University of Houston-Victoria

Purchasing Department

Contract Review by Office of General Counsel

Alterations of standard contracts, approved for System-wide use by the Office of General Counsel (OGC) or any agreement or contract required by a vendor must be reviewed and approved as to form by OGC, regardless of the source of funds or dollar amount of the order. This review requirement is cited in UHS Administrative Memorandum 03.A.05, paragraph 3.3:

"The form of all contracts must be reviewed and approved by the Office of Legal Counsel before execution."

Normally, the only agreement needed for most University purchases is either an institutional Purchase Order issued through the Purchasing Department or a Delegated Departmental Order issued directly by a department or school. Occasionally, however, a vendor will require execution of a separate corporate or company agreement in addition to the University order. These types of contracts are frequently associated with equipment leases, pest control services, maintenance agreements and licensing agreements, to name a few. If a separate contract is required by a vendor for execution, the vendor should be immediately advised that the agreement must be reviewed by UHS OGC as to form and that this can take anywhere from 21 to 30 days depending upon workload. The procurement process stops at this point, pending the outcome of the review.

The school or department must forward unsigned original contracts to Business Services for review by OGC. Business Services is a liaison between this campus and OGC on contract related matters and will follow up as needed on contract review status.

It must be emphasized that only certain individuals are authorized to execute contracts within their area of responsibility on behalf of the University. For more information on please refer to this link.