28/09/2026
Third-Party accreditations – are they worth it?
On 24 September Wye Valley Group’s Quality Manager Gavin Pettigrew joined the panel at the second Construction & Trade Showcase, hosted by Herefordshire Means Business at NMITE in Hereford, for a discussion and Q&A on third-party accreditations.
It's a topic that divides the room. For many businesses, smaller ones especially, these desktop accreditations take a serious amount of admin time and money. But they exist for a reason: clients need to show due diligence when appointing subcontractors and suppliers. The alternative is long, client-specific questionnaires that cost even more hours.
SSIP (Safety Schemes in Procurement) was set up to cut that duplication, so businesses don't have to gain and pay for multiple accreditations. It has been a partial success. Many clients still insist on a named scheme rather than accepting an SSIP equivalent, usually because procurement policies are written without a clear understanding of how SSIP works, or because contract arrangements simply don't suit SMEs.
SSIP is here for the short and medium term, so my message to fellow SMEs is twofold:
• Use your accreditations to stand out in a crowded market. They're evidence of how you run your business, not just a box ticked.
• Ask the hard question when a client demands a specific scheme: will you accept an SSIP-recognised equivalent, and if not, why not? That's how SMEs get to compete fairly.
Thanks to Herefordshire Means Business and NMITE for hosting, and to everyone who came with questions.
At Wye Valley Group across our various businesses we hold Constructionline Gold, Veriforce CHAS Elite & Achillies UVDB (Utilities Sector), alongside our UKAS ISO 9001, 14001 and 45001 (+SSIP) certified management system. If you're a local business working through the process, I'm always happy to share what we've learned.
What are your thoughts?
