Validation: Qualitative

Manual evidence validation and Reporting Boundaries Review

Manual Evidence Validation

Validation Scope

What is manually validated?

GRESB manually verifies the following content:

1. Evidence uploaded to the indicators that require it. GRESB validates this evidence against GRESB’s requirements. Refer to the 'Criteria' section below for a summary of indicators subject to manual validation and their specific requirements.

2. All scored ‘Other’ answers. Most indicators allow participants to report an additional option if it is not already included in the indicator’s assessment choices. These ‘Other’ answers are also subject to manual validation. ‘Other’ answers should not be duplicates or subsets of existing options. Multiple ‘Other’ answers can be reported, but only one will count toward the final score, as long as it meets the acceptance criteria.

3. Information related to third parties, such as assurance, audit, and certification standards.

Validation Criteria

Evidence Format

Document: Participants may upload multiple documents of any file type. GRESB encourages participants to follow the following documentation best practices to ensure that validators can identify relevant information as efficiently and clearly as possible:

• Use an evidence cover page (see GRESB’s template here) or open text box to specify where evidence for each selection can be found.

• Participants may upload evidence as a document or an active hyperlink.

• When using multiple documents, consolidate them into one file (but avoid using zip files).

• Make sure section headings and page numbers are clear.

Hyperlink: The evidence must be accessible within two clicks. Note that to support selections pertaining to public availability, participants must upload a hyperlink.

Reporting Year Applicability

Regardless of whether the indicator is manually validated, all assessment answers must refer to the reporting year identified in indicator EC4: Reporting year.

However, certain indicators have different reporting year requirements and may refer to the past three calendar years or fiscal years, including the current one, depending on the lender's reporting period selection:

• LRM4-7: Climate-related Risk Management indicators

• LSE2: Employee satisfaction survey

• LSE4: Employee safety indicators

A response to an indicator must be true at the close of the reporting year; however, the response does not need to have been true for the entire reporting year. For example, if a policy was put in place one month prior to the end of the reporting year, this is acceptable, it need not have been in place for the entire reporting year.

For manually validated indicators, it is mandatory to clearly specify the year to which the evidence corresponds within the evidence or open text box.

Reporting Entity Applicability

Answers must directly apply to the entity (lender) identified in EC1, regardless of whether the indicator is manually validated.

When a participating entity (lender) belongs to a larger investment management organization or group of companies (the 'organization'), it must clearly explain the relationship between the entity (lender) and the organization. This ensures that group-level answers or evidence are appropriately linked to the reporting entity. This clarification can be provided within the evidence itself or in an open text box.

• Note for indicators in the ‘Climate-related Risk Management’ section of the Risk Management Aspect (i.e., transition and physical risk identification and impact assessment): GRESB requires evidence to be specific to the reporting entity identified in EC1. References to the overarching organization cannot be used as substitutes for entity-level risk assessment outcomes.

Indicator Applicability

GRESB does not consider evidence submitted under other indicators or evidence from previous years, even if it is available in the Document Library.

Participants must upload evidence directly under the relevant indicator for the validation team to consider it.

Language

As of 2025, GRESB accepts evidence in any language. However, the systems must be able to read the text contained in the file. Information or text contained in pictures will only be accepted if accompanied by a translation.

Note that information provided in open text boxes that appear in the Benchmark Report will be displayed exactly as submitted, in the original language.

Validation Outcomes

What are the impacts of each validation decision?

Validators will make one of the three decisions below depending on the degree to which evidence meets GRESB’s requirements.

Each validation outcome corresponds with a scoring weight that impacts the indicator’s final score. See the Scoring Basics page for more information.

'Other' Answers

Validation status	Explanation	Scoring impact
Accepted	'Other' answer falls outside the provided options and fulfills indicator requirements.	Full points
Duplicate	'Other' answer fulfills indicator requirements but duplicates an already selected answer.	No points will be awarded for this answer
Not Accepted	No points will be awarded for this answer'Other' answers do not fulfill indicator requirements.	No points will be awarded for this answer

Evidence and Open Text Boxes

Validation Status	Explanation	Scoring Impact
Accepted	Evidence fully meets the validation requirements.	Full points, resulting in the application of the full multiplier (100%) to the indicator's score
Partially Accepted	Evidence fully meets general requirements but fails to meet some indicator-specific requirements and/or support all selected options.	Partial points, resulting in a reduced multiplier (50%) to the indicator's score
Not Accepted	Evidence does not meet general requirements and/or does not support the selected options.	No points, resulting in a 0 multiplier to the indicator's score

---

Download GRESB's Evidence Cover Page Template