A Pre-Qualification Questionnaire (PQQ) — now formally a Selection Questionnaire under the Procurement Act 2023 — is the first filter on every UK public sector tender. It tests financial standing, insurance, certifications, H&S, quality, equality, and three references. Most SMEs fail at PQQ on one of five issues: bidding above their financial threshold, missing insurance certificates, missing certifications, weak references, or inconsistent information.
What is a PQQ?
A Pre-Qualification Questionnaire (PQQ) is the first stage of a public sector procurement. Before evaluators read your technical bid, your business has to demonstrate it meets minimum standards — financial standing, insurance, health and safety, certifications, references, no exclusion issues. If you fail PQQ, your bid is rejected before anyone reads what you actually proposed.
The terminology has shifted. Under the Procurement Act 2023 (effective February 2025), the standard form is now called a Selection Questionnaire (SQ). Many buyers still use "PQQ" colloquially. The Standard Selection Questionnaire — a unified template — is used across most central government procurements, with variations from local authorities and frameworks.
PQQ exists because procurement officers can't read 50 bids in detail. The PQQ filters out suppliers who can't meet baseline expectations. Pass it and your bid gets read; fail it and you don't.
What's actually in a PQQ?
Part 1: Supplier information
Basic company information — registered name, address, Companies House number, VAT registration, number of employees, annual turnover for the last three years. Straightforward and easy to keep wrong by typo — double-check the registered name matches Companies House exactly.
Part 2: Exclusion grounds
You declare whether your business or its directors have any of the mandatory or discretionary exclusion issues listed in the Procurement Act schedule. These include unspent convictions for fraud, corruption, money laundering, modern slavery, and serious tax offences. The vast majority of SMEs have no exclusions to declare — but you must declare honestly. False declarations are themselves an exclusion ground.
Part 3: Financial standing
Buyers want to see your turnover comfortably exceeds the contract value, usually by 2–3x. They check audited accounts (Companies House), credit rating, insurance cover, and sometimes ask for parent company guarantees. Bidding for a £500K contract when your turnover is £200K usually fails here — even if your capability is real.
Part 4: Insurance
Minimum levels of Employers' Liability (usually £10M), Public Liability (£5M–£10M), and Professional Indemnity (£1M–£5M) depending on contract type. You provide certificates of currency from your insurer. Buyers verify directly — having insurance "in place" but no certificate available is a common fail.
Part 5: Health and safety
For any contract involving physical work, you need H&S policy, named competent person, recent accident statistics, and usually a recognised accreditation (CHAS, SafeContractor, Constructionline Silver+, or ISO 45001). For high-risk contracts, a documented safety management system is required.
Part 6: Quality management
Usually verified via ISO 9001 or equivalent (BSI Kitemark, AS9100 for aerospace, ISO 13485 for medical). Without a recognised quality cert, you submit a quality manual and procedures for review. ISO 9001 dramatically streamlines this section — that's one of the main reasons buyers favour it.
Part 7: Equality and supply chain
Equal opportunities policy, modern slavery statement (mandatory if turnover exceeds £36M, recommended below that), supplier diversity approach, and increasingly social value commitments — what your business contributes beyond the contract itself.
Part 8: Technical and professional capability
References from past contracts — usually three, in the last three years, of similar value and complexity. This is where most SMEs without prior public sector experience struggle. Buyers want directly comparable evidence.
The five most common PQQ failures
1. Bidding above your financial threshold. Turnover well below contract value is an instant fail. Stay within the size band that matches your actual accounts.
2. Missing or expired insurance certificates. Often the simplest fix — request fresh certificates from your insurer at least a month before bid submission and check the levels match the tender requirements.
3. Missing certifications. Discovering at PQQ that ISO 9001 or ISO 45001 is required, when you don't hold it, is too late. Cert gap analysis before targeting tenders is the right pattern.
4. Weak references. Three contracts of similar value and complexity in the last three years. If you don't have those, target lower-value contracts to build the reference base before bidding above your weight.
5. Inconsistent information. Turnover stated as £800K in PQQ but accounts at Companies House show £600K. Director names different. Insurance provider listed wrong. Buyers cross-check; inconsistencies fail.
How to fill in a PQQ once and reuse the answers
PQQ content is highly repetitive across buyers. Most of the answers — financial standing, insurance, certifications, policies, references — change only when your business changes. The right pattern is to maintain a master PQQ document that you update quarterly and reuse across tenders.
Maintain these as live artefacts: company information (refresh quarterly), insurance certificates (refresh on renewal), three current references with permission to use them, named competent persons, quality manual, H&S policy, modern slavery statement, equal opportunities policy. With this in place, a new PQQ becomes a 1–2 hour exercise instead of 1–2 days.
How ENKII helps with PQQ
ENKII stores your PQQ-ready information in your founder profile. When you Easy Apply to a tender, the matching PQQ content auto-fills from your profile — so your master answers stay synced across every bid. The readiness score per tender tells you upfront whether you'd pass PQQ, before you commit time to a full bid.
Where you'd fail, ENKII tells you exactly why — a missing cert, insufficient turnover, or a missing reference — and how to close the gap.
Frequently asked questions
How is the new Selection Questionnaire different from the old PQQ?
The Procurement Act 2023 standardised the form across central government, simplified some sections, and emphasised social value more explicitly. Structurally similar but with a unified template. Local authorities and frameworks may still use bespoke versions, but the SSQ is the default reference.
Can a sub-contractor be on my reference list?
References should be from the buyer side of past contracts — the customer you delivered to, not a peer you sub-contracted with. Buyer references carry more weight because they speak to your delivery capability against a customer.
My turnover is too low — what do I do?
Three options: target lower-value contracts that match your size; consortium bid with a larger partner where their turnover counts; or use a parent-company guarantee if you sit inside a group. Don't bid above your weight — the financial standing check is one of the hardest to argue around.
Does ENKII fill in the PQQ for me?
Easy Apply pulls your profile data into the PQQ structure as a first-draft response. You review and edit — you still own the answers. The value is removing the "fill in the same fields for the 14th time" tax on every bid.