Supplier onboarding
A new supplier or subcontractor cannot be paid, and often should not start, until the file is complete: the account form, insurance certificates, accreditations, tax and bank details. This role sends the pack, reads what comes back and chases the gaps, so your buyer or contracts manager sees a finished file with the exceptions listed, not a trail of emails.
The role in brief
Sends each new supplier or subcontractor your pack, checks what comes back against your requirements, chases the gaps and presents a complete file for approval.
Your accounts or purchasing system, for example Xero or Sage 200, a shared mailbox and your supplier files folder.
The purchasing manager, quality manager or contracts manager. Every approval, every exception to your requirements and every set of bank details goes to them or to accounts.
Days from first request to approved supplier, files complete at approval, and suppliers waiting on a document.
Setting up a supplier is nobody's main job
A buyer, a purchase ledger clerk or the office manager does it, between other jobs. They email the form, wait, ask again for the insurance certificate that came as a quotation, key the details into the ledger and file what they have. It turns urgent when a first invoice arrives from a supplier nobody has set up, or a subcontractor is due on site tomorrow.
Work starts before the file is complete
The order is placed, or the gang is on site, while the insurance certificate is still promised. If something goes wrong in that gap you learn what cover the supplier really had after the claim, and your own customer or principal contractor asks to see a file that is not there.
A subcontractor paid before verification
Under the Construction Industry Scheme a contractor verifies each new subcontractor with HMRC before paying them, and HMRC gives the deduction rate: 20% if registered, 30% if unregistered, 0% with gross payment status. The details must match the registration exactly, so a UTR copied wrongly from an email delays the verification and the first payment.
Bank details taken on trust
A new supplier's bank details, and changes to old ones, usually arrive by email. They are the one part of the file that moves money. The safeguard is a phone call to a number you already hold, and on a busy day it is the step that gets skipped.
From the first request to an approved supplier
Verifying tax status, confirming bank details and approving the supplier are for your people. Sending the pack, reading what comes back, chasing and filing are for the agent, working to the document list you set for each kind of supplier.
Pack sent
Sends your account form or subcontractor questionnaire, with the list of documents you require for that kind of supplier, on the day the buyer or contracts manager asks.
Nothing.
Documents checked
Reads each document as it arrives and checks each certificate for name, limit and expiry date. Can also check the company at Companies House and the VAT number on GOV.UK.
Anything that does not match, and any limit or scope below your requirement.
Gaps chased
Reminds the supplier by email for what is missing, at the intervals you choose, and tells the buyer which suppliers are stuck and on which document.
Any phone call, and any request to start before the file is complete.
File for approval
Puts the file together with a one-page summary and the exceptions, drafts the supplier record for your ledger and diarises every expiry date.
Approval of the supplier, CIS verification with HMRC, and bank details confirmed by phone.
Days to approved supplier
Counted from the day the pack goes out to the day a person approves the supplier, for every new supplier and subcontractor. Reviewed with you each month.
Files complete at approval
The share of suppliers approved with every required document in the file and in date, against those approved on an exception a person accepted.
Suppliers waiting on a document
How many open files have not moved for longer than the number of days you set, and which document each one is waiting for.
Construction contractors and trades
Subcontractor packs: the UTR and company details for CIS verification, insurances, CSCS cards and RAMS, gathered before the first day on site.
Manufacturing
Supplier questionnaires and ISO 9001 certificates gathered for the quality manager, who decides who joins the approved supplier list.
Wholesale and distribution
New supplier accounts: trading terms, price files and bank details collected, with the record drafted in Sage 200 or Business Central for purchase ledger approval.
Questions owners ask
Can an AI agent approve a new supplier?
No. It chases the UTR and the details CIS verification needs, the insurances and the cards, then builds the file showing what is missing or out of line with your requirements. Approval, and every exception, such as letting a subcontractor start before an insurance certificate arrives, is decided by a named person: your buyer, quality manager or contracts manager.
Who verifies a subcontractor with HMRC under CIS?
You do, as the contractor, before the first payment. The agent collects the UTR and the National Insurance number or company details that the verification needs, and checks they are complete. HMRC also expects a contractor to consider whether the person should be an employee instead. That judgement is yours.
What does it check on an insurance certificate?
The insured name against the supplier's, the type of cover, the limit against the one you set and the expiry date. Employers' liability, for one, must by law cover an employer for at least £5 million. Whether a lower limit or an exclusion is acceptable is a decision for you or your broker.
How are a supplier's bank details handled?
Never by the agent alone. It records the details the supplier sends and flags any change to details you already hold. A person confirms them by phone, on a number you already have, before anything reaches the payment run. The agent makes no phone calls and approves no payment.