Bureau Veritas launches digital service to manage food safety

SAFEOPS is the name of the service and Eezytrace is the software created by EEWORX, who Bureau Veritas have a strategic partnership with.

It is for daily quality checks and food traceability, in line with HACCP and international requirements.

SAFEOPS provides potential to optimize costs as for sites that are consistently compliant; the company can reduce the frequency of third party audits.

Daily checks​

Vincent Bourdil, global food director at Bureau Veritas, said restaurant chains need to conduct checks daily.

“For example on goods they receive from their supplier to make sure the temperature is ok and sign off on that. To control the temperature of fridges and if there is an issue to dump the food inside. They have records of cleaning to sign off. ​

“These are mandatory, daily checklists. In the catering industry they need to heat and freeze fast and all checks and records are on paper. When did the freezing start and stop and who did it, they print a label and stick it on the dish.”​

There is a goldmine of information that nobody is using, said Bourdil.

“Clients have data on paper, we can extract the appropriate data and the ultimate goal is to reduce the pressure of external audits and inspections. We can reallocate the number of audits so we do them only when necessary.  ​

“We can replace paper checks by Eezytrace and predict and propose how to improve the situation. Paper is time-consuming and you are not sure how accurate the weekly sheets to fill in are, sometimes you have the impression it was all done on Friday evening.”​

Restaurants and retail chains collect thousands of pieces of data each week on food safety and quality such as temperature and labels logbooks, but also brand conformity such as hospitality standards.

The problem is many organizations still collect this on paper, with no effective way of tracing or tracking data.

Focusing resources​

Third party audits help weed out problems but the vast majority of sites are compliant. This means a large proportion of companies’ audit budgets are focused on the wrong sites.

Bourdil said it can be customised to fit local regulations as non-compliances set by regulation can vary by geography.

“You first try the system for one month free in the operation, give us your HACCP plan and we digitalise it within two weeks to replicate paper checks on the system. We bring the tablet to clients and try that, there are always adjustments or added things they want to do, and after one month we see if they want to employ it.”​

By using the software, employees collect all data on customized tablets. Data is centralized and made available to concerned parties in real time: site managers, quality and operations managers at head office and Bureau Veritas as an independent third party.

By centralizing data, brands are able to optimize audit and control plans and budgets.

Improved data tracking and visualization enable company managers and Bureau Veritas to identify sites with difficulties, allowing for a customized approach to helping them improve.

Bourdil said SAFEOPS provides a way to collect and track data from daily checks at every site in real time, identify issues, and address them.  ​

“It also helps our clients with profiling risks and saves money by avoiding a blanket approach to auditing, instead, channeling spend where it is truly needed. Being built on the same risk-based methodology, our solution is 100% FSMA ready​.”