Product Release Policy
I work for a winery who produces and bottles all our products and we are going for SQF Certification. My question is about our Product Release Policy, and more specifically how deep does our Product Release Policy have to go. Below are my main questions:
1) Does our release policy only need to address Food Safety hazards, or does it also need to address food Fraud? For example, we perform post-bottling analysis to make sure the alcohol matches TTB Label standards
2) Part of our release process requires my position to actually review Lab results and signoff on them. The Lab tech is SQF Certified, so can she approve of that portion herself, or is secondary verification required?
My previous company had a very straight forward release process. I would fill out a spreadsheet for each bottling and identify if there was any type of HOLD. Once the product passed Micro, I would release the product as long as there was not any type of HOLD. Wine is a VERY safe product.
Basically I'm trying to find the most efficient way to comply with this code. I'm already super busy and need to create as efficient a release system as possible.
For more context, I oversee all Bottling Quality HOLDs and would be the one putting product on HOLD if necessary. If our product passes micro testing and the post-bottling analysis confirms product is acceptable (which is more of a quality and fraud check), do I have to verify or sign off on their analysis prior to releasing the product, or can they email me the product has passed and I take it from there?
1) Address both
2) SQF certified lab tech would do it - unless the GFSI scheme specifies double-verification, but I doubt it
Don't overcomplicate the process.
You can mange this piece however it works for you SQF is not dictating what you do---just that you follow whatever you say you'll do
where I am we have a one liner in our program that our product does not require a release UNLESS it's on hold
So you're program would show the flow----lab report----lab tech review/sign----product released OR lab report------lab tech review-FLAG----product placed on HOLD