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How much does a GMA-SAFE
audit cost?
The main costs associated with having a GMA-SAFE audit
are the Audit Fee and the GMA Administrative Fee. The
GMA-SAFE fee is $1000 per GMA-SAFE Audit, to cover the
expense of establishing and maintaining the program,
e.g., posting the audit to the secure internet for three
years, visiting and auditing the SAFE Qualified Auditing
Firms (SQAF), and providing Process Review Audits. The
Audit Fee is established by the SQAFS, independent of
GMA-SAFE, and will vary based on the SQAF selected and
the length of the audit. Some other factors affecting
the auditor fee include the size and complexity of the
facility and quality systems being audited, and how
prepared the facility is for the audit. The GMA-SAFE
audit request process is designed so that you can
receive audit bids from multiple SQAFs, and select the
bid you want. Furthermore, the GMA-SAFE Administrative
fee for the GMA-SAFE Warehouse and Distribution Centers
is $500.00. Lastly, GMA-SAFE has a new product offering
which is called the GMA-SAFE Express Audit. This audit
was created as an off-year audit and GMA-SAFE urges
those suppliers who wish to have this audit performed to
check with its customers to determine whether said
customer will accept the audit. This audit has a
GMA-SAFE Administrative fee of $495.00.
What makes the GMA-SAFE
audit better than other audits in the industry?
For the first time, the food industry's leading
companies have reached a consensus through GMA to
establish a standard, high-quality food safety/food
protection systems audit. Instead of each company
relying on or imposing its own audit and audit checklist
on suppliers, these companies have agreed to a single,
comprehensive audit that is widely accepted across the
industry. As a result, a single GMA-SAFE audit will
satisfy the audit requirements of several customers,
eliminating the need for costly, disruptive, and often
duplicative audits. The SAFE audit allows a facility to
describe what they are actually doing, rather than be
scored by compliance to an arbitrary set of quality
indicators. The SAFE audit is flexible: a facility can
always add information that they know their customers
will be interested in. Moreover, SAFE provides access to
over 300 certified Auditors around the world, with a
broader range of food industry expertise than is
available in any one-audit company.
How long is a GMA-SAFE
audit good for?
Although the GMA-SAFE audit was designed as a yearly
audit, each user of the GMA-SAFE audit determines the
time lapse between each audit. Some have determined
yearly, some have determined every two years and some,
every three years. The Express audit was created by GMA
to be an off-year audit to fill the gap between the
GMA-SAFE full audits.
What are the SAFE Audit
requirements? What do I need to pass the audit?
A fundamental difference about the SAFE audit is that
there are no SAFE requirements, other than the facility
is not producing adulterated or regulatory-violative
product. We have found that what is a requirement for
one customer is negotiable or even not important to
another. The SAFE auditor reviews your policies and
procedures and your actual practices, and provides that
information in the report as an objective "virtual tour"
of your quality/food protection systems. The auditor
also provides his/her opinion, or "judgment", of the
overall effectiveness of each system. Then it is left
for your customers to read the report and determine for
themselves whether your quality systems meet their
expectations.
Is SAFE a scored audit?
How is this score determined?
GMA-SAFE believes that the strength of the SAFE audit is
in the auditor's narrative of objective observations,
not in a score that is inherently subjective, so
GMA-SAFE and SAFE auditors do not score the audits.
However, while the GMA-SAFE Program does not advocate
using scores to rate a supplier, we recognize that some
customers must have a score to begin their assessment
process. Therefore, a "scoring" option is available that
allows customers of the audit to assign values to the
auditor's judgments and calculates a "Score" based on
weights they assign. Another option available to
customers is the use of customized scoring templates
created by SAFE to determine industry averages. Every
customer using the scoring option must decide for
themselves the score that constitutes a "pass" or
"fail".
How long does a SAFE
audit take?
SAFE is not a typical, superficial audit. Rather than
inspecting for quality system indicators, SAFE auditors
will learn your policies and procedures, investigate
your actual practices and compliance, and assess the
apparent effectiveness of those programs. GMA-SAFE
determined a minimum amount of time be established for a
Universal Food Protection Audit. This amount of time
has been set at 32 in-plant hours. This allows the
auditor enough time to collect the information needed to
provide readers the comprehensive report they desire.
SAFE has also established a minimum of 12 in-plant hours
for the Express Audit. GMA-SAFE has not determined any
minimums concerning the Universal Food Protection
Packaging Audits or Universal Food Protection Warehouse
and Distribution Center Audits.
How do I request an
audit?
The audit request process is done entirely online. You
can start the audit process by visiting our public web
page at
www.gma-safe.org;
or if you are repeating the audit process go to
http://www.fpa-safe.net/safe.htm,
which will take you to your company’s secure web page
where you can request a new audit. The bids are
competitive and SQAFs respond directly to you with their
proposal via the secure website. After entering in your
facility information, you will be emailed a username and
password, which allows you to enter your personal
homepage at
http://www.fpa-safe.net/safe.htm.
From this page, you can view all incoming audit
proposals, and accept the one you want. In addition,
this site is where you will manage and track your audit
as it is completed. More detailed are available from the
Supplier webpage.
When should I request an
audit?
A SAFE audit can be requested for next week or next
year, but will depend on the availability of the SQAF
and their auditors. Requested audit dates should not
coincide with significant construction projects that
could hamper the audit process and the plant must be
making product during the audit. Please note that the
presence of key plant individuals in the following
departments will be critical for a complete audit; e.g.,
Quality, Human Resources, Sanitation,
Production/Operations, Engineering and Maintenance.
How do I select an
auditor?
At the Supplier webpage (http://www.fpa-safe.net/auditorlist.htm),
or during the Request an Audit process, you will see the
list of 300+ SAFE-certified auditors. These individuals
will work for one of the existing SAFE Qualified
Auditing Firms. All auditors have demonstrated a high
caliber of auditing and report writing skills necessary
to be a SAFE-certified auditor. The auditor list can be
searched using a multi-level search engine which is set
up to look for an individual with: 1) a particular
expertise, 2) by location of the auditor (US and / or
International), 3) by auditor’s name 4) by SQAF and 5)
by language skill. From your search criteria, a list of
auditors’ names shall appear. Each auditor's name is a
hyperlink, taking you to a window that provides more
information about the auditor, including contact
information. Your SAFE audit is an investment; if you
aren't sure who you want to perform your audit, we
recommend that you contact and interview the auditors of
interest, to ensure they will meet your needs.
I put in my audit
request, but now want to send it to more auditors. How
do I do this?
Once an audit request has been submitted, it cannot be
revised to add more auditors to the potential auditor
base. The best way to send your request to more auditors
is to send out a new request that encompasses the other
auditors you want to have bid on the audit. The original
request can then be deleted; to do this please contact
Jill Gerken at 708-478-4842. |
