I've spent the last week at a sister facility and attended the audit on Wednesday through Friday. Following are some observations.
YAMMV (Your Auditor Mileage May Vary)
1. Auditor grabbed 8 random COA's and asked for the spec sheets for those ingredients. Auditor raised NC because not all of the specs had corresponding entries on the COA. I understand the reasoning here. If the spec is the spec, would it not be a good idea that all of the specs are being tested and reported on the COA? In essence, it's up to the site to review the specs and determine which of those are important to food safety, legality and quality.
Site determines this, and demands suppliers show those on the COA's.
2. Ensure you have third party audit results/certifications for your suppliers. I would guess that most major ingredient suppliers are certificated to some GFSI scheme. Make sure your purchasing department have a robust checklist/spreadsheet/file on each supplier.
3. If you are doing manual mix sheets/batching records (or whatever), make sure they are being filled out correctly and are rigorously checked for accuracy and completeness. (For example: if you have a mix sheet that has pre-printed quantities for a recipe/batch, and you do a half or double batch, make sure you indicate on the batch sheet that the batch in question was a half batch or a double batch, because the manually entered quantities will not match what is printed in the sheet.
4. Visitor logs. Make sure in and out times are recorded. (Food Defense). This particular facility has a really nice tablet based system, where you enter info and you get your picture taken and it prints out a visitor badge. Problem being there is a confidentiality statement you have to agree to, but there is no health survey that you have to tic boxes on. And even if you did, there is no way for anyone to review that before allowing you entry to production areas.
5. Make sure your people that receive reports from third party people (boiler treatment especially), are making sure that the reports they receive are within specs. This just frosted my ass. Why would you get a report from the guy that is supposed to be maintaining your boiler chemicals, that is WAY out of spec, and not question it right then and there? DO NOT file paper just because it's paper. Better yet, FIRE the provider that will give you a report that plainly shows that something is out of spec and not bring it to your attention.
6. I wish I could weigh in on a thumbs up or thumbs down on the Vulnerability Assessment for ingredients. It did not come up in the assessment. After the audit, I presented my take on it and asked for feedback. The auditor said that it looks good, as long as you can justify at what point some material becomes "high risk" and thus requires more, or better oversight.
Very thorough and fair audit. Real world perspective while ensuring the integrity of the written standard.
