Specialist Task Forces

Contract & Invoice - Letter of Engagement (LoE)

General conditions

ETSI will establish "Letters of Engagement" (LoE) with the Companies providing experts.

The Letter of Engagement can be established with Organizations which are Members of ETSI or are supported by a Member (see "recruitment of STF experts").  ETSI cannot set up contracts directly with individuals.

The expert remains an employee of his/her Organization, which will continue to pay salary, social security, secondment allowances and comply with any other legal obligation of an employer however, during his/her work for the STF, the expert will respect the internal rules of ETSI as appropriate to achieve the technical standardization tasks, under the technical guidance of the reference TB and the supervision of the ETSI Director-General, with regard to the application of the ETSI working procedures and the production of the ETSI deliverables.  For the purpose of the management of the STFs, the ETSI Director-General is assisted by the ETSI Secretariat and is represented by the STF Manager.

ETSI will compensate the Company for the contribution provided by the expert to the STF.  The reference rate is 600 € per working day, including all the cost to perform the work and, in particular, the travel and subsistence costs to participate in the STF working sessions.

ETSI will reimburse, in addition, the cost for mission travels required to represent the STF in meeting and events, with the preliminary authorization of the ETSI Secretariat.

Compensation principles and voluntary contribution

 The compensation for the ETSI Member to make the expert available is not intended to be on a commercial basis, nor as a "salary" for the expert.  The contribution to the progress of the deliverables and not the interest for the contractual compensation shall constitute the main motivation to send experts to the Specialist Task Forces.

 ETSI Members are expected to contribute to the standardization work by sending experts to work in the ETSI premises for relatively short periods of time, on specific subjects.

 If the duration of the contribution is extended beyond a minimum duration or the work does not require travelling to ETSI, the Member should be prepared to offer part of the contribution on a voluntary basis, according to the normal practice of standardization work.

The LoE may therefore include the requirement for the expert to provide a certain amount of voluntary contribution to the STF work.  The ETSI Secretariat is responsible to manage the voluntary contribution, in order to achieve the overall objectives stated in the STF ToR and to ensure a fair distribution of the effort between the experts. The indicative guidelines are defined in the voluntary contribution allocation criteria.

Maximum number of working days per year

In accordance with the French Work Regulations, ETSI shall limit the participation of experts in STFs over long continuous periods: the total number of 220 contracted working days during a calendar year shall not be exceeded, in any case.

In order to avoid that ETSI becomes their exclusive customer, experts who are self-employed consultants or employed by Companies for which ETSI is the main customer cannot be contracted for more than 150 working days during a calendar year.

These limitations take into account all contracts with ETSI of the expert and of the Company for Specialist Task Forces as well as for other activities. If the contractual remuneration is a lump sum, this will be converted in an equivalent amount of working days, with reference to the standard remuneration of 600 EUR/day.

Manpower, duration and nominated expert(s)

The LoE is established for a certain number of working days over a defined period, estimated by the Company.

The actual compensation will be proportional to the number of working days actually performed by the expert during that period and subject to the achievement of the STF objectives.  If either the estimated number of working days or the defined period are not sufficient to complete the work, the Company will have to negotiate with ETSI a possible extension of the LoE, prior to the execution of the additional work.

The LoE requires the participation of a nominated expert, who has been selected by ETSI because of his/her skills, knowledge and experience of the subject.  The expert cannot be replaced by the Company without the preliminary agreement of ETSI. If the expert is not able to complete the engagement, for whatever reason, the Company may propose his/her replacement with another expert of equivalent qualification, however ETSI reserves the right to accept the proposed replacement or to terminate the engagement, after consultation with the reference TB.

Resolution of conflicts

The following provisions have been taken to resolve conflicts at different levels, proportional to the nature and importance of the misunderstanding/conflict:

1st level: supervisors

To guard against "wrong turns" that may rise from different interpretation of the engagement and/or its’ governing rules, both ETSI and the Company designate a "Supervisor", to serve as liaison to resolve minor inconsistencies.  If problems arise, the Supervisors must be available to participate in preliminary informal discussions on fact-findings, on a weekly basis.

The ETSI Supervisor is the STF Manager, Mr. Alberto Berrini
alberto.berrini@etsi.org, tel: +33 4 9294 4264

2nd level: LoE signatories

If the conflict cannot be resolved between the Supervisors, then the issue will be raised at the level of the Signatories of the LoE.

3rd level: termination of the engagement

The LoE can be terminated by each of the parties by giving one-month formal notice.

4th level : jurisdiction

This engagement is governed under French law.  In the event that a mutual agreement proves impossible at all levels, the French Courts will have exclusive jurisdiction to determine the dispute.