Is your project ready to be ready?
Financial close is where the risk is priced. TCP's Readiness Maturity Assessment gives lenders and insurers independent evidence of how a project will get from construction to operation, before capital is committed and before policies are underwritten.
Readiness is not a milestone. It is a maturity that has to grow.
A project does not become ready on the day it starts up. Readiness maturity builds, or fails to build, across the whole project. Construction progress reports show whether the asset is being built. They do not show whether readiness maturity is keeping pace.
Readiness maturity is in its infancy at the start of a project and matures over time. The evidence already exists at financial close to show which path a project will follow, and the risk of delay in the transition to operation.
Why financial close
Lenders commit capital and insurers underwrite construction and delay-in-start-up cover at financial close. Both decisions rest on an assumption about how the project will get from construction to operation: the commercial operation date, the debt sizing, the indemnity period and the sums insured.
The assessment lets lenders evaluate that risk before committing capital, and insurers evaluate it before underwriting policies. Findings can still shape the terms: conditions precedent, covenants, reporting requirements and policy conditions.
After close, the capital is committed and the cover is in force, and the same risk surfaces at commissioning, when it is most expensive to address.
| Who it is for | What the assessment gives them |
|---|---|
| Lenders and their advisers | Evidence behind confidence in the commercial operation date, readiness conditions that lenders' counsel can adapt, and a baseline for monitoring through construction |
| Construction and delay-in-start-up insurers, and their brokers | Evidence on how the project will reach operation, to set the indemnity period, sums insured and policy conditions against |
| Sponsors preparing for financial close | An independent view that answers the readiness questions lenders and insurers will ask, before they ask them |
What the assessment answers
An assessment is a snapshot in time. It asks one question: is this project's readiness maturity progressing, and is there an evidenced plan to keep it progressing to commercial operation?
- Where readiness maturity stands against what should be in place at financial close.
- Whether each area is progressing, stalled, reversed, or absent with no plan to develop it. The level of maturity is not the finding on its own; the direction of travel is.
- What the gaps mean for the commercial operation date, delay-in-start-up cover and the finance case.
- The conditions that would close each material gap, and a baseline against which progress can be monitored.
Two parts: a snapshot, then monitoring
The assessment
An evidence review of the data room, read for readiness maturity and its direction of travel. Typically three to four weeks from receiving the documents.
Output: a signed opinion, evidence register, draft conditions and a readiness maturity baseline.
Monitoring
Repeat snapshots at the project's key milestones, or on a quarterly cycle, against the same baseline. Stalls are flagged while they can still be recovered.
Output: a short report to lenders and insurers at each review, showing whether maturity is progressing as planned.
Monitoring is where the value compounds. A single snapshot shows the curve at close; successive snapshots show whether the project is actually following it.
How it works
TCP applies a proprietary readiness maturity framework built on the ICxA Outcome Assurance, Commissioning and Operational Readiness standards. It covers more than 400 evidence items, from the front end of a project to operation, mapped to the project's own gate structure. At each gate it sets the minimum condition each item should have reached: defined, in draft, complete, or submitted as evidence for the gate decision.
Scoping call. Confirm the project, where it stands, the decision timetable and the report the opinion feeds. The document list for the project's stage is issued.
Evidence review. Each requested document is recorded against the condition it should have reached, with the document and page it rests on.
Maturity reading. Findings are read for trajectory, not just status: is there an owner, a date and a trail, or has the work stalled, been cancelled or never been started?
Consequences and conditions. Material gaps translated into their effect on the commercial operation date, cover and the finance case, with the conditions that would close them.
Signed opinion and baseline. The opinion is issued under TCP's signature, with the baseline that monitoring will track.
The assessment uses documents already in the data room. No site visit is needed and no documents are created for the review; if a document does not exist, the project says so, and that is itself evidence. The evaluation matrix is proprietary to TCP. What you receive is the evidence and the reasoning, with every finding traceable to a document.
What it is not
- Not a rating or a grade. It sets out evidence and where the risk sits; it never scores a project.
- Not a construction or engineering review. Design, cost and progress stay with the independent engineer.
- Not insurance advice or placement. It gives insurers and brokers evidence, not a view on cover.
- Not a guarantee. Each assessment is a professional opinion at a point in time, based on the documents provided.
Terms and independence
- Fixed fees. The assessment fee is agreed at the scoping call, set by the size and complexity of the project; monitoring is a fixed fee per review. Fees do not depend on the deal closing or a policy being placed.
- One side per project. TCP does not advise the sponsor, contractor or operator on a project where it gives an opinion to a lender or insurer, and discloses any past work with the parties before engaging.
- Relationship to ICxA. TCP applies ICxA standards as an ICxA Operating Partner. ICxA sets the standards and credentials practitioners; it is not a party to any TCP engagement.
Next steps
Read the offer
The offer sheet sets out the assessment, monitoring, method, terms and independence in full.
Book a 30-minute scoping call
Tell us the project, where it stands, its financing timetable and the report the opinion needs to feed.
Fixed-fee proposal
We run a conflict check, confirm fit and fee, and send the document list for the project's stage. Work starts when the documents arrive.
Find the start-up risk before capital is committed
Whether you are lending, underwriting or preparing a project for financial close, the evidence of which path it will follow already exists. The assessment reads it while the terms can still change.
Building readiness maturity into your own organization's delivery process? See the Readiness Capability Program.