🤝 Subcontractors
Your subs carry most of your risk. This hub links every guide, workflow, calculator, and template for qualifying subcontractors, keeping certificates current, and knowing when a sub is in trouble — plus the sub-side guide for getting on bid lists.
Key principle
Prequalify before the bid list, not after bid day. By then you want the low number to be true. Qualify first, bid second.
Start here
Pillar guide
GC: Qualify them
Tier requirements by exposure, award limits, and conditional approval instead of guessing.
Traffic play
Sub: Get on lists
What GCs actually look at, why you keep failing prequalification, and what to fix.
Risk scorecard
Score before award
Seven capacity tests, a suggested award limit, and generated conditions.
Understand it
- Subcontractor Prequalification — pillar explainer for GCs
- Getting Prequalified as a Subcontractor — the sub-side guide
- Warning Signs a Subcontractor Is in Trouble — field, paper, and financial signals
- Subcontractor Management — lifecycle overview (bidding, coordination, payment)
Qualify them
- The Prequalification Process — step-by-step workflow
- Subcontractor Prequalification Form — full application template
- Subcontractor Risk Scorecard — interactive capacity tests
- Reading a Subcontractor's Financials — GC-side financial read
- Subcontractor Qualification Checklist — short checklist version
Onboard them
- Subcontractor Onboarding — from award to mobilization
- Subcontractor Onboarding Packet — W-9, banking, contacts, safety
- Subcontractor Onboarding Checklist — day-one gate
- Subcontractor Agreement Generator — the subcontract itself
Keep them compliant
- Certificates of Insurance — what to require and how to read an ACORD 25
- Collecting and Tracking Certificates — COI workflow
- Insurance Requirements Exhibit — merge-field exhibit for subcontracts
- Subcontractor Compliance Tracker — manual expiry tracker
- Annual Requalification — annual file refresh
- Post-Job Subcontractor Evaluation — closeout scoring
When it goes wrong
- Warning Signs a Subcontractor Is in Trouble — staged response before default
- Subcontractor Default Procedures — formal default workflow
- Conditional Approval Letter — yes with controls
- Backcharges — when and how to backcharge
Related on this site
- Bonding & Surety Hub — one tier up: how sureties read subs like you read subs
- Surety Readiness Scorecard — subs run the same ratios on themselves
- Subcontractor Lifecycle Playbook — SOP across the full relationship
- Contract Insurance Requirements — prime contract insurance flow-down
Two audiences
GC pages explain what to require and how to review it. The sub-side guide explains what GCs are looking at when you are on the wrong side of the bid list.