After publishing a guide for schools, parents and school governing bodies on pro-competitive principles that should be considered for the procurement of school uniform and learning materials in 2021, the Competition Commission confirms it is still working with the Department of Basic Education (DBE) to ensure compliance.

The DBE’s provincial offices have also been helping the commission to distribute educational material and raising awareness among schools and governing bodies on the guidelines. 

The commission says one of the biggest challenges has been the monitoring of compliance by schools given the large number of schools in the country.

Currently, the commission is collaborating with the DBE to develop a tool that will monitor suppliers and prices of school uniforms to ensure compliance with the guidelines.

Once finalised, the tool will be distributed to all schools and will assist the commission and the DBE to determine non-compliance with the guidelines, as well as identify anticompetitive behaviour in the school uniform market, including excessive pricing and the exclusion of small and medium-sized firms owing to these agreements.

In turn, the commission will use the data received from the tool to ensure fair and competitive pricing of school uniforms and to promote the entry and/or expansion of small suppliers in the school uniform market.

The commission anticipates the tool to be available in all schools before the end of this year, with schools then being encouraged to submit data, which will be monitored by the commission to ensure competitive pricing and the entry of small and medium-sized suppliers in the market, as well as to an eliminate exclusive agreements.

The commission had received various complaints since 2010 about schools signing exclusive supply agreements with specific suppliers of school uniform – agreements which were entered into without any transparent or competitive bidding process.

This resulted in substantial prevention or lessening of competition in the market and parents had to pay higher prices for school essentials.

Since the commission’s official investigation in 2017, it has set out to enhance competition in the procurement of school uniform and other learning-related goods and services, with suggestions having been made in the form of guidelines to schools.

Among the guidelines, which will be monitored by the new tool, are policies that promote procompetitive procurement practices, parents being involved in the procurement process of schools and schools’ understanding of the benefits of competition in the sale of school uniform and learning material.

Between 2020 and 2025, the commission received 490 complaints related to school uniform and learning material pricing; however, it was able to resolve 465 of these complaints.

The commission encourages parents and guardians to shop around and exercise their right to choose and actively pursue comparable quality at the lowest price. They should also encourage their schools to implement the guidelines on the procurement of school uniform and learning material.

Should parents find that schools are ignoring the guidelines, they can submit a complaint to the commission.