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Your customers' sustainability surveys, answered
A spreadsheet from one customer, an online portal from another, a supplier code of conduct to sign from a third. The questions overlap, the formats never do. We answer each survey in its own format from one evidence file, so every new survey takes less of your time than the last.
Customer surveys in five lines
- What it is
- A customer's own supplier survey on sustainability, often called a supplier self-assessment questionnaire (SAQ), sent as a spreadsheet, a document or an online portal
- Who asks
- Procurement and sustainability teams of your customers, as part of supplier onboarding, an annual supplier review or a tender
- What they ask about
- Policies and certificates, energy and emissions, health and safety, working conditions, business ethics and how you manage your own suppliers
- Why it matters
- Answers often feed a supplier score or a preferred-supplier decision, so incomplete or unsupported answers can cost you business
- What you get
- The survey answered in your customer's format, the evidence behind each answer, and a gap list with templates
What customer surveys usually ask
- Policies and certificates
Which policies you have, whether they are in use, and which management system certificates you hold, such as ISO 14001 or ISO 45001.
- Energy and emissions
Energy use, greenhouse gas emissions and reduction targets, sometimes split by site or by product.
- People
Health and safety, working conditions, training and diversity in your own workforce.
- Ethics
Anti-corruption, data protection and a way for people to report concerns.
- Your own suppliers
How you select and check your suppliers on environmental and social criteria.
New to Customer surveys? Read our free guide: How to answer customer sustainability questionnaires without starting from zero each time.
The ask
Customer sustainability surveys come in every shape. Some are a spreadsheet of fifty questions, some are an online supplier portal, some are a document with a code of conduct attached for signature. Behind them sits the same need: your customer has to report on its own supply chain, or wants to know which suppliers help or hurt its own sustainability goals. So it asks you.
The questions overlap heavily with each other and with schemes such as EcoVadis and CDP: policies, certificates, energy and emissions, working conditions, ethics, and how you manage your own suppliers. The formats, deadlines and scoring differ per customer.
Who this applies to
Any company that supplies larger businesses. Surveys typically arrive at supplier onboarding, in an annual supplier review, or as part of a tender. This deliverable fits you if a survey is in your inbox now, or if you receive several a year and each one starts again from scratch.
What you need to have ready
This list doubles as our intake. What is missing becomes the gap list.
- The survey itself, in whatever format your customer sent it, and the deadline
- Your policies: environmental, health and safety, code of conduct, HR, anti-corruption
- Certificates you hold, such as ISO 9001, ISO 14001 or ISO 45001
- Energy and fuel use for the last full year, and any emissions figures you already have
- Earlier survey answers you sent to this or other customers, if any
- What you know about your own key suppliers
What Humboldt delivers
The survey answered end to end in your customer’s own format, with every answer backed by one of your documents or a clearly labelled estimate. Where the survey asks for attachments, we collect and attach them. What you cannot evidence yet goes on the gap list, ranked by how much it matters to this customer, with a ready-to-adapt template for every standard document on it.
Our ESG expert checks and signs the whole survey before it reaches you. You review and submit. Everything we build goes into your evidence file, so the next customer’s survey starts from answers that are already checked and sourced.
The finished deliverable, ready to submit.
Included
- Your customer's survey answered end to end, in their own format, spreadsheet, document or portal
- Every answer backed by one of your documents or a clearly labelled estimate, with the source noted
- Supporting documents collected and attached where the survey asks for them
- A gap list of what you could not yet evidence, ranked by how much it matters to this customer
- A ready-to-adapt template for every standard document on the gap list, such as a supplier code of conduct or an environmental policy
- Your evidence file, which every next survey starts from
- Checked and signed by our ESG expert before it reaches you
Good to know
- You stay the supplier of record: you review the answers and submit them to your customer.
- Your customer decides how the answers are scored and what they mean for the relationship.
- Some customers ask you to sign a supplier code of conduct. We explain what you would commit to; the decision to sign is yours.
Your Customer surveys evidence works for other requests too
Everything we collect and check for this deliverable goes into your evidence file. The next request starts from there, whichever scheme or customer it comes from.
Customer surveys: common questions
Something else? Ask it on the call.
Every customer uses a different format. Can you handle that?
Yes. We answer in the format your customer sends: their spreadsheet, their document or their portal. The content comes from one evidence file, so the answers stay consistent across customers.
Can you fill in the customer's online portal for us?
Usually the portal account is yours. We prepare every answer and attachment ready to paste and upload, and walk through it with you if that helps. If your customer allows a colleague login, we can enter it directly.
We get many surveys a year. Does it get easier?
Yes, that is the point of the evidence file. The first survey builds it; each next survey mostly reuses answers that are already checked and sourced.
Is a request sitting in your inbox?
Tell us what your customer is asking for and when it is due. In 20 minutes a senior ESG expert tells you honestly whether we can deliver it in time.
No commitment. We'll tell you on the call whether we can hit your deadline.