With Biosphere Responsible Tourism you receive the tools to move forward at your own pace. Our platform Biosphere Sustainable guides you step by step as you design a continual improvement plan, realistic and tailored to your business. You will be able to document your sustainability actions from your computer or mobile phone, simply and intuitively. And when your entity's profile is ready, you will be able to request the external third-party audit to assess your work and give it the visibility it deserves, in accordance with the requirements of the relevant certification scheme.
Start with no obligation: creating your profile is free, in the language of your choice, among the 7 in which we offer our services. Only when you decide to move forward with the assessment of your documentation do you take out the certification service.
Our certification services are tailored to businesses of any size, and can be requested in 7 different languages. With our Biosphere Sustainable platform, you register information, provide evidence and progress through an assessment process tailored to your organisation's activity, resources and capabilities, in accordance with the requirements of the Certification Scheme. For €359/year, for the applicable scope of the Biosphere Scheme, you obtain the annual third-party external audit services, 100% online, with:
✔️ Secure, encrypted storage of your documentation
✔️ Online assessment of basic criteria (Starters) - Committed level
✔️ Online audit of the criteria for the Biosphere Certified level
✔️ Your own certificate and public profile on our web repository
✔️ Presence of your certificate on Booking.com and other portals*
*subject to current terms
Is your company located in a Destination with Biosphere certification? Some of these destination management bodies may have programmes with discounts or special terms for companies located in their territory. The availability, scope and percentage of this discount depend on the terms provided by the competent manager offering it. Check the programmes available in your location
Register your user, create your entity profile and choose the certification scheme under which you wish to have your actions assessed; currently, we offer our certification services only for the Biosphere Scheme of the RTI.
Under the Biosphere Scheme, choose at least one activity for each Starter and document your initiatives (photos, invoices, videos, etc.). The platform will guide you on the documentation that may be required in each case.
For €359 a year, you can request a third-party audit for Biosphere Committed status — the entry level of the Biosphere Scheme. To receive this service, you must have demonstrated compliance with the minimum criteria for this level by documenting at least one activity for each Starter.
In the Biosphere Scheme, the levels are progressive. With the Committed level, you gain access to a more extensive catalogue of requirements. With a further audit, included at no additional cost, you will be able to communicate each of the assessed actions on your profile, working towards the Biosphere Certified level.
🕐 You can complete the certification process under the Biosphere Scheme in less than 3 months, depending on your pace of work on the platform, the documentation provided and the review times.
€359 per year per business unit. All services provided for under the certification scheme and the contracted scope, including the corresponding annual assessment and audit in accordance with the terms of service, are included, with no hidden costs or additional charges. You can pay your fee by credit or debit card directly via the platform’s own payment gateway, once you have registered your user account and created your individual entity’s profile. In the case of chains and groups, please note that each entity (business unit) must take out its own individual fee and profile, passing its own certification process and corresponding audits, with each unit comprising the group obtaining certification individually, rather than as a single entity subscribed to a corporate package, product or service bundle.
The audit for the Committed level covers the first set of criteria (Biosphere Starters) and may take up to 15 days from the point at which the required information is complete and the service is requested; the Certified-level audit covers the full Biosphere Scheme catalogue and may take up to 25 working days, depending on the scope, the documentation provided and the necessary reviews. In both cases, the timeframes refer to the review process once the relevant information has been submitted, as these are external third-party audits; these are the maximum timeframes granted to the audit team; in other words, they may be completed in less time, but must not exceed these maximum timeframes.
Yes. You can try out our Biosphere Sustainable platform by registering your account (email and password), and then creating your organisation’s profile with no obligation. Registration is free and will give you access, at no cost, to view the criteria and initial actions in the Biosphere Scheme’s ‘Starters’ catalogue, allowing you to work with the platform’s basic features so that you can assess whether it is a useful tool for your certification process. These free basic features will allow you to start organising information about your sustainability actions on the platform with no time limit.
And if you later decide to apply for our certification services, you’ll have nothing to worry about. The information and progress you have recorded on the platform so far will be retained in your profile, and you’ll be able to submit it as part of your assessment process, provided the information meets the requirements set out by the certification scheme.
The fee of €359 covers the audit services you require for 365 days for your entity’s profile, enabling you to receive a compliance assessment at both the Committed and Certified levels of the Biosphere Scheme certification process. This service is limited to one audit per level and one opportunity to rectify issues per level, within the contracted period, at no additional cost in accordance with the terms of service. These opportunities allow you to correct or complete the requested information and resubmit the profile for review.
No. The Biosphere Responsible Tourism certification processes are designed to operate on an ongoing basis via the Biosphere Sustainable platform, where you can enter information, document actions and view dashboards tracking the process. Assessment or audit reports will be received via the tool itself, along with information on the status of your profile and the progress of the process.
Yes, you can invite as many users as you need at no additional cost, even during the trial period! You decide which people to give access and co-management permissions to your profile.