Government seeks €1M from outsourcing company after civil service exam 'chaos'

Catalan presidency minister Laura Vilagrà announced the government would be seeking "at least" one million euros in compensation from Cegos, the outsourcing company in charge of proctoring the civil service entrance exams last Saturday that were marred by delays, cancellations, and privacy violations.

Vilagrà spoke in Parliament on Friday morning, a day after announcing that the examination process would take place again in early July, and described the events as "unjustifiable and a complete breach of contract."

Cegos had won a €1.4m tender to organize this process, hiring staff from the temporary work agency ETT Randstad.  

The authorities have already received more than 2,600 complaints from test-takers, who have until Friday to file them.

Civil service director general Marta Martorell was dismissed and replaced by Anna Maria Molina in response to this issue, and Vilagrà has twice met with the heads of the CCOO, UGT and IAC-CATAC unions to discuss the matter. The Ombudsperson's office has also opened an investigation into it.

Meanwhile, students have raised their concerns as retaking the exams "implies prolonging this agony another two months," and in fact, they just thought "that everything that was up to us was done but now we have two more months to face it all again," civil service aspirant Queralt Tor told Catalan News Agency (ACN).

Cegos blames authorities

Cegos, on the other hand, countered by sending out a statement in which it claims the government did not prepare the testing process adequately.

According to the outsourcing company, they were not provided with the necessary information "in a timely manner" or in the correct "form."

Cegos goes on to argue in the statement that the company was only in charge of part of the entrance examination process and that the government was responsible for the content of the tests, the venues, and distributing test-takers accordingly. 

The company also claims the government has not "formally" informed them their contract has been rescinded.