foodspecifications.com and external accreditations
foodspecifications.com provides you tools and links to aid with many aspects
of the accreditations process. This page shows an example of how we assist with certain clauses of the BRC Global
Standard for Food Safety.
You can add the italic text directly to your quality manual. If your quality manual is an electronic document, and you are logged in
to food specifications.com, the links will take you to the relevant information.
3.6 Purchasing & Supplier Approval and Performance Monitoring
The company shall control all purchasing processes which are critical to product
safety, legality and quality to ensure that all products and services procured
conform to defined requirements.
3.6.1 The company shall have a documented supplier approval procedure and continual
assessment program in place, based upon risk assessment
Our foodspecifications.com supplier audit screen shows the current external accreditation standard, level and expiry date of each of our suppliers, together with an early warning
indicator for those accreditations approaching expiry.
Any of our suppliers not covered by
an appropriate accreditation are expected to complete our internal supplier
audit document, and the current version of that document, together with its expiry date are provided from our audit screen.
3.6.2 These procedures shall include clear criteria for ongoing assessment and
standards of performance required.
Ongoing assessment may take the form of
monitoring performance through the following, although this is not an exhaustive
list;
- In house checks
- Certificates of analysis (If required). Each product has it's own live specification including HACCP documentation and product analysis available through our specifications catalogue
- Supplier audit available here as appropriate
- Records of this monitoring shall be retained and are available here.
3.6.3 The procedures shall define how exceptions are handled, e.g. the use of products
or services where audit or monitoring has not been undertaken.
All of our suppliers, however temporary are expected to make their product specifications available through foodspecifications.com, together with appropriate external audit information.
3.6.4 The company shall review the performance of new suppliers against defined
criteria within a specified 'trial' period and thereafter at a specified
frequency to decide upon the level of ongoing supplier performance monitoring.'
3.7 General Documentation Requirements
3.7.2 Specifications
The company shall ensure that specifications exist for all materials including
packaging, intermediate / semi - processed and finished products, (where
relevant) and any product or service which could affect the integrity of the
finished product.
The specifications for all of our factored products, and the ingredients for our manufactured products are stored and maintained through our specifications management system.
These specifications include packaging information, HACCP documentation, process checks and
microbiological testing results and are available here
3.7.2.1 Specifications shall be adequate and accurate and shall ensure compliance with
relevant safety and legislative requirements
Our specification management system is live and online, complies with all current
legislative and safety requirements, and can adapt instantly to regulatory changes, alerting our suppliers if new information becomes relevant.
3.7.2.2 Manufacturing instructions shall comply with recipes as detailed in agreed
customer specifications and shall be implemented.
3.7.2.3 The company shall seek formal agreement of specifications with relevant parties.
Where specifications are not formally agreed then the company shall be able to
demonstrate that they have taken steps to ensure formal agreement is in place.
All of our suppliers are required to provide full and detailed specifications for the products and ingredients that they supply to us. Our supplier managment portal shows how each supplier's level
of compliance. We are then able to drill down into each supplier to see the compliance against individual products.
3.7.2.4 There shall be a documented procedure for the amendment and approval of
specifications for all parts of the process including regular reviews to ensure
adequacy and status.
3.7.2.5 Specifications and / or their contents shall be accessible to relevant staff.
Basic specifications, including nutritional information is available to all our staff and customers. An example is given here.
Complete specifications are available to relevant staff for each product, an example is provided here.