Food Safety Management Systems (HACCP) and Legal Responsibilities
What this domain tests
The exam tests the seven HACCP principles, how a small caterer applies them through Safer Food Better Business (SFBB), and the legal duties of the food business operator (FBO) under the Food Safety Act 1990 and the Food Hygiene Regulations.
HACCP in practice
The seven principles: identify hazards; determine critical control points (CCPs); set critical limits; monitor; establish corrective action; verify; keep records. Prerequisites - cleaning, pest control, personal hygiene, training, supplier approval - must be in place first. A CCP is a step where control is essential to prevent, eliminate or reduce a significant hazard; cooking is a classic CCP with a limit of 75°C for 30 seconds. Monitoring must be at a defined frequency, and corrective action must be recorded when a limit is breached. Verification checks the system still works; it is not the same as monitoring.
Legal responsibilities
FBOs must register the establishment with the local authority at least 28 days before opening, ensure food safety, supervise and train staff, keep records, and provide allergen information. The defence of due diligence requires evidence that all reasonable precautions were taken. Environmental health officers can inspect, serve improvement or hygiene emergency prohibition notices, and close premises. The Food Hygiene Rating Scheme publishes ratings from 0 to 5.
Worked example
A roast is probed at 68°C. The chef continues cooking until the centre reaches 75°C for 30 seconds, records the temperature, and notes the corrective action. That is monitoring plus corrective action. If the chef simply recorded "cooked" without a probe reading, the record would not verify the CCP.
Traps
- Treating HACCP as paperwork rather than a working system.
- Confusing verification with monitoring.
- Assuming due diligence means "we tried our best" without records.
- Forgetting allergen information as a legal requirement.
- Thinking registration is optional or can wait until opening day.