Construction and maintenance tenders: the accreditations that decide the selection stage

In construction and maintenance tenders, the selection stage can end a bid before anyone reads a method statement. Buyers check health and safety accreditation, trade registrations and competence, and a missing or expired certificate can be enough to fail. This guide explains each one and how to keep them ready.

What the selection stage is checking

Most public construction procurements start with pass/fail tests. Under the Procurement Act 2023 these are called conditions of participation. The Act sets some limits on them:

they must be proportionate to the nature, complexity and cost of the contract
a buyer can ask for particular qualifications, but must allow for equivalents
a buyer cannot insist that insurance is in place before award, although it can ask for evidence that you will have it when the contract starts

Two practical points follow. If you hold an equivalent accreditation to the one named, say so and show why it is equivalent. And check every expiry date against both the submission deadline and the contract start date.

Safety Schemes in Procurement: the health and safety baseline

Safety Schemes in Procurement (SSIP) is an umbrella body for health and safety assessment schemes. It was founded in 2009 with the backing of the Health and Safety Executive (HSE). Member schemes assess contractors against the SSIP Core Criteria, which SSIP says are aligned with PAS 91, a construction pre-qualification questionnaire published as a Publicly Available Specification (PAS). PAS 91 has since been withdrawn, as explained below.

The key feature is mutual recognition. SSIP members agree to accept a current, valid approval from any other member. If you hold one SSIP certificate and a client asks for a different scheme, you can usually get a "deem to satisfy" certificate instead of a full new assessment.

Scheme named in tenders	How it links to SSIP
CHAS, now branded Veriforce CHAS	A founding SSIP member scheme
SafeContractor, run by Alcumus	An SSIP member scheme
Constructionline	Its paid memberships include SSIP through its Once For All Health & Safety scheme, which is the registered SSIP member

Watch the dependency. A deem to satisfy certificate relies on the original. SafeContractor, for example, says its certificate is suspended when your original SSIP certificate expires. Keep one master renewal date and work back from it.

The Common Assessment Standard

The Common Assessment Standard (CAS) is an industry-agreed question set and assessment standard for pre-qualifying construction suppliers. It was developed by Build UK and goes further than SSIP. Constructionline, for example, describes its CAS-aligned assessments as covering environmental management, quality management, equal opportunities, modern slavery and anti-bribery, alongside health and safety.

There are two levels: a desktop assessment and a site-based assessment that includes a visit. Choose the level your clients ask for. Only Build UK's Recognised Assessment Bodies can certify you, including Constructionline, Achilles and Veriforce CHAS. Build UK publishes the full list.

Build UK says central government and the wider public sector should use CAS to pre-qualify suppliers, in line with government Procurement Policy Note (PPN) 03/24. It has also said version 6 of the question set will be published on 1 November 2026. If your assessment falls around then, check which version applies.

The withdrawn British Standards questionnaire

PAS 91 was published by the British Standards Institution (BSI). The last edition was PAS 91:2013+A1:2017. BSI has since withdrawn it, and government guidance issued in 2023 told public bodies they could use CAS instead.

You will still see PAS 91-style modules in some questionnaires, and SSIP says its Core Criteria are aligned with it. Treat them the same way as CAS: answer every module asked, attach current evidence, and make sure policies are signed, dated and reviewed.

Trade registrations the buyer will check

Registration	What it means	Typical contracts
Gas Safe Register	The Gas Safety (Installation and Use) Regulations 1998 say an employer must be a member of a class of persons approved by HSE before its staff work on gas fittings. HSE says anyone employed to work on gas appliances in domestic premises must be Gas Safe registered and competent in that area of gas work.	Gas servicing, landlord gas safety checks, boiler replacements
NICEIC and other competent person schemes	A competent person scheme lets registered installers self-certify certain building work instead of seeking building regulations approval. For electrical installations in homes, the government's list of schemes includes Certsure (trading as NICEIC) and NAPIT, the National Association of Professional Inspectors and Testers.	Rewires, electrical upgrades, kitchen and bathroom programmes

Check that registrations cover the right categories of work, and that the operatives named in your resource plan hold them. A company registration with no competent engineer for the work type is a gap an evaluator can find.

Construction health and safety duties in your method statements

The Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2015 (CDM 2015) define construction work widely. It includes repair, upkeep, redecoration and other maintenance, so responsive repairs and planned works are usually in scope. The regulations set duties for clients, principal designers, designers, principal contractors, contractors and workers.

What evaluators look for in your method statements:

Your dutyholder role. State whether you will be contractor or principal contractor on this contract, and what that means you will do.
Plan, manage, monitor. Contractors must plan, manage and monitor work under their control so it is carried out without risks to health and safety. Show how job-specific risk assessments are written, briefed to operatives and checked.
The construction phase plan. On a single-contractor project the contractor prepares it. Where there is more than one contractor, the principal contractor prepares it and coordinates the others, inductions and site access.
Competence. CDM 2015 requires skills, knowledge and experience and, for organisations, organisational capability. Evidence it with a training matrix, supervision ratios and audit records, not a pile of individual cards.
Notification. Projects scheduled to last more than 30 working days with more than 20 workers on site at the same time, or to exceed 500 person days, must be notified by the client to the enforcing authority, usually HSE. Show you know when this applies.

Responsive repairs: performance targets you can hold

For social housing clients, repairs performance is now closely regulated. In England, social landlords report Tenant Satisfaction Measure RP02: the proportion of emergency and non-emergency repairs completed within their target timescale. Awaab's Law, in force for social landlords since 27 October 2025, requires emergency hazards to be investigated and made safe within 24 hours, and significant damp and mould hazards to be investigated within 10 working days. Further hazards are being added in phases.

Your key performance indicators (KPIs) sit inside those duties. Propose targets you can hold for the whole term, and say how you will prove them.

KPI	Evidence you can offer
Emergency repairs attended and made safe within target	Time-stamped job logs from report to make-safe
Routine repairs completed within target	Completion date against target date, job by job
Appointments made and kept	Booking system reports
Right first time	Jobs completed on the first visit, with recalls tracked
Resident satisfaction	Post-completion survey results, including the complaints

If you have figures from a similar contract, give the last 12 months, including the months you missed, and what you changed.

A pre-submission check

List every certificate the tender asks for, with its expiry date.
Flag anything that expires before contract start, and book the renewal.
Where you hold an equivalent, write one line explaining why.
Check insurance levels now, even if proof is only needed at contract start.

If you want your selection stage checked before you invest in the method statements, or help writing them, get in touch. You can also read how we approach construction and maintenance bids.

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