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PRO MemberPermalink Reply by Dan Frazer Gardening on January 27, 2012 at 19:46

Justin there are so many ways of getting work, you have to try anything and they can all work in their own way.

T&Cs - just have a think about YOUR business and what you need to cover. Basic issues like payment terms, purchase of items for contracts and getting paid for them, how you deal with complaints, damage to underground cabling that's not correctly fitted or made known to you, what waste you will remove, site access and cancelled visits, dog foul, quote validity and contract period, etc.

Perhaps things like time of work, noise etc too.

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PRO MemberPermalink Reply by Graeme @ BGS on January 27, 2012 at 20:17

You have nothing to loose by writing to these type of businesses (particularly the HA's) but may be more prudent to find out the head office and write in asking to be added to the approved suppliers for their properties within your location.

You will probably also find that most of the HA's and nursing homes probably have a service provider currently in place and working to a contract that may not be up for renewal for a year or so. However, getting your company name out in front of the right people and showing a willness to discuss requirements etc. never goes a miss.

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PRO MemberPermalink Reply by Brian www.mibservices.co.uk on January 27, 2012 at 21:55

Hi Justin, whats your company setup, ie: kit, qualifications chas, safecontractor, constructionline, etc, insurance, H&S policies etc ? These are all questions that a HA will ask of you before getting on their supplier list. Lots of red tape and lots of company H & S documentation required. Chances are you will have to increase your insurance cover, submit RAMS etc. Best to have most or all of these in place prior to contacting them. If your not set up in this way i would do so before contacting the Supplier Managers of these potential new customers. As you have only been going less than a year I would suggest you try, less "stressfull" commercial clients. By that I mean factorys, industrial estates and offices with gardens or grounds. They are more likely to be more responsive to your inquiry as they will probably not have such a strict supplier qualification system in place and your time spent on trying to gain commercial clients would be more fruitfull. HA are very difficult to get into because they usually use a large maintenance contractor to do all their landscaping. You could do worse than trying to find out who that is, but they would require you to have the same set up as them as far as RAMS H&S and insurance is concerned.

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Permalink Reply by Justin Hemming on January 28, 2012 at 11:32

Hi all, thanks for that, lots to go on.

At the moment I have 5 million public liability, c&g horticulture, chainsaw certificates, risk assessment and method statements.

I am looking at safe contractor accreditation. How long does this take?

Cheers

Justin

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PRO MemberPermalink Reply by Brian www.mibservices.co.uk on January 28, 2012 at 13:15

There are three members on here that i know of that are safecontractor accredited and a couple who are currently going through their audit process at the moment ( Im currently going through my third year audit now ), so plenty of advice available on that if you want to go ahead with it. It will take around 3-6 weeks, depending on how good your RAMS etc are.


Justin Hemming said:

Hi all, thanks for that, lots to go on.

At the moment I have 5 million public liability, c&g horticulture, chainsaw certificates, risk assessment and method statements.

I am looking at safe contractor accreditation. How long does this take?

Cheers

Justin

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