Food premises approval

Overview

Your food business may need approval from South Tyneside Council if you intend to use "unprocessed products of animal origin", e.g. fresh meat, raw minced meat, raw milk or eggs, to produce any, or a combination of the following:

Minced meat
Meat preparations
Mechanically separated meat
Meat products
Live Bi Valve Molluscs
Fishery products
Raw milk (other than raw cows' milk)
Dairy products
Eggs (not primary production)
Egg products
Frogs legs and snails
Rendered animal fats and greaves
Treated stomachs, bladders and intestines
Gelatine and collagen
Certain cold stores
Certain wholesale markets

If your food business needs approval there are a number of requirements which need to be followed and you cannot operate until your food operation has been approved by the Council.

There are some exceptions:

If you are a retailer, or have a genuine retail element to your business (e.g. farm gate sales) and intend to supply other retailers or caterers, you could be exempt from approval if the supply of the food of animal origin is "marginal and localised and restricted".

Marginal is interpreted as a small part of the establishment's business, as meaning up to a quarter of the business in terms of food or less than 2 tonnes in terms of meat.

Localised is interpreted as meaning sales within the supplying establishment's own county, plus the greater of either the neighbouring county or counties or 30 miles from the boundary of the supplying establishment's county.

Restricted is interpreted as concerning only certain types of products being made or establishments being supplied.

You cannot manage or apply for an approval for a food business if a court has issued you with a prohibition order prohibiting you from running a food business.

Evaluation process

If you think your proposed food business may need approval please contact us to arrange a visit to your premises.

At the visit there may need to be a planned programme of works to achieve approval and you and / or your employees may need to gain further training proportionate to the size and nature of your business.

An approval application form will need to be completed and there will be a certain amount of information required to accompany the completed form which will include a detailed scale plan and a description of the proposed arrangements of your business.

This will include the (proposed) arrangements for:

Waste collection and disposal arrangements
Water supply quality testing arrangements
Arrangements for product testing (shelf life / microbiological / water)
Pest control arrangements
Arrangements for monitoring staff health and staff hygiene training
Record keeping
Applying the identification mark to product packaging or wrapping

The approval process requires you to put procedures in place to manage food safety.

These procedures should be based upon hazard analysis and critical control points (HACCP) principles.

The HACCP principles are:

To identify any hazards that must be prevented, eliminated or reduced to acceptable levels
To identify the critical control points (CCP's) at the step/s at which control is essential to prevent or eliminate a hazard or to reduce it to acceptable levels
Establish a critical limit at those CCP's which separate acceptability from unacceptability for the prevention, elimination or reduction of identified hazards
Establish and implement effective monitoring procedures at critical control points
Establish corrective actions when monitoring indicates a CCP is not under control
Establish procedures to verify that the above measures are working effectively
Establish documents and records commensurate with the nature and size of the food business to ensure that the above measures are effective

Your food safety management system can be tailored to fit your business and should be simple and appropriate to the scale and type of production you intend to carry out.

You are also required to have received adequate training in the application of HACCP principles and for you and your staff to have been instructed or trained in food hygiene matters to a level appropriate to your jobs.

Once your business is approved we will issue your establishment with a unique approval number which makes up part of the Standard Identification Mark which must be applied to your products and documentation.

This is in the form of an oval mark containing the unique three digit approval number which ensures that the products are traceable back to your company.

How to apply

Apply online for food premises approval

Tell us about a change to your existing food premises approval

You can also download the food premises approval application form and email it to us at Environmental.HealthMailbox@southtyneside.gov.uk.

Tacit consent

Tacit consent is where an application is treated as accepted if a reply is not recieved within a certain timeframe.

Tacit consent will not apply.

It is in the public interest that the Council must process your application before it can be granted.

Approval can only be granted once your business can demonstrate compliance with all the requirements listed above.

We will contact you when we have received your application to arrange to carry out the necessary checks needed to satisfy the requirements.

You can contact us oneline through UK Welcomes service or contact Environmental Health on 0191 427 7000.

If you have a query about your registration

For any queries about your registration, please contact Environmental Health on 0191 427 7000.

For more information about food premises approval see Food Standards Agency: Approved premises in the UK.

If you have a complaint

If you have a complaint, we advise that you contact the trader, preferably in the form a letter (with proof of delivery).

If that has not worked, if you are located in the UK, the Citizens Advice Bureau will give you advice.

From outside the UK, contact the UK European Consumer Centre.

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