High standards of personal hygiene must be maintained at all times at The British Premium Sausage Company in order to ensure obligations under food safety legislation are met. Therefore these rules must be followed:
Hand washing
Hands must be washed on entry to food storage and production areas, prior to working and at regular intervals during the day using the hand wash sinks provided. Equipment sinks must not be used for handwashing. Particular care must be taken to wash hands in the following circumstances:
• After visiting the toilet
• After coughing into your hands or using a handkerchief or touching face or hair
• Between handling raw and ready to eat products
• After carrying out any cleaning tasks or handling waste
• After breaks, eating, drinking or smoking
• Regularly during the production day
Hands must be washed in any circumstances where non washing might lead to contamination of food or food equipment. If in doubt, wash your hands.
Protective Clothing
Protective clothing must be worn in a production area. This includes:
• Coats or Overalls
• Mob caps
• Wellington Boots or food industry shoe. Overshoes are permitted for short term use.
• Beard snoods where there is visible sign of hair growth.
• Aprons, gloves and over sleeves are available if required.
• Safety equipment eg. Gloves when handling cleaning chemicals.
Coats and overalls are colour coded according to the area. This is white for low risk; red for ambient high care ready to eat; blue for non-manufacturing work such as cleaning, goods in, goods out.
Protective clothing must be removed before visiting the toilet or kitchen/rest areas, for breaks and when going outside. Clothing must be changed daily or where there is a risk of contamination to product e.g. allergen spillage, glass breakage.
Disposable protective clothing such as gloves, oversleeves, aprons, mob caps and beard snoods must be single -use only due to the potential for foreign body contamination after removal. These should also be changed when soiled, dirty or damaged. When removing disposable protective clothing, these should be removed with care to avoid any potential contamination and placed straight into a bin.
Non disposable protective clothing such as gloves and aprons should be cleaned and/or replaced when soiled, dirty or damaged.
Personal garments must not be worn over protective clothing e.g. outdoor clothing with “hoods” must be under protective clothing, outdoor clothing with zip tags must be covered under protective clothing.
Any loss or damage could be potential product contamination. Please ensure all damages are accounted for and must be reported to your supervisor.
Medical Health
All employees must complete a pre-employment medical questionnaire and are required to comply with the medical screening procedure.
Personnel suffering from infectious illness, diarrhoea, and nausea or vomiting, some throat infections, skin rash, boils or any other skin lesions are not allowed to work in contact with food. These conditions must be reported to your supervisor.
After all sickness absence, staff are required to complete a return to work
Wounds - Cuts, grazes or sores must be treated and covered with a blue metal detectable waterproof dressing.
Personal medication - must not be taken into the production area. All medication must be securely stored in personnel lockers provided, unless specific permission is given to an individual by a Director or Manager.
Food Safety
Personal Possessions - must not be taken into the production area. This includes cigarettes and food. Electronic cigarettes shall not be permitted to be used or brought into production or storage areas. Only authorised mobile phones are permitted.
Allergens - Foodstuffs containing nuts and sesame must not be brought onto site by employees, visitors or contactors.
Food and drink - must not be consumed within processing and storage areas. This includes chewing gum and sweets. Putting any kind of items (pens, labels, tape) in the mouth is strictly forbidden.
Smoking & Tobacco - use is expressly forbidden on site. A designated smoking area is provided.
Aftershave and Perfume - strong fragrances must not be worn.
Make-up – No make up is preferred but light make-up is allowed at the discretion of your supervisor.
Jewellery - Watches and similar wearable devices must not be worn. Jewellery shall not be worn, with the exception of a plain wedding ring or wristband. Rings and studs in exposed parts of the body, such as ear, nose, tongue, eyebrow shall not be worn. Any jewellery worn for either ethnic, religious, medical reasons may be allowed after but only after your Supervisor is notified.
Finger nails - must be kept short and clean. Nail varnish, Nail art, false finger nails or false eye lashes are not permitted.
Staples and paperclips - must not be brought into the production area.
Routine checks will be carried out to ensure compliance with company personal hygiene requirements, and in particular personal cleanliness, correct dresscode and the absence of any obvious signs of illness.
Security – All visitors to site must be complete a questionnaire and be accompanied at all times. Any unidentified or unknown visitors must be reported.
This policy will be reviewed annually or more frequently if required by changes within legislation or the needs of the business. It is communicated to staff via briefings and inductions.