Register a Food Business
If you are planning to start a food business, you must register your premises at least 28 days before opening or producing food. This applies to most types of food business, including catering businesses run from home, mobile or temporary premises such as stalls and vans and those operating online or by distance selling. Failing to register can result in legal action being taken against you.
Registration of your food business is free and can’t be refused. If you are already trading and have not registered yet, you need to register as soon as possible as this is a legal requirement.
Businesses must also register with the local authority if they are taking over or make significant changes to an existing business food operation, such as starting to prepare foods or having a delivery service.
You can register your food business via the online food registration form on the Food Standards Agency’s website. If you use two or more premises you will need to register all of them. If food premises are to be used by several catering businesses (for example a village hall or conference centre) each of the organisations using the building for their food businesses need to register with the local authority.
Once we receive a completed food registration we may contact you to confirm some of the details and gather any additional information we need. We will also plan an initial inspection at this point.
Food Business Guidance and Advice
The Food Standards Agency’s website contains comprehensive information on how to make food safely and run your business hygienically. Guidance includes cleaning methods, temperature control requirements, pest management and allergens guidance, along with a large amount of other really critical information. Before you start a business visit those pages, and check them out for updates as required.
The Council will inspect a food business after it has started operating and on a periodic basis afterwards. This can range between every once every 6 months to every once every 3 years, depending on the level of risk and they type of business you are. However, it is the business which is responsible for ensuring they have appropriate and competent advice to help them start up and manage food safety.
If you have reviewed the topics on the FSA’s pages and need specific advice about an issue, feel free to contact us through the contact form, and we will be happy to respond. Our normal response times to business support enquiries is 10 working days.
Free Food Safety Training for Businesses
We have a limited offer of free online training for food business managers, supervisors and food handlers.
The manager/supervisor level 3 Qualification usually costs £175 and the Level 2 food handler course costs £25. To support local businesses recovering from the pandemic and to enable businesses to achieve a 5 star food hygiene rating we’re offering a limited number of courses for free.
The offer is limited to one of the Level 3 courses for each business premises and two for the Level courses per business premises. They’re also available on a first come, first serve basis. When they’re gone, they’re gone.
At the end you receive a formal qualification and certificate to download, print and display.
Click here for more information and to register.
If you require larger numbers of courses we may be able to set up a specific training session or provide additional places for a fee.
Food Safety Management
All food businesses are required to have a documented food safety management system based on the principles of HACCP. Although this may sound onerous a small catering business can get a free guidance pack called Safer Food and Better Business from the Food Standards Agency.
In partnership with the Food Standards Agency, we joined the National Food Hygiene Rating Scheme, where a food hygiene rating for a food premises is established following an inspection and taking into account observations and discussions made during the visit.
Food Safety - Allergens Reminder
Food business operators in the retail and catering sector are required to provide allergen information and follow labelling rules.
This means that food business operators must:
- provide allergen information to the consumer for both prepacked and non-prepacked food and drink.
- handle and manage food allergens effectively in food preparation.
Food businesses must make sure that staff receive training on allergens.
On the Food Standards Agency website they have provided a detailed package of information to support businesses to understand the requirements including online training so please use these links to make sure your business complies.
Food Hygiene
We regularly inspect food businesses in our district to ensure their food hygiene and waste disposal methods are in order. If you have encountered an issue while visiting premises in the District, please get in touch so we can investigate.
Food Warnings and Recalls
To find out if there are any food recalls from products purchased in the UK, please see the latest food warnings from the Food Standards Agency.