{"id":4721,"date":"2022-07-28T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-07-27T22:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ceper.it\/governing-contracts-through-it-based-operational-tools\/"},"modified":"2026-03-11T17:24:54","modified_gmt":"2026-03-11T16:24:54","slug":"governing-contracts-through-it-based-operational-tools","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ceper.it\/en\/governing-contracts-through-it-based-operational-tools\/","title":{"rendered":"Governing contracts through IT-based operational tools"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Within businesses, there is growing recourse to contracting out activities, works, or services. Companies therefore regularly supplement their own organisations with the presence of &#8220;third-party&#8221; organisations, sometimes across multiple levels and often highly intrusive.<\/p>\n<p>The reasons are varied and usually legitimate, but this choice frequently conceals pitfalls arising from risks thought to have been removed or eliminated, which resurface in new forms or with different timing and scope. In practice, performing an activity directly or contracting it out is simply a different way of managing the associated risks.<\/p>\n<p>As a client, it is therefore necessary to be aware that, to a large extent, one is &#8212; by law and in practice &#8212; the architect and responsible party for the successful outcome of the contracted work, including its effective prevention management.<\/p>\n<p>Regarding the obligation to verify the technical-professional suitability of the chosen external supplier, the first measure of the client&#8217;s liability derives from the reasons and methods by which the decision was made to contract out certain activities to a third party in exchange for payment (Article 1655 of the Italian Civil Code).<\/p>\n<p>Today, contracting out is, according to established case law, a foreseeable factor in increasing organisational and prevention risk for the personnel involved, and must therefore be duly considered. Like any other organisational and technical decision, it must be analysed and assessed, taking into account the possible impacts and threats as well as the advantages (which often vanish, especially in the face of problems, damage, accidents, etc.). While contracting out can become a business advantage and even a tool for raising the level of prevention within the company, it is nevertheless necessary to accept and understand the inherent risk and to govern it.<\/p>\n<p>News reports and statistics show that the consequences of such decisions are too often underestimated.<\/p>\n<p>Increasingly, beyond the investigation into accident dynamics, and even before examining the lack of coordination between client and contractor or the assessment and management of interferences between operations, inspections focus on the root of the problem. This can often be found in the selection of the supplier, making the obligation to verify the technical-professional suitability of the contractor (and subcontractor) the first and essential step in ensuring a safe contract and adequate protection at every level, without the governance chain fraying or falling apart to the detriment of the client.<\/p>\n<p>Choosing an inadequate partner undermines the reliability of the outcome from the outset and creates potential (and sometimes actual) harm, nullifying whatever cost savings were originally sought.<\/p>\n<p>The superficiality with which clients often rely on (or trust) the formal acquisition of documents, avoiding more rigorous, objective, and thorough verification, can lead to consequences in both regulatory terms (inadequate risk management) and criminal terms (liability for a workplace accident due to negligence).<\/p>\n<p>The verification activity (which can become a genuine qualification process) is therefore the first prevention measure for the contract and the first protection for the client. To this end, CEPER has implemented a dedicated IT tool through which all parties involved (potential supplier, client&#8217;s reference person) are empowered and assisted, laying the foundations for an informed and careful selection of the supplier and for effective field coordination (DUVRI), so as to assess the supplier&#8217;s performance throughout the entire duration of the contract, standardising formal compliance requirements and critical steps.<\/p>\n<p><u>The software, with a user-friendly interface adaptable to the specific needs and characteristics of the client company, enables the following:<\/u><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>guided management of supplier qualification processes (contracting and subcontracting companies) based on the type of company and activity required;<\/li>\n<li>continuous monitoring of each company&#8217;s qualification status and actual suitability for the assigned work(s);<\/li>\n<li>automated management of deadlines and sending of associated reminders;<\/li>\n<li>storage of documents and communications to\/from companies;<\/li>\n<li>linking of employees and their documents to each company (identification document, certificates, special authorisations, etc.); consequently making the information required for access control visible;<\/li>\n<li>linking of equipment, substances\/materials to each company (and any related documentation);<\/li>\n<li>rapid preparation (and sharing) of the DUVRI, suitably customised, among all interested parties.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><u>In particular, the application enables:<\/u><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>increased levels of protection for the client, with objective evidence of compliance with all applicable obligations;<\/li>\n<li>creation of a database containing supplier data (including subcontractors);<\/li>\n<li>automatic collection and storage (cloud) of supplier documents, with the ability to view and assess them remotely;<\/li>\n<li>immediate monitoring of qualification document expiry dates;<\/li>\n<li>instant availability of countersigned documents;<\/li>\n<li>precise identification of interferences and preliminary preparation of the DUVRI;<\/li>\n<li>monitoring of site access authorisations through a dedicated web portal.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>In further detail, the following can be achieved simply and in a standardised manner:<\/p>\n<p><strong>Preliminary selection of qualification documents<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>creation of predefined lists of minimum\/essential documentation based on the type of contracted activity;<\/li>\n<li>direct entry of identifying data by the supplier (thereby simplifying administration for the client);<\/li>\n<li>automatic updating of required documentation in the event of different types of activity being contracted;<\/li>\n<li>transparent management of subcontracts (authorisation, qualification, monitoring).<\/li>\n<li>Requesting documentation<\/li>\n<li>automatic document requests to the contractor, who has access to a dedicated web portal for autonomous uploading of required documents;<\/li>\n<li>automatic storage of communications to and from the supplier;<\/li>\n<li>activation and qualification only upon confirmed upload.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Verifying and storing documents<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>creation and provision of standardised templates that can be downloaded and completed by the supplier;<\/li>\n<li>easy and immediate review of documentation uploaded by contractors;<\/li>\n<li>automatic storage of documents with immediate indication of validity period;<\/li>\n<li>cloud storage (saving space on the company server).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Managing deadlines<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>continuous risk coverage for the client (especially for the most critical documentation);<\/li>\n<li>graphical indication of document validity;<\/li>\n<li>automatic creation of a deadline tracker with a synoptic view of documents and their status;<\/li>\n<li>automatic email notifications to the supplier with customisable timescales.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Managing subcontracts and access<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>transparent, timely, and simplified management of subcontracts;<\/li>\n<li>list of authorised employees visible via a dedicated web portal, accessible to the client&#8217;s security\/reception\/supervisor;<\/li>\n<li>automatic sharing of detailed information on specific risks in the working environment and on prevention and emergency measures adopted in relation to the relevant activity (also differentiable by work site);<\/li>\n<li>rapid and simplified preparation of a specific DUVRI through preliminary mapping of the types of contracts existing within the company, the risks present at the workplaces, the prevention and protection measures in place, the definition of coordination measures, customisation of content, and the setting and coding of predefined items that simplify the final preparation;<\/li>\n<li>identification of the work areas in which the supplier is required to operate;<\/li>\n<li>verification of the information contained in the DUVRI generated online;<\/li>\n<li>web-based sharing of the DUVRI with the contractor (and any subcontractor).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The software thus ensures a simplified and reliable procedure, including for suppliers interfacing with a single system, and achieves complete digitalisation of the process, eliminating the need to print documents and enabling simplified uploads.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Providing stability and effectiveness to the contracting process is thereby facilitated, to the benefit of prevention and the protection of all parties involved, avoiding unwanted or unforeseen escalations of liability.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Dr. Ignazio Quattrin &#8211; Head of Legal Division, CEPER<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Management of contracted activities and preparation of DUVRI (information on the prevention of accidents and related risks) with CEPER. Support for managing contracted activities securely.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4720,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[98],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4721","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-articles"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ceper.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4721","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ceper.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ceper.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ceper.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ceper.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4721"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.ceper.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4721\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4723,"href":"https:\/\/www.ceper.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4721\/revisions\/4723"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ceper.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4720"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ceper.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4721"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ceper.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4721"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ceper.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4721"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}