If you supply services or products to the construction or facilities management sectors, you’ll already know that demonstrating strong occupational health and safety management is essential.
Many clients now expect suppliers and contractors to complete a pre-qualification health and safety assessment before they can work on site. Without it, suppliers often find themselves repeatedly answering the same questions, submitting the same policies and completing multiple assessments for different buyers.
That’s exactly the problem SSIP was created to solve.
SSIP – Safety Schemes in Procurement – is an umbrella organisation that brings together over 50 recognised health and safety assessment schemes. By completing an assessment through an SSIP member scheme, suppliers can demonstrate that they meet core health and safety standards aligned withUK health and safety legislation.
The key advantage is mutual recognition. Once a supplier has successfully completed an SSIP assessment through a member scheme, other registered SSIP schemes will recognise that assessment. This recognition by other Registered Members helps reduce duplication and makes the procurement process faster and simpler.
For suppliers, this brings several important benefits:
- Access to more work opportunities
Many principal contractors, clients and buyers require SSIP certification as part of their pre-qualification process. Having it in place can help open doors to new projects. - Reduced paperwork
Instead of completing multiple health and safety questionnaires for different clientsor suppliers can rely on a single recognised assessment. - Demonstratingprofessionalism and competence
SSIP certification shows that your organisation has appropriate policies, procedures and controls in place to manage health and safety risks and meet legal responsibilities. - Saving time and money
By avoiding repeated assessments, suppliers can reduce administrative costs and focus on delivering their work.
In this blog series we will explain how suppliers can successfully pass an SSIP assessment, step by step. In the next article, we’ll start with the foundation of every successful application: your health and safety policy.
