Is a PCQI certificate required for all my suppliers?
Hello everyone , I
I have a question , we planning to be certified as a SQF and we working in all the internally procedures and quality manual ..
I have an external helper to implement the system ,
he ask me to require to all my suppliers the following information:(regarding the module :
But I'm not sure if I should be require this to all my suppliers including the suppliers non certified for any quality system ..
2.3.4 Approved Supplier Program (Mandatory)
SUPPLIER EVALUATION
All suppliers must deliver the following information:
- FDA Registration
- Letter of Guarantee
- Copy of liability insurance
- Copy of Quality system certificate (SQF, BRC, IFS, FSSC 22000, etc)
- Copy of Quality system annual audit report including non-conformances, and solutions
- Copy of GMP’s, HACCP Program
- FSMA Compliance (PCQI ((Copy of QI individual certificate), Sanitary Transportation Rule, Food Fraud/Food Defense) rules compliance
- Specification sheet/Technical Data Sheet, Material Safety Data Sheet
If the supplier does not have a quality system certification, must provide with
- FDA Registration
- Letter of Guarantee
- Copy of liability insurance
- Copy of GMP’s, HACCP program
- FSMA Compliance (PCQI ((Copy of QI individual certificate), Sanitary Transportation Rule, Food Fraud/Food Defense) rules compliance
- Exquisita Tortillas, Inc., will eventually require all suppliers to have a quality program certification
- Specification sheet (Must be signed by both parties)/Technical Data Sheet, Material Safety Data Sheet
thank you ..
I'll defer to the people here that know much more about SQF than I do, but just some observations from a BRCGS certificated facility:
1) There is no need to "require" the following for supplier approval (I assume that's what you mean by Supplier Evaluation)
a) FDA Registration
b) Letter of Guarantee
c) Liability Insurance
d) Copies of GMP's/HACCP plan (it is assumed as a matter of certification to a GFSI benchmarked standard)
e) FSMA compliance statement (and the certification of a PCQI).
f) Copy of the audit report/non-conformance list (many suppliers consider this confidential/proprietary and they will not release this information without a signed Non-Disclosure Agreement)
From a BRCGS perspective, these documents are certainly nice to have (since it shows due diligence on your part to approve suppliers), but they are not "required" to approve a supplier. This also requires more work on your part to ensure that these documents are valid/up to date/reviewed by you.
What does the SQF code "require" for supplier approval and monitoring? Ask your suppliers for what is "required" by the SQF code to start with on your journey to getting certified. If you choose to add more documents later, that's certainly your prerogative. Do NOT, however make them a part of your requirements to approve a supplier, because that's simply an easy non-conformance an auditor can call out if you do not have the document in question.
Marshall
SQF Code doesn't require most of this. It only states you need agreed specifications and COA or COC. In saying that it is up to you to decide how you will assess your suppliers food safety risk, what criteria you have to rate and approve them and the methods and frequency of monitoring them. It is up to your company to decide this. That being said a lot of the documents you are asking for would help with this, if you so choose to utilize requesting them.
Most of what you are looking to ask for is actually a pretty standard ask. The only issue I would have as a supplier is sending you the full audit report if we are already GFSI certified as I feel that is not needed (personal thing I seem to have about this as seen from my postings on other threads, lol). Agree with the last paragraph as well, posted above.
Forgot to mention asking for PCQI certificates of individuals is a new one to me. I have been asked in a questionnaire if our facility has someone certified as a PCQI, but never have been asked to provide a certificate. Feel that is a bit of an overreach there.
Forgot to mention asking for PCQI certificates of individuals is a new one to me. I have been asked in a questionnaire if our facility has someone certified as a PCQI, but never have been asked to provide a certificate. Feel that is a bit of an overreach there.
I have been asked for a certificate and the auditor hinted that there may be a need for a re-certificate even though there is no such language.
Forgot to mention asking for PCQI certificates of individuals is a new one to me. I have been asked in a questionnaire if our facility has someone certified as a PCQI, but never have been asked to provide a certificate. Feel that is a bit of an overreach there.
Correct - some people may have one, but that is only ONE way to meet the PCQI requirement, which is taking a training course. Someone can be a PCQI just based on work experience and knowledge in their field.
2.3.4 Approved Supplier Program (Mandatory)
SUPPLIER EVALUATION
All suppliers must deliver the following information:
- FDA Registration
- Letter of Guarantee
- Copy of liability insurance
- Copy of Quality system certificate (SQF, BRC, IFS, FSSC 22000, etc)
- Copy of Quality system annual audit report including non-conformances, and solutions
- Copy of GMP’s, HACCP Program
- FSMA Compliance (PCQI ((Copy of QI individual certificate), Sanitary Transportation Rule, Food Fraud/Food Defense) rules compliance
- Specification sheet/Technical Data Sheet, Material Safety Data Sheet
If the supplier does not have a quality system certification, must provide with
- FDA Registration
- Letter of Guarantee
- Copy of liability insurance
- Copy of GMP’s, HACCP program
- FSMA Compliance (PCQI ((Copy of QI individual certificate), Sanitary Transportation Rule, Food Fraud/Food Defense) rules compliance
- Exquisita Tortillas, Inc., will eventually require all suppliers to have a quality program certification
- Specification sheet (Must be signed by both parties)/Technical Data Sheet, Material Safety Data Sheet
thank you ..
I wanted to ask to clarify: is this list generated in your company program? I double checked SQF Ed 9 and the Guidance Documents, and I'm not finding any similar lists in the published materials from SQF.
I wouldn't think a copy of individual PCQI certificates are required: as mentioned above a certificate is not required for a site to establish a PCQI. Also keep in mind suppliers should not be sharing their FDA registration number with you, but it is sufficient for them to state in writing that they have a registration on file (you can ask to view it during an audit).
If this list is a copy of your internal program, I'll say it's quite robust. Though in my recent experience with supplier approval, I would struggle to get my suppliers to fully conform to such a list.
This is not a requirement of Supplier Approval. It also should be noted that a PCQI could easily be a person who has not taken a "PCQI Course" but rather had the experience and knowledge to qualify.
Go to the code and build your program around what the code says not what someone is suggesting.
Again, might be nice to have but does involve more documentation than required, especially if the have a GFSI Cert...this alone tells you they have a program and person in place to manage it.
First, I am assuming your company is not yet SQF - if that is correct you can't go for the quality component until you have at least 1 or 2 years as SQF certified.
Why would you require suppliers to have the quality component?.
As to the PCQI certificate - formal training where a certificate is issued is not a requirement to be a PCQI - people can be PCQI's based on their experience, study, etc - for instance while I'm an SQF consultant I am also the PCQI for our organic verticle growing facility and I don't have a certicate - just boo coo experience and study work.
We and our clients ask for product analysis, coa's, migration guarentees, either a GFSI scheme certificate that shows products in scope, grade, must be within past year and shows a grade/score, etc or a 3rd party audit.
We might ask for their haccp plan or a haccp summary and there are a couple of other things depending on their risk.
All suppliers are also subject to a fraud assessment, thus we send each one a questionaire.
We reserve the right to do the audit on their facility or commission an auditing company send an auditor either we pick up the cost on this or we split cost.
I can't really comnent on your huge listing of requirements further - only will add this - your "helper" does not appear to be HELPING YOU AT ALL!
Get an experienced SQF Consultant regarless of whether or not they have a certicate - you need this, what you have is a bumbler.
I am sure you can figure out what happened next in almost ALL cases where the required to comply list was way too long.
Plus, asking for so much stuff will becone a nightmare to manage for getting updates every year or so from your suppliers.
I manage our supplier program and we ask for the following items from our suppliers:
- letter of guarantee < 1 year old
- 3rd party audit certification (BRC, SQF etc)
- spec sheet
- allergen declaration (if not included in the spec sheet)
- country of origin statement (if not included in the spec sheet)
- emergency contact information
I forgot to mention that we update the LoG annually and the 3rd Party certificates according to their expiry dates and we update the spec sheets every three years.