Important notice from Constructionline and the UK’s main contractors

We would like to update you on behalf of many of the UK’s largest main contractor firms who manage their supply chain risk on the Constructionline network.

The group met remotely on the 20th March, and again on the 24th March, to discuss a coordinated effort to best manage the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic in the construction industry.

All main contractors and Constructionline fully recognise the difficulty of the current situation for suppliers regarding interruption to work and the ongoing uncertainty. The ongoing and long term medical and financial health of the construction industry is of paramount importance to all involved.

COVID-19 Supplier questions

The main contractor group have requested that Constructionline make available a small subset of questions related to the preparedness of Suppliers for the COVID-19 pandemic and to track the ongoing impact of the pandemic on their staff and businesses. There will be no additional cost to completing these questions on the Constructionline platform.

These questions will not be assessed or be used to calculate your Constructionline verification status.

The purpose of the question is as follows:

• They will be used by contractors to assist in their PQQ process.
• They will be used by contractors to assess the readiness of their supply chain and understand the ongoing impact of COVID-19.
• By coordinating a common set of questions, the group are trying to prevent many suppliers having to provide the same information multiple times.
• To enable main contractors, and the industry at large, to evidence that the construction industry is adopting the recommended COVID-19 Standard Operating Procedures.
• To get feedback from Suppliers as to how the main contractors may be able to assist them through this difficult time.
• To proactively prepare suppliers not currently working with the main contractors to be COVID-19 ready to minimise the time to onboard them as a result of wider supply chain disruption. Providing this information may increase the likelihood that you are selected to join a main contractor’s supply chain over the coming months.

Constructionline will make this data available to all buyers on the Constructionline platform which should result in a reduction in requests for similar information from buyers not in this group.
These questions should take no more than 15 minutes to complete.

Maintaining a verified status

The main contractor group acknowledged that there was a high likelihood of supply chain disruption over the coming weeks and months as a result of illness and financial challenges. This will result in the main contractors needing to call on new suppliers at short notice and have requested that all suppliers look to ensure they get and/or maintain their Verified status to reduce the time required to onboard a new supplier. To assist with this, Constructionline have agreed to provide the Fast Track process free of charge to all existing suppliers on the Constructionline network to assist them in proactive achieving a Verified status. This will mean that any supplier taking up that option will be provided dedicated assistance from a verification specialist and their assessments will be undertaken in 2 working days or less, a service normally costing up to £395+VAT.

The main contractor group and Constructionline are all committed to assisting Suppliers through this difficult time and will be meeting regularly to assess the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and to identify approaches to ensuring the medical and financial health of the construction supplier community and further communications will be issued as appropriate. The group wanted to emphasise their collective commitment to keep the industry going over the coming weeks and months.