6 replies to this topic

[highlind chick]

Hi everyone ,
Have only been a technical manager for just under a month and need to implment version 5 of the BRC. This is my first proper job since graduating last year and the company has been awarded a grade A for BRC version 4, the previous girl who ran this department got that lst month. I really feel that generally I know what I am doing but some parts of the layout confuse me and sometimes I wonder where certain things go. Does anyone have a layout of the new version or a mock food safety and quality manual. I have the guidance notes and the manual is coming any day. Any help would be greatly appreciated as I am the one and only technical person in my company.

[Charles.C]

Dear hdchick,

Slightly confused yr post. Presumably you hv the existing "manuals" etc used for certification to ver 4 or ??

If yes, there are several posts here regarding changes to ver 5 although you will obviously require full ver 5standard for yr own use. Changes discussed here -

http://www.ifsqn.com...showtopic=10148

If you hv a more specific query, please repost and no doubt some assistance will appear.

Rgds / Charles.C

[keith]

Hello Highland Chick,

We are trying to attain BRC Ver 5 from scratch. We have had two gap audits and it's a lot of hard work. You should have the basic layout to a very acceptable level, if you have an A grade at ver 4. I have a PDF detailing the major differences between ver 4 & 5 and it's attached here. The differences are greyed out on the relevant pages.

Best of luck

Keith

Attached Files

•  GLOBAL_STANDARD_FOR_FOODSAFETY___AIDE_MEMOIR_FOR_CLIENTS_Issue_5_for_July_2008.pdf   412.26KB   125 downloads

[highlind chick]

Hi guys,
Thanks for that. What I meant was is it necessary to have section 1, 2 and 3 as a quality managment system and section 4, 5, 6 and 7 as a manual containing quality procedures? Also when putting a header on each page, what should be at the top should it be the company name and the global standard for food safety or should it be something else?
Another question if I havent asked enough already, from what I know I thought it was a good idea to number each section relating to the number of the section from the BRC however when writing about one section you could fill all the requirements on one page is this ok and just name it number 3.2 instead of 3.2.1 and 3.2.2 and 3.3.3? Hope that makes sense.
Thanks to all who have been helping me your help is totally appreciated.

[Simon]

Hi guys,
Thanks for that. What I meant was is it necessary to have section 1, 2 and 3 as a quality managment system and section 4, 5, 6 and 7 as a manual containing quality procedures? Also when putting a header on each page, what should be at the top should it be the company name and the global standard for food safety or should it be something else?
Another question if I havent asked enough already, from what I know I thought it was a good idea to number each section relating to the number of the section from the BRC however when writing about one section you could fill all the requirements on one page is this ok and just name it number 3.2 instead of 3.2.1 and 3.2.2 and 3.3.3? Hope that makes sense.
Thanks to all who have been helping me your help is totally appreciated.

It's hard to get a picture of your manual from your description, if you have a draft maybe you could post it for critique. At then end of the day though your system can look how it wants and does not necessarily need to follow the format titles, numbering of the standard. People tend to do things like that to make it easier to find stuff during audits. I prefer documents to be valuable to the business, process etc. and let the auditor do their job of finding and verifying compliance. And as for header information it matters not a jot what you put in there, but I would probably put the company name and the name of the document e.g. the things that don’t change to often. Standards bodies tend to change the name of standards regularly and you don’t want to be updating everything if that happens.

Regards,
Simon

[Charles.C]

Dear Highlind chick,

As Simon said, artistic license is totally acceptable as long as you cover the intended scope/requirements of the standard.
One very non-innovative but time-tested procedure is to do an (a) Quality Manual “closely” based on the Standard similar to yr comments and cross reference to a subsidiary (b) “Procedures Manual”. This is like the traditional ISO 9000 approach which you may be already familiar with (or you can see many fully worked dwlable examples of both on ISO forums if you google iso 9000). An equally antique but effective (IMO) way to produce a Procedures manual is from something like the ISO pyramid style + pre-2000 version of iso9000 which was structured like a do-it-yourself manufacturing guide. Assuming you have a HACCP manual already (?) it is then relatively easy to xreference to that from within the Procedures manual. For many people the “Procedures’ is where the real action starts although it shouldn’t really be so I guess.
From my experience BRC are not quite so paranoid regarding documentaion aspects as ISO even though the latter will give you a very comprehensive result if followed.

The HACCP/hygiene packages in the document exchange are a good illustration of the way to construct "procedures" if you are interested.

Hope the above not too confusing, a specific answer maybe needs a bit more info.

Rgds / Charles.C

[highlind chick]

Thanks guys for all your helpful information.