Pre-qualification (PQQ) is the stage at which a client verifies that a contractor is legally able, financially sound, technically capable and safe enough to be invited to tender. It happens before pricing, and it is the cheapest stage at which to remove risk.
Commercial Registration, trade licence, Chamber of Commerce membership, VAT registration and the municipal licence for the workshop. This tests whether the entity bidding can lawfully sign and be sued.
Audited accounts, bank reference, and evidence of working capital against the size of the contract. This tests whether the contractor can carry the job between valuations.
Contractors' all-risk, third-party liability and workmen's compensation, each in force and with limits that match the contract value.
Completed projects of comparable type, value and complexity, with client references. Volume alone is not capability — comparability is.
Headcount by trade, number of site engineers, workshop area and equipment. This tests how much of the work is genuinely in-house rather than re-let on award.
Safety policy, incident and near-miss statistics, training records and any statutory notices. Malls and developers increasingly score this before price.
Saudization band and GOSI standing for Saudi work; equivalent nationalisation and labour compliance elsewhere in the Gulf.
Pre-qualification asks whether a contractor is capable of doing the job at all. Tendering asks what they will charge to do this particular job. Doing them in the wrong order wastes everyone's time.
There is no universal figure, but the number matters more than the promise. Ask for headcount by trade and workshop area — a contractor who re-lets eight of nine trades on award is a broker, and you are carrying the interface risk.
Audited accounts for the last two to three years, a bank reference letter, and an indication of current committed workload. The concern is not profit — it is whether they can fund the work between payment valuations.
To contract directly, yes. A foreign contractor can still be engaged through a locally licensed partner, as a subcontractor to a locally licensed main contractor, or on a supply-and-install basis. What matters is that the bid states which route it is using.
A written safety policy, method statements and risk assessments per activity, permits-to-work for hot works and live services, induction records for every operative, and incident statistics. Many mall handbooks make these a condition of site access.
We bid retail and commercial fit-out tenders across the Gulf from our Jeddah base.
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