What is CanQualify’s offer?
We provide supplier prequalification services and contractor management systems for clients who hire third-party contractors, suppliers, vendors, and subcontractors. That means we prequalify (or prescreen) the suppliers, so our clients don’t have to.
There are many companies that help suppliers get registered through other contractor management services because, the process can be so long and confusing with competitors, suppliers often feel like giving up. That causes additional expenses and increases supplier irritation.
Competitors cause a lot of frustrations for suppliers due to:
- High costs
- Confusing requirements
- Lack of support
- Length of processing time and
- Poor customer service
We solve all those frustrations with our customizable dashboard. It is simple to use and easy to navigate. The requirements are straightforward and clearly communicated. This helps streamline the process thus, reducing costs.
We offer our customers a better way to qualify and manage suppliers. We have genuine customer support, and we treat the suppliers like our own customers.
What problem(s) are you solving for your customers?
You would think most large companies already have a way to manage and prequalify their contractors, but often they do not. Or, they have one person trying to do all that work by themselves. However, that person typically has other jobs to perform as well, so prequalifying the contractors often becomes a disorganized mess.
As is often the case, we see the individual employee receive the prequalification forms (PQF) from contractors, only to put that form into a filing cabinet. Sometimes they even collect Certificates of Insurance (COI) and those often get lost in the same cabinet. That’s not the employees fault though. With no centralized systems in place to convert the data, what other options are there?
At CanQualify, we set up notifications so, for example, we know when the Insurance Certificate expires ahead of time so we can inform all parties to recertify.
We provide the software needed to effectively manage and prequalify suppliers, contractors, vendors, subcontractors, and their employees. This software compiles all the data and centralizes it into one location and makes it accessible to whomever in the organization needs access to it. The clients hold the keys but the contractors decide which client(s) have access to their data.
Our experienced team collects the safety data and other pertinent information our clients request, such as incident reports, EMR certifications, Loss Run reports, etc. We also have a section for documents to be stored like Terms & Conditions (T&Cs), Master Service Agreements (MSAs), Policies, Disclosures, etc.
We show clients which suppliers are meeting their requirements, which fall just short, and which just simply do not meet them at all. Our job is not to “disqualify” suppliers, but to collect, organize and provide the information to the client so they can make an informed decision.
A company can still hire a supplier that falls under their benchmarks if they choose because they can make an exception. Again, our clients hold the keys. CanQualify provides the data. We also have multiple levels of user access from “Administrator” down to “View Only.” The guard at the worksite can log in and easily see if a person is approved to enter the site. We are working on a mobile app for speed of use in the field. Stay tuned!
Why Work With CanQualify?
The slogan for our process is, “A better way to qualify and manage suppliers” and we have worked hard to own these words. We treat the suppliers as if they were our own customers. Our goal is to provide the best service we can and be honest in all our dealings, bottom line.
We have a very robust dashboard that is also very simple to navigate.
Some of our competitors can leave the contractors with a bad experience because they treat them as if the contractor has no choice. The client requires it, so they don’t always treat the contractors fairly and often raise the costs. We do not upgrade our contractors’ services without their knowledge. Or worse, upgrade them and not tell them until they get invoiced. This is both unethical and extremely frustrating.
Some competitors often take weeks to complete updates – sometimes for even simple tasks. It’s not unheard of taking a couple months for a supplier to get through the prequalification process.
We measure our process in days, not weeks. If all requested data is provided, our typical turnaround time is 24-48 hours for reviews, and can often complete the process on the same day.
Speed of results is a huge deal for CanQualify. We never want to be the cause of a project being delayed because we are behind on our work and slow to complete a contractor review.
We listen carefully to our client’s needs and we try hard to meet them. We implemented multiple modifications, additional reports, and new features based on both our client’s and contractor’s input. Our goal is to make the dashboard easier and more relevant for all users.
Our pricing is also very reasonable and affordable to even smaller contractors.
What is CanQualify’s Story {How did CQ get to where they are (the journey to the product)}?
The simple answer is that CanQualify saw a need in the Contractor Management System industry that our competitors were not filling. We wanted a better way to do things, to provide a product and service the way it should be.
One of our competitors has a blanket policy for data collection which can actually cause additional liability. If there is a serious incident and OSHA comes on-site and sees that a company has a policy in place for work they don’t usually perform, they are not going to care that they don’t perform the actual work. It’s in their policy.
For example, if a contractor that never works at heights is still required (by one of the competitors) to have a policy for fall protection anyway, that leaves the door wide open for an OSHA finding; what we call “audit fodder.”
Other Contract Management companies are jumping on the bandwagon that we built.
They are still playing catch up, but we at CanQualify are confident with our abilities as leaders in this industry. We look forward to the day when all Contract Management companies take care of their suppliers and contractors the way they should be, with honesty and respect.
What is your Customer’s Story (What’s Their Story/Stress Level/Pains & Frustrations)?
Some companies delegate supplier prequalification duties to their procurement department, which can cause frustration with the safety personnel and managers, who typically work alongside the contractors.
When there are multiple sites, there can be different requirements at each site. Think of how different local and federal requirements are to private business requirements. This has an untold number of possible events that can go wrong, including no set standards for prequalification and safety requirements.
It gets even worse when the person who sets the requirements for a specific site no longer works there.
Having a set requirement for all sites is a stress reliever because it takes that burden off the individual site manager. That doesn’t mean a blanket policy – that all sites have to qualify for the same requirements – because not all sites perform the same work. But having a set policy for each site and the requirements for those individual sites.
We work with many companies that have different site requirements based specifically on the work performed. CanQualify only collects the relevant data based on the requirements for each site and sets a baseline for compliance.
Frustration can also arise when smaller companies don’t get approved through a competitor because they are “too small” and don’t have the required documentation; OSHA doesn’t require reports for companies with less than 10 employees. Or, even more often, they simply can’t afford the cost of competitors. This leads to the hiring client using two system: one for the larger contractors and another for the smaller ones. That defeats the purpose of centralizing the data.
We work with smaller suppliers and can still get them approved.
Furthermore, often the HSE manager, or sometimes even a small group, is over-burdened with collecting all their contractor’s prequalification data. This can cause suppliers working on-site with expired certificates and lapsed training because notifications are difficult to set up and follow-up is even harder. At CanQualify, we work well with individuals and small groups to make sure their training and certifications are up-to-date.
Collecting the safety data and requirements can become overwhelming. We help reduce most of that stress by taking the busy work off our customers’ hands. Our team does that for them and centralizes that data for easy access.
We even have different levels of access and customizable reporting. So, if a site manager only cares about a specific site they can narrow their search. But if a corporate manager wants to see all their sites, they have access to that as well. We can even set up view-only access which is helpful to the guards at gates or guard shacks. Our new mobile app will help all levels access their data at the press of a button.
Contact CanQualify to discover a powerful new alternative to the contractor management process.
Article by: Gary A. Wright, MS, CSP
Gary has been in the Safety & Health Industry for over 30 years. He has worked in the military, government, and private sectors and currently works as an Environmental, Safety & Health (ES&H) Coordinator in the Laboratory Safety Industry. He not only represents the safety industry, but also the safety worker.
