8 replies to this topic

[KDuf]

Hey everyone,

I'm wondering what to do about cleaning our facility. I'm a part of a package manufacturing company (printing and thermoforming), so our cleaning standards are not currently as high as a direct food contact facility. We also work in a 100 year old building that has low ceilings, lots of corners, etc. It's not the large warehouse feel with four walls and that's it. We have one contract worker come in daily to clean our bathrooms and lunch rooms, but not the production area.

We have dust controls in place or being updated, but the corners and some storage areas have some dust, dirt, etc. Our paperboard produces a lot of paper dust. What should we do? What will an auditor do if he/she sees dirt in the corner?

Thanks,

KDuf

Edited by KDuf, 18 December 2012 - 02:57 PM.

[skredsfan]

I'm certainly no expert on these matters but I think the main areas of concern are directly above production lines. We produce paperboard packaing at our facility as well, so I understand the paper dust problems! With that being said, I would recommend including walls, ceilings, & overhead fixtures on your master cleaning schedule, and determine a frequency at which you can reasonably clean them. We purchased some telescopic cleaning equipment to help with the overhead tasks. That may be something for you to look into.

Hey everyone,

I'm wondering what to do about cleaning our facility. I'm a part of a package manufacturing company (printing and thermoforming), so our cleaning standards are not currently as high as a direct food contact facility. We also work in a 100 year old building that has low ceilings, lots of corners, etc. It's not the large warehouse feel with four walls and that's it. We have one contract worker come in daily to clean our bathrooms and lunch rooms, but not the production area.

We have dust controls in place or being updated, but the corners and some storage areas have some dust, dirt, etc. Our paperboard produces a lot of paper dust. What should we do? What will an auditor do if he/she sees dirt in the corner?

Thanks,

KDuf

[KDuf]

I'm certainly no expert on these matters but I think the main areas of concern are directly above production lines. We produce paperboard packaing at our facility as well, so I understand the paper dust problems! With that being said, I would recommend including walls, ceilings, & overhead fixtures on your master cleaning schedule, and determine a frequency at which you can reasonably clean them. We purchased some telescopic cleaning equipment to help with the overhead tasks. That may be something for you to look into.

Thanks Skredsfan,

Anyone else have some insight? I think we need to address this issue a little more forcibly in our facility, but I'm not sure if the manpower is there to allocate for cleaning right now. That said, I'd like to get some more opinions (and poll answers) that I can take to any conversations about hiring new employees or expanding our cleaning contract ($$$ ).

[Simon]

I voted a mixture, IMHO it's important that production operators are involved in cleaning.

[mgourley]

The machine operators should be involved. Unless they must watch their machines like hawks, they have time during their shift to do basic housekeeping tasks such as sweeping the floors and especially those corners.

You will have to provide suitable cleaning equipment in sufficient quantity to facilitate these cleaning activities. If someone has to pack a broom or dustmop, dustpan and trash container to the opposite side of the building to do some clean up, they are less likely to do so.

Marshall

[Charles.C]

Dear All,

We have dust controls in place or being updated, but the corners and some storage areas have some dust, dirt, etc. Our paperboard produces a lot of paper dust. What should we do? What will an auditor do if he/she sees dirt in the corner?

Unless the condition is within the typical operating appearance of such an operation / backed up by an appropriate cleaning schedule IMO the auditor will not be happy. Typically rewarded by a NC of some variety.

Surely the specific SQF packaging standard referred will have some representative expectations in relation to the OP?

Rgds / Charles.C

[john123]

Hello, first post from a long time lurker. We just passed an SQF Level 2, and this is one of the topics we struggled with as well. For background purposes, we are a 3rd party toller of dehydrated vegatables with milling, blending, sorting and packaging operations.

Our cleaning programs consist of:
-post-production cleanups of the production lines and surrounding areas (various mill types are their own lines, the cone blender is its own line, etc)
-pre-op checklists to verify cleanliness prior to start (and instructions to reclean if an item is dirty, such as the floors)
-master sanitation schedules (we have a custodian full time on day shift, the sanitation schedule for his duties covers some of the "easy to miss" areas such as corners, warehouse perimeter, overall floor cleanliness with a floor scrubber, etc)


To answer your question on "what will an auditor do", the answer is you'll get a non-conformity. Period. We took a couple minors related to cleanliness. Our facility is like you describe: a warehouse with many areas for dust to accumulate. One hit was due to an auditor finding dust/debris inside an equipment motor housing. We missed that particular area because it's on a production line that is non-operational (and hence, we don't have anyone actively cleaning it post-production). We addressed that in the audit response by adding a check and clean of idle production lines to the sanitation schedule on a bi-weekly basis, meaning even if we aren't using a production line for an extended period, someone will check for debris and clean it if debris is found.

The other hit we took was product debris on an metal detector. Now, the metal detector had just been returned from maintenance, where it had been for a week following a failed operational test. When we pulled it from service, it had been in production, and it uses a food grade belt to transport product through the detector prior to packaging, so obviously product debris was on it when we pulled it. That morning the detector had been returned to an idle packaging line, maybe an hour before the auditor found it, so we hadn't had a chance to clean it prior to the auditor finding it. Our mistake, we've rectified that as well.

Those are my experiences thus far with the SQF audits. This December was our first one, and we were very happy to pass with the "good" grade. These guys are very through. If you've got a dirty part of the warehouse, he's going to ask when it was last cleaned. He's going to ask who's responsible for cleaning it. And he's going to ask for the DOCUMENT that shows you clean that part of the warehouse, with the frequency schedule. Hope that helps answer some questions.

[mikysya]

What if production of eggs packaging is non-stop. How you can validate the cleanliness? You cannot do pre-op check because it is non-stop. Only 2 times a year the facility is shut down and cleaned. Any ideas how to validate cleaning?

[Charles.C]

What if production of eggs packaging is non-stop. How you can validate the cleanliness? You cannot do pre-op check because it is non-stop. Only 2 times a year the facility is shut down and cleaned. Any ideas how to validate cleaning?

Dear mikysya,

It sounds like you are saying that the production area is unclean and you are asking how to correct it ??

Rgds / Charles.C