Check eligibility and evidence — Culture & heritage

By the end of this lesson, you will be able to build a sector evidence register and identify a blocking gap.

Common to all countries

Turn capability into verifiable evidence

Read each participation condition separately from the award criteria. A participation condition asks whether the bidder is eligible or capable; an award criterion compares admissible offers. A beautiful method statement does not repair a missing mandatory authorisation. Record the entity that must hold each credential, its scope, validity date and the moment at which it is required.

Build an evidence register with requirement, document, issuing body or owner, expiry, proposed bid location and responsible colleague. If relying on another entity, establish the permitted arrangement and obtain a real commitment. Remove confidential personal or client information that is not needed. Never replace a missing document with a claim that it will probably be available.

Worked example — Create a travelling exhibition

This is a fictional teaching case. Quantities, prices and contractual conditions below are assumptions for the exercise, not legal requirements or market benchmarks.

Demonstrate comparable handling and exhibition work, with named specialist roles and actual responsibilities. Include a sample condition-report workflow and evidence of rights clearance. Do not claim conservation qualifications held only by an unconfirmed partner.

Gap to resolve. The intended partner has not confirmed availability. Record the commitment as open, assign a deadline and plan a replacement or no-bid decision. An authentic document outside the relevant scope does not solve the gap.

Country specific — what to verify

Check heritage and cultural-property movement rules, artist contracting, customs where relevant, accessibility and funder conditions. Do not assume an artistic purchase automatically qualifies for an exception to competition. The legal form of a grant, prize, loan and services contract matters.

Heritage permissions and professional qualifications. Use the destination-country module and the actual tender pack. The sources below are references with their own scope; they do not form a single worldwide regime. For the general method, revisit the foundations.

Put it into practice

Create four evidence-register rows: relevant reference, team capability, regulatory evidence to verify and partner commitment. Include holder, validity, document and the action if it is missing.

Model answer

Demonstrate comparable handling and exhibition work, with named specialist roles and actual responsibilities. Include a sample condition-report workflow and evidence of rights clearance. Do not claim conservation qualifications held only by an unconfirmed partner. The register must explicitly flag the uncommitted partner and unverified regulatory evidence. Neither a partner name nor a ticked box proves available capacity.

Keep this worksheet in your working file. The quiz below checks the lesson’s decisions; passing it is neither a professional qualification nor a guarantee of an award.