Gaining accreditation in CHAS/ SafeContractor / Constructionline / SMAS 

CHAS – Contractors Health and Safety Assessment Scheme

CHAS is a national database of contractors who have completed a Health and Safety assessment and demonstrated adequate compliance and management standards. This enables them to work on local authority as well as other members’ contracts, subject to approval of other checks such as financial integrity.

The scheme has two main aims:

To improve Health and Safety in small to medium sized businesses

To reduce the need for repeated completion of Health and Safety forms when applying to members’ approved lists or tenders

CHAS client membership consists of local authorities, housing associations, NHS trusts, major contractors and blue chip companies nationwide. Once a contractor has been assessed and approved with one member, they can be accepted by any other signed up to CHAS.

SMAS

Constructionline is the UK register of pre-qualified construction services. Accreditation makes it unnecessary for prospective customers to carry out the traditional vetting processes, and for prospective suppliers to check credentials elsewhere. It saves all parties time, cost and resource.

Safecontractor is an accreditation scheme that assesses the health and safety competency of contractors and service providers. Customers have a legal obligation to ensure that external contractors and service providers working on their premises operate in a safe way. There is therefore a need to assess contractor’s health and safety arrangements and increasingly this is being carried out through Safecontractor, with many large organisations using it as their primary selection criterion.