted, and that the limited market response was not the result of a restrictive short list or unsuitable sourcing strategy.
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November 09, 2016 -
COP form and ToR guideline were updated. Security Charges to Individual Contracts policy document was added under Related Policies on the policy page.
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September 03, 2015 -
With this revised Policy, Delegated Procurement Authority for the management of ICs is USD 150,000 for all Business Units (over 100k, the case must be reviewed by Contract Assets and Procurement Committee.)- COs may have ICs with durations up to 24 months (over 24 months, Bureau Director or Resident Representative (if delegated) approval of duration is required) – though it is important to note that consultancies are typically recommended for short-term interventions, usually up to 12 months
- COs may have IC daily fees up to USD 1,350 (over $1,350, RR approval is required with notification to the Bureau Director).
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April 01, 2015 -
Reviewed and edited (no substantive change) in Q4 2015
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