BRC how to organize the program

Personally I prefer a combined Food Safety & Quality Manual. Mine is based on the sections of ISO 9001, but within each section all of the BRC polices, processes and procedure are mentioned and referenced. You can do it the other way around, but my manual was already aligned to ISO 9001 before the BRC came along. At the end of the day it is up to you as long as you have all of the requirements covered and they are referenced in the manual. It’s your manual for your business.

Regards,
Simon

Personally I prefer a combined Food Safety & Quality Manual. Mine is based on the sections of ISO 9001, but within each section all of the BRC polices, processes and procedure are mentioned and referenced. You can do it the other way around, but my manual was already aligned to ISO 9001 before the BRC came along. At the end of the day it is up to you as long as you have all of the requirements covered and they are referenced in the manual. It’s your manual for your business.

Regards,
Simon

I've based mine on the clauses of the BRC itself

For each section of the BRC I have a risk assessment pertaining to the clause, and I list on this risk assessment the types of documents that I expect to see to support the BRC clause. My Top Tier documents I have kept seperate as they also include such items that are not addressed in the BRC (items such as Food Fraud, Bioterrorism etc). These Top Tier documents are referenced in the BRC Risk assessment so can be cross referenced.

Caz x

Same as Caz I base the manuals on the BRC standard, the Quality manual contains the policies required to address each clause in each section. The SOPs and records are referenced in the Policies.

The Internal Audit schedule is based on the Quality manual so that each section is audited at least annually but mostly bi annually unless risk assessment requires more frequent auditing( HACCP f ex is reviewed Quarterly and checked monthly to catch any changes that might creep in unbeknownst to me.....perish the thought..... but it's hard to watch production managers).

As Simon says, how you set up the manuals is completely up to you, but I found following the BRC standard the easiest way as this is the one we met first. I am sure I will have to jiggle things around when we start applying other standards ( which keeps me in a job yay ).

This particular client has a separate HACCP manual, but that is because there are 7 or 8 different products all of which are not covered by the Scope of BRC, we are adding them to the scope as the production facilities are upgraded to BRC standards.
In any case the manual would need to be transported by trolly if we put it all in one binder!! I am moving away from paper manuals for this very reason....I only print copies for the audit to allow the auditor ease of access, the rest of the year it's all electronic with a neat little management system that takes care of the revisions and doc control.

Obviously copies of policies and procedures are printed off for training and I use SOPs as training records which are signed by the operators, and held on their files.

That's all I can think of for now, if i have another moment of clarity and think of anything else I'll let you know., but don't hold your breath these moments don't happen very often, most of the time I am in the corner drooling......( mostly after Quality Management meetings).

I've based mine on the clauses of the BRC itself

For each section of the BRC I have a risk assessment pertaining to the clause, and I list on this risk assessment the types of documents that I expect to see to support the BRC clause. My Top Tier documents I have kept seperate as they also include such items that are not addressed in the BRC (items such as Food Fraud, Bioterrorism etc). These Top Tier documents are referenced in the BRC Risk assessment so can be cross referenced.

Caz x

Thanks Caz x. Thats a good one. could you please share some of your risk assessments with us, just to get some idea?


thanks and regards,

QAMalpha