Name: SafeContractor
Address: Axys House Heol Crochendy, Nantgarw, Cardiff, Wales
Rating: 4.27

“I submitted my renewal questionnaire and documents on 29 December 2020. Our accreditation expired on 25 Jan 2021. When I hadn't heard anything from SafeContractor I contacted them on 25th Jan and was told that no one had looked at our case yet, but an auditor would deal with our accreditation in the next couple of days. This then did go smoothly and we received our new certificate on 27th Jan 2021. It seems as though SafeContractor is hoping that we will upgrade and pay more for Fast-track service, and yet you had sat on our documents and done nothing for four weeks. I submit our renewal documents on time each year. I think that Safecontractor could be more efficient and review our documentation before the certificate expires. COVID is no excuse, as I had exactly the same experience last year. Thank you to Huw Williams-Beynon who was efficient and helpful on the phone.”

Helpful Report

Posted 4 years ago

Thank you for your review, and congratulations on your SafeContractor accreditation. Our standard audit time taken from all required documents being submitted is 20 working days for a technical officer to review your h&s assessment. Our team endeavour to assess all questionnaires as quickly as possible and to provide as much assistance as possible. If you would like to upgrade your package to have an express audit included or to include assistance from our team of expert IOSH and NEBOSH qualified auditors then this option is available to you also. To make the process faster next year, we recommend updating your documents throughout the year via our online portal, ready for when the questionnaire can be submitted 30 days before expiry. Please accept our apologies for any issues caused by the delay this year.

Posted 4 years ago

“After many years of satisfactory application this year has proved very difficult. The Safecontractor auditor appeared to wish to impose arrangements on the company that were not appropriate to our business and would have added unnecessary drain on our resources. We had to involve our health and safety advisor to push back on this pressure (we pride ourselves on being able to make the application ourselves). Even when he became involved and confirmed our arrangements were satisfactory it took over a week for Safecontractor to respond to emails and then protracted discussions until our point was accepted - overall very difficult process and left us with a feeling that the audit has not fairly reflected the nature of our business and thoroughness of our arrangements - never had issues with this topic on previous audit Even this feedback sheet is problematical - given options for how we communicated we used email and phone but can only select one or the other - hopeless”

Helpful Report

Posted 4 years ago

Thank you for your review, and congratulations on your SafeContractor accreditation. As part of awarding our UK-leading accreditation annually, our team of expert auditors need to ensure that all contractors have the relevant documentation in place to comply with health and safety legislation. Our audit team try to ensure that they make any documentation requirements very clear, however if at any point you have any queries about how these apply to your business then please do not hesitate to contact your auditor directly, who will be happy to support you.

Posted 4 years ago

“The process seems a bit hap hazard. There is not mention of not having to complete certain elements of the process if you have another SSIP accreditation such as CHAS. Upon asking, we were advised to not upload certain documents, as these were covered by the other accreditation. The assessor then requested these after all. It would maybe be an idea to decide upon a company policy on this. We were also asked by the assessor to provide evidence that we do not recall being asked for in the assessment process.”

Helpful Report

Posted 4 years ago

Thank you for your review, and congratulations on your SafeContractor accreditation. As part of awarding our UK-leading accreditation annually, our team of expert auditors need to ensure that all contractors have the relevant documentation in place to comply with health and safety legislation. Many client organisations choose to work with us because SafeContractor goes beyond the 14-point core SSIP criteria to ask risk-based questions tailored to contractor’s business profile. If you have an active accreditation elsewhere, then you need to let our team know about this when you renew your membership so that they can ensure your membership places you on the appropriate audit level. This means that you can complete a shorter audit if using another accreditation as Deem To Satisfy, or alternatively you could gain a full SafeContractor accreditation to FastTrack to other SSIP schemes with up to a 77% discount. Please see the SSIP deem to satisfy chart for more information: https://ssip.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/Deem-to-Satisfy-Chart-07.10.2020.pdf

Posted 4 years ago

“This was the first year we didn't use the premium. And we were disappointed on the time for someone to mark/check our accreditation. This was never explained when we went for the lower membership. I was told a date it would be returned by, which was fine. But Then I had a call to say no way was it going to be back by then, but if we paid another £60 it would be quicker...... really???? Came across as just a money making attempt. Quite poor.”

Helpful Report

Posted 4 years ago

Thank you for your review, and congratulations on your SafeContractor accreditation. Our standard audit time taken from all required documents being submitted is 20 working days for a technical officer to review your h&s assessment. If you would like to upgrade your package to include assistance from our team of expert IOSH and NEBOSH qualified auditors then this option is available to you also. To make the process faster next year, we recommend updating your documents throughout the year via our online portal, ready for when the questionnaire can be submitted 30 days before expiry. If you have any further queries about how this works then please don't hesitate to get in touch with our team directly.

Posted 4 years ago

“Pretty shoddy this time, communications were difficult and the understanding of our trade poor with our submissions. I am currently reviewing if SafeContractor will be my preferred assessed route to SSIP at our next renewal.”

Helpful Report

Posted 4 years ago

Thank you for feeding back on your accreditation experience. We're sorry to learn that the process did not meet your expectations. We endeavour to make the audit as relevant as possible to the work activities carried out by your business. As part the audit, our team must need to ensure that all contractors have relevant documentation in place to comply with health and safety legislation. If you require further assistance or would like to discuss your business needs in more detail please do not hesitate to contact your auditor directly.

Posted 4 years ago

“Again, as per our comments last year renewal was overly painful in terms of repetition of information needed. We were told again that it would be far simpler, not the case and very time consuming.”

Helpful Report

Posted 4 years ago

Thank you for your review, and congratulations on your SafeContractor accreditation. As part of awarding our UK-leading accreditation annually, our team of expert auditors need to ensure that all contractors have the relevant documentation in place to comply with health and safety legislation. Many client organisations choose to work with us because SafeContractor goes beyond the 14-point core SSIP criteria to ask risk-based questions tailored to contractor’s business profile.

Posted 4 years ago

“We have been members for many years and you used to get your submitted application back within a week or so, it now takes minimum of 4 weeks unless you want to pay extra for a faster service. This seems as though you a penalised for not wanting to spend extra money on a service you already pay for. We are now looking at builder profile and alternates for next year.”

Helpful Report

Posted 4 years ago

Thank you for your review, and congratulations on your SafeContractor accreditation. Our standard audit time taken from all documents being submitted is 4 weeks for an auditor to complete your h&s assessment. Our team endeavour to assess all questionnaires as quickly as possible and to provide as much assistance as possible. However if you would like to upgrade your package to have an express audit included or to include assistance from our team of expert IOSH and NEBOSH qualified auditors then this option is available to you also. To make the process faster next year, we recommend updating your documents throughout the year via our online portal, ready for when the questionnaire can be submitted 30 days before expiry.

Posted 4 years ago

“disappointing”

Helpful Report

Posted 4 years ago

We're sorry to learn that you were disappointed with your accreditation experience - please provide further details of any issues you experienced via https://www.safecontractor.com/feedback so that we can pass on and ask our Technical Team Leader to investigate?

Posted 4 years ago

“It seemed very drawn out this year. We have sailed through the past couple of years but this year there was lots of comeback, when we had provided pretty much the same information as in previous years, without explanation.”

Helpful Report

Posted 4 years ago

Thank you for your review, and congratulations on your SafeContractor accreditation. As part of awarding our UK-leading accreditation annually, our team of expert auditors need to ensure that all contractors have the relevant documentation in place to comply with health and safety legislation. Our audit team try to ensure that they make any outstanding documentations very clear, however if at any point you have any queries about how these requirements apply to your business then please do not hesitate to contact your auditor directly, who will be happy to support you.

Posted 4 years ago

“We submitted on 19th October and advised it would be 30 working days for approval. I chased and received an email from Archie Davies advising our deadline was the 16th November and we would receive an update on that day. On this day you asked us to confirm some information and then added another 5 working days on to when we would receive an update. It would of been helpful if this information which was only about numbers asked previous to this so that additional time was not added as you have not requested any additional information from us”

Helpful Report

Posted 4 years ago

Thank you for your review, and congratulations on your SafeContractor accreditation. Our audit process consists of an initial check by a Technical Support Officer and final sign off by and Auditor. On occasion, you may be asked to supply additional information by the Auditor to ensure that you have provided all relevant documentation in place to comply with health and safety legislation. Please accept our apologies for any inconvenience that this delay may have caused you. To make the process faster next year, we recommend updating your documents throughout the year via our online portal, ready for when the questionnaire can be submitted 30 days before expiry. If you have any further queries about how this works then please don't hesitate to get in touch with our team directly.

Posted 4 years ago

“For a renewal it took too long to assess my application, normally quicker than this it said 20 working days ( unless you pay an upgraded fee) and I had to contact after 20 days as it had not been checked. A little disappointed as normally a great service I know we are in strange times but it is like it for all businesses and we have had 6 months to sort out issues.”

Helpful Report

Posted 4 years ago

Thank you for your review, and congratulations on your SafeContractor accreditation. Our standard audit time taken from all documents being submitted is 4 weeks for an auditor to complete your h&s assessment. Our team endeavour to assess all questionnaires as quickly as possible and to provide as much assistance as possible. However if you would like to upgrade your package to have an express audit included or to include assistance from our team of expert IOSH and NEBOSH qualified auditors then this option is available to you also. To make the process faster next year, we recommend updating your documents throughout the year via our online portal, ready for when the questionnaire can be submitted 30 days before expiry. If you have any further queries about how this works then please don't hesitate to get in touch with our team directly.

Posted 4 years ago

“The way some questions are worded it is hard to understand what is required and how it applies to our business”

Helpful Report

Posted 4 years ago

Thank you for your review, and congratulations on your SafeContractor accreditation. Our audit team try to ensure that they make any outstanding documentations very clear, however if at any point you have any queries about how these requirements apply to your business then please do not hesitate to contact your auditor directly, who will be happy to support you.

Posted 4 years ago

“It was more difficult in obtaining the required information you wanted from our assessor, leading to backwards and forwards with the information needed. Several times it was at the last minute changes were required. As to some reason we had a Tuesday deadline to meet, otherwise we were told we would have to resubmit. In the end accreditation was achieved Acceptable”

Helpful Report

Posted 4 years ago

Thank you for your review, and congratulations on your SafeContractor accreditation. Our audit process consists of an initial check by a Technical Support Officer and final sign off by and Auditor. On occasion, you may be asked to supply additional information by the Auditor to ensure that you have provided all relevant documentation in place to comply with health and safety legislation. Our audit team try to ensure that they make any outstanding documentations very clear, however if at any point you have any queries about how these requirements apply to your business or the deadline to submit them then please do not hesitate to contact your auditor directly, who will be happy to support you.

Posted 4 years ago

“i find health and safety audit quite time consuming when the only thing that has changed is company liability insurance”

Helpful Report

Posted 4 years ago

Thank you for your review, and congratulations on your SafeContractor accreditation. As part of awarding our UK-leading accreditation annually, our team of expert auditors need to ensure that all contractors have the relevant documentation in place to comply with health and safety legislation.

Posted 4 years ago

“The help I received from all staff was perfect and talked me through the process in easy to understand terms, the staff are very good. My only issue is the high cost almost £600.00 for a very small business with 2 staff and 1 labour only contractor (when needed) carrying out low risk work in low risk environments. I really think you should take this into consideration and charge a low cost set at £150.00 for the service.”

Helpful Report

Posted 4 years ago

Thank you for your feedback! Pleased that our team were able to support you through to successfully achieving accreditation. Please be advised that our prices are based on employee numbers and service level package rather than the risk level of work carried out. Achieving our UK-leading accreditation makes you visible to over 480 organisations who only work with SafeContractor members.

Posted 4 years ago

“Only issue is the amount of time taken to receive the accreditation without paying for the Fasttrack service.”

Helpful Report

Posted 4 years ago

Thank you for your review, and congratulations on your SafeContractor accreditation. As part of awarding our UK-leading accreditation annually, our team of expert auditors need to ensure that all contractors have the relevant documentation in place to comply with health and safety legislation. To make the process faster next year, we recommend updating your documents throughout the year via our online portal, ready for when the questionnaire can be submitted 30 days before expiry. If you have any further queries about how this works then please don't hesitate to get in touch with our team directly.

Posted 4 years ago

“I thought the process was okay, but the time it took to get there was not as it should have been according to your description. It took too long for the pre assessment when I submitted what was requested by return”

Helpful Report

Posted 4 years ago

Thank you for your review, and congratulations on your SafeContractor accreditation. As part of awarding our UK-leading accreditation annually, our team of expert auditors need to ensure that all contractors have the relevant documentation in place to comply with health and safety legislation. To make the process faster next year, we recommend updating your documents throughout the year via our online portal, ready for when the questionnaire can be submitted 30 days before expiry. If you have any further queries about how this works then please don't hesitate to get in touch with our team directly.

Posted 4 years ago

“I am new to role and it is part of my role to ensure all of our accreditations are up to date. This is the first time I have used SafeContractor, and whilst having the accreditation is important to us, the system is not user friendly in the slightest, especially when you have never used it before. When you request additional evidence via email it suggests the auditor hasn't actually looked at all the evidence initially supplied as what they were asking for had already been submitted. I had to contact SafeContractor by phone to understand what exactly was required; I wasn't able to speak to my rep, so I waited for our rep to call me back, and was asked to reply via email with a statement explaining the evidence that had been submitted - why can we not speak to the actual person auditing us? and why are we not able to submit this statement as free text initially - it would have reduced so much time spent on the renewal. I appreciate that every company that applies for this accreditation will do everything slightly differently depending on their company and that will make auditing tough, notwithstanding the difficulty the current pandemic presents to how all businesses can feasibly operate. This is not an experience I look forward to repeating next year.”

Helpful Report

Posted 4 years ago

Thank you for your review, and congratulations on your SafeContractor accreditation. Our audit process consists of an initial check by a Technical Support Officer and final sign off by and Auditor. On occasion, you may be asked to supply additional information by an available member of our Audit team to ensure that you have provided all relevant documentation in place to comply with health and safety legislation. You are asked to provide a statement via email to ensure that the information you have provided is recorded and easily referred back to by the auditor, should they need to provide any further guidance. We’re sorry to learn that you found this process difficult. To make the process easier next year, we recommend updating your documents throughout the year via our online portal, ready for when the questionnaire can be submitted 30 days before expiry. If you have any further queries about how this works then please don't hesitate to get in touch with our team directly.

Posted 4 years ago

“Very slow sorting out problems will probably find different company next year”

Helpful Report

Posted 4 years ago

We're sorry to learn that you experienced problems when gaining your accreditation. Please provide us with more information about the issues you encountered so that we can refer these to our Technical Team Leader for investigation: https://www.safecontractor.com/feedback

Posted 4 years ago

“Again, as last year, I could not download the questionnaire, nor did it arrive promptly. Two blokes I spoke to initially referred me to my IT dept (we are a team of 3 people! so no IT department) and remove cookies and that there was nothing wrong with your system. It took talking to Laura Davies who copied and pasted it onto a word document and emailed it to me (as Danielle Thomas did last year) for me to be able to complete my accreditation. Several hours wasted on this for me!!!”

Helpful Report

Posted 4 years ago

Thank you for your review, and congratulations on your SafeContractor accreditation. Sorry to learn of the technical issues you experienced with the questionnaire. We recommend testing your accessibility on a different browser if you do experience difficulties, and will ensure this is flagged with our technical team. We're pleased to learn that Laura was able to copy the questionnaire for you this time. If you experience accessibility issues next year, we recommend using the same question set you did (in the word document) this time to prepare your documents throughout the year. You can then submit this to your auditor 30 days before your accreditation expiry. Please accept our apologies for any inconvenience and if you have any further queries about how this works then please don't hesitate to get in touch with our team directly.

Posted 4 years ago

Shipping & Delivery
Delivery Methods	Postal Service
Average Delivery Time	Within 5 Days
On-time Delivery	Greater than 55%
Accurate And Undamaged Orders	95%
Customer Service
Communication Channels	Telephone, Email, Live Chat
Queries Resolved In	Under An Hour
Customer Service	4.1 out of 5

SafeContractor Reviews