9 replies to this topic

[Lynx42]

We recently had our initial SQF audit, completed all the corrective actions, and got the final report.  There are a number of discrepancies that I am not sure if I need to get my manager to address with SQF or can ignore.  These were all clauses we were compliant on and none of them affected our score.   Will these come back to haunt us in future audits? We are an ambient storage 3PL.

 

• 2.1.1 - He mentions a monthly luncheon, a gift card program for reporting food safety incidents and a weekly meeting of all employees and the Production Manager. - We do not have these programs, and as we are a storage only facility, we do not have a production manager.
• 2.2.1 - He mentions a Quality Assurance Supervisor, and later in the report mentions a Quality Manager. - We have a Food Safety Coordinator (me) who is also the SQF Practitioner and HACCP Team Lead.
• 2.4.1 - He mentions the California Health Code and that we review all production records before shipping.  He also says he reviewed a PCQI certificate from 2022. - We are not in California, do not produce anything, and are exempt from the PQCI requirements.  I am the first person who has been in a primarily food safety role and didn't start until mid-2023.
• 2.6.3 - He mentions Recall Team, a legal counselor, initiating and investigating recalls. - We do not own any of the product stored with us and our Recall SOP clearly states that we assist customers in the recall process, but will never initiate one.
• 2.8.1 - says we use blue labels for allergen identification. - No.  None of our customers color coordinate allergens, and as most of it is finished products very few label their allergens on the outer packaging or require segregation in storage.  
• 12.2.5 - Mentions a "Cleaning Chemical Usage SOP" and protocols for measuring concentrations. - We have a Cleaning SOP and a Chemical Control Policy, but nothing named what he put in quotes.  We also only use RTU sanitizers so our sanitation crew never has to mix or check concentrations.
• 12.3.4 - mentions our Driver Lobby and "Driver Sign-In Log." - We have a guard shack with a couple portable toilets for drivers to use.  I have only once seen a driver actually come into the building, and he had to get buzzed in at the main entrance like all visitors. 
• 12.3.5 - Mentions a changing room with storage for street clothing, access through a room separate from the processing area, and a designated outer garment storage area while using the facilities (inaccurate), even after mentioning in 12.3.3 that street clothing is permitted and there are no exposed products on-site (accurate).

There are a number of other discrepancies (mentioning an outside eating area), that I didn't think would matter as much, but these kind of worry me if our next auditor will have access to these notes during our next audit.

The auditor was very unprofessional in my opinion.  Every time my boss left the room he would complain about not getting paid enough based on the time it took to write up his reports, about the previous place he had audited, and he took several personal calls. Stopped the audit for half an hour to get his flight changed, then asked for lunch before he would do the closing meeting.  

Edited by Lynx42, Yesterday, 11:19 PM.

[Setanta]

Yes, you want to clear this up ASAP. This will only lead to more confusion down the line. I would get your auditor and the reviewer involved, maybe even the scheduler.

Edited by Setanta, Yesterday, 11:22 PM.

[SQFconsultant]

You really should file a complaint against the Auditor with the CB and copy to Compliance at SQFI.

 

Personally I would have thrown him out of the facility and then called the CB and SQFI.

 

Fortunately in 20 years of SQF I've only tossed 2 Auditors.

 

Very curious to know why your Auditor went into what appears to be a consulting mode on your  report and the CB Reviewer allowed it.

 

It is however customary for facilities to offer a lunch but not for the Auditor to demand it.

[GMO]

Asked for lunch or demanded it?  I suppose that's semantics and depends on tone.  They may have felt it would be difficult to do afterwards.

 

The report though and his complaints on site suggests to me that he's copying and pasting from other reports.  He may believe that he's insufficiently paid to write up but this is unequivocally unethical behaviour and needs to be flagged to the CB.  I would be careful how you word it, innocently as you have in the post that there were some factual errors in the narrative on compliant areas of site standards.  Any CB worth their salt will work it out for themselves that he's being naughty.

[TimG]

Is it possible he copy/pasted some of those verification points he used from someone else's audit? Like, maybe he got sick of actually writing up from your audit and just used one he had previously written up (from CA).

[Scampi]

Report NOW 

 

Full details as your provided us sent to your CB    Add as much detail as you can reasonably manage

[MDaleDDF]

Is it possible he copy/pasted some of those verification points he used from someone else's audit? Like, maybe he got sick of actually writing up from your audit and just used one he had previously written up (from CA).

That was my first response as well...

We just had our audit and the auditor was an master's degree engineer who out of college couldn't find engineering work, so became an auditor.   (He told us so at lunch).   So this guy had zero food experience, and zero manufacturing experience.   He actually had zero real work experience, other than being an auditor.      

He was not a good auditor...lol.   I think he was on my production floor maybe 20 minutes?   And wrote up every little nit picky paperwork issue he could find.   Which is fine, I'll work my way through the CARs, but just......just bad......  day 1 he literally grilled me on paperwork for 12 hours, with a 30 minute break for lunch.   Last time I'll let an auditor dictate a 12 hour work day to me.

[Lynx42]

Asked for lunch or demanded it?  I suppose that's semantics and depends on tone.  They may have felt it would be difficult to do afterwards.

 

The report though and his complaints on site suggests to me that he's copying and pasting from other reports.  He may believe that he's insufficiently paid to write up but this is unequivocally unethical behaviour and needs to be flagged to the CB.  I would be careful how you word it, innocently as you have in the post that there were some factual errors in the narrative on compliant areas of site standards.  Any CB worth their salt will work it out for themselves that he's being naughty.

 

Demanded... Held the closing meeting hostage until he got something to eat... I was being diplomatic with "asked." 

At 10:30 he asked for 30 minutes to type things up, and said after that he wanted to walk the warehouse again, have lunch, then do the closing meeting.  We left him in the conference room, but a few minutes later I went in to grab something and he was on the phone arguing with someone about the cost of changing his flight.  At the 30 minute mark I walked back in and he was talking to his wife.  He then complained about the cost of changing his flight, mentioned something about his kid having a game the next day he'd now get to attend, then asked when lunch would arrive.  He didn't mention walking the warehouse, just stared at his laptop and occasionally typed stuff until lunch arrived.
I am 100% sure he copy and pasted stuff as he asked for a few documents so he wouldn't have to type them all out.  Specifically said to copy it from what we had and send it as an email, so it wasn't the actual doc, just portions of it, which my boss agreed to.  Also, at least twice he took a phone call regarding his previous audit and was complaining about them.  He didn't tell us who or where it was.

 

I will type up, by clause, the exact wording and how it does not pertain to our site, and send that to my boss to send in.  I wish I had looked this over better earlier, but once all the corrective actions were in I was moving on to other projects between my normal duties. It was a relief to not be absorbed in preaudit details.  I will leave out all the other stuff and just focus on the actual report, which was what I had planned to do. 

[Lynx42]

That was my first response as well...

We just had our audit and the auditor was an master's degree engineer who out of college couldn't find engineering work, so became an auditor.   (He told us so at lunch).   So this guy had zero food experience, and zero manufacturing experience.   He actually had zero real work experience, other than being an auditor.      

He was not a good auditor...lol.   I think he was on my production floor maybe 20 minutes?   And wrote up every little nit picky paperwork issue he could find.   Which is fine, I'll work my way through the CARs, but just......just bad......  day 1 he literally grilled me on paperwork for 12 hours, with a 30 minute break for lunch.   Last time I'll let an auditor dictate a 12 hour work day to me.

 

Our guy also had no food experience but a lot of general auditing experience.  He was excited about some of the non-food stuff we had as it was stuff he "used to audit."  Very very by the book on the paperwork though and argued with us about things that don't exist in our warehouse because we don't have exposed foods. No, we don't have specific biological hazards listed on our HACCP as nothing "can reasonably be expected to occur at each step" since the food comes in and leaves the building in the same packaging, usually on the same pallet.  He did not have a flashlight when walking the warehouse.  Didn't talk to a single warehouse employee (though he mentions he does in several points on his report), and was very hyper focused on the paperwork.

[jfrey123]

Yep, this is complaint worthy.  Future [good] auditors will take this report as gospel truth, comparing prior notes to current practices when they visit.  When they can't find a policy or record you 'had during a prior audit', they'll ask for evidence and validation of the change (which, you know, didn't happen since it didn't exist...)

 

Go through line by line like you just did for us and point out the factually incorrect aspects.  Consider adding a letter with signatures from yourself and other witnesses of your company to help verify some of the parts like "auditor did not actually talk to our employees as indicated in report."  Your CB should have contact info for how to direct the complaints.  As GMO indicated, it's pretty clear the auditor likely copy/pasted over a past report, but leave any speculation out of your complaint.  Just point out which items you can say are factually incorrect and let them figure out on their own your auditor pencil whipped your audit.

 

Lastly, depending on how many you need corrected, and depending on the severity of what they do about their auditor, you can probably expect the CB to come back and schedule a new audit.  The CB could be in violation of issuing a certificate that they know wasn't audited correctly.  Obviously you shouldn't be paying for it if it comes down to that, but I just wanted to prep you for the possibility it could come up.