Food premises approval

If your food business prepares or handles food of animal origin for supply to other businesses, you may require approval from us.

This includes:

  • Minced meat, meat preparations and mechanically separated meat
  • Meat products
  • Live bi-valve molluscs and 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 and wholesale markets

There are some situations where approval is not required. For example, if your food business supplies food of animal origin direct to the final consumer (the person who eats the food product) then your business will be exempt from approval. Additionally there may be an exemption available depending on the extent to which the business wishes to supply food of animal origin to other businesses.

Even if your food business is exempt from the requirement to be approved, you will still need to register your business as a food business with us.

You cannot operate your food establishment until we have approved it. The approval process requires that you put in place procedures to manage food safety based upon Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point (HACCP) principles.

The HACCP documents will make up part of your 'food safety management system' which should be tailored to fit your business and should be appropriate to the scale and type of production you intend to carry out.

How to apply for approval

Fees

There is no approval fee.

Tacit consent

Tacit consent does not apply. It is in the public interest that we visit your premises prior to approval, which can take several weeks. If you have not heard from us within a reasonable period, please contact us.

Appeals

If you are not happy with our decision to grant approval, you can appeal to a Magistrates Court within 28 days of a decision. If you are still unhappy by a decision of the Magistrates Court, you can appeal to Crown Court. In certain circumstances, you have a right to seek a judicial review.

Processing timescales

We try to process applications for approvals as quickly as possible. However, we can only consider approval once we have received a fully completed application form and all other relevant documents, e.g. HACCP plan. We also need to carry out a detailed inspection of the premises before we can grant approval.

If you have not heard from us within 28 days of submitting your application, please contact us.

Changes to approval

Once approved, you will need to notify us if there is a change of food business operator or a change in the nature of the business.

Contact us