Guidance notes for the completion of the Application for Approval form

Part 1

a) The Trading name is the name that the business ordinarily uses in its day to day trade for example on your letterhead or invoices.

b) The full address must be given including the post code.

Part 2 - Type(s) of products(s) of animal origin for which approval is sought

Your application will be considered and granted against the types of products that you are handling. Your approved establishment will be registered on a national database according to product type by the Food Standards Agency.

Tick each of the products of animal origin that you intend to handle or use within the establishment.

The following legal definitions apply to some of those listed.

• 'Minced meat' means boned meat that has been minced into fragments and contains less than one per cent salt.
• 'Meat preparations' means fresh meat, including meat that has been reduced to fragments, which has had foodstuffs, seasonings or additives added to it or which has undergone processes insufficient to modify the internal muscle fibre structure of the meat and eliminate the characteristics of fresh meat.
• 'Meat product' means processed products resulting from the processing of meat or from further processing of such processed products, so that the cut surface shows that the product no longer has the characteristics of fresh meat.
• 'Fishery product' means all seawater or freshwater animals (except for live bivalve molluscs, live echinoderms, live tunicates, and live marine gastropods, and all mammals, reptiles and frogs), whether wild or farmed, and including all edible forms, parts and products of such animals.
• 'Fresh fishery products' means unprocessed fishery products, whether whole or prepared, including products packaged under vacuum or in a modified atmosphere, that have not undergone any treatment to ensure preservation other than chilling.
• 'Dairy Product' means processed products resulting from the processing of raw milk or from the further processing of such processed products.
• 'Egg products' means processed products resulting from the processing of eggs, or of various components or mixtures of eggs, or from the further processing of such processed products.

Contact us if you require advice as to which definition applies to your products.

Part 3- Food business operator and management of the establishment

It is vital that the details in this section are correct. If you have any doubt as to the registered name and address, you must seek legal advice or contact Companies House.

a) If the business is registered as a limited company, you must give the full Limited Company name, registration number and the registered office address, or

b) If the business is a partnership, the full names and home addresses including the postcode of each partner must be stated here, or

c) If you are a sole trader, your full name and home address including postcode is required.

d) In all cases, the business telephone numbers, fax number and email address must be included.

e) You must complete the full names of the managers on site and their job titles. Include managers on all shifts and in all departments.

f) If there are other people in control of the business, for example, a finance manager, sleeping partners, their names and job title must be included.

Part 4 - Use of the Establishment

This is the primary use of your establishment. Tick each of the activities that apply.

To assist you in this, the following definitions apply to some of those listed.

'Standalone cold store' means an establishment which stores POAO, under temperature control conditions (meaning chilled or frozen) and transports the POAO to other than the final consumer.

'Products of animal origin' (POAO) means -food of animal origin including honey and blood; live bivalve molluscs. This will include meat, fish, dairy foods, eggs, and live echinoderms (such as starfishes, sea urchins), live tunicates (including sea squirts) and live marine gastropods (limpets, whelks) intended for human consumption and other animals destined to be prepared with a view to being supplied live to the final consumer.

'Wholesale market' means a food business that includes several separate units which share common installations and sections where foodstuffs are sold to food business operators.

'Processing' means any action that substantially alters the initial product including heating, smoking, curing, maturing, drying, marinating, extraction, extrusion or a combination of those processes.

'Packing' in this context means either 'Wrapping' - placing of a foodstuff in a wrapper or container in direct contact with the foodstuff concerned, and the wrapper or container itself and /or 'Packing' - the placing of one or more wrapped foodstuffs in a second container.

'Retail' means the handling and/or processing of food and its storage at the point of sale or delivery to the final consumer. It includes distribution terminals, catering operations, factory canteens, institutional catering, restaurants and other similar food service operations, shops, supermarket distribution centres and wholesale outlets.

'Catering' means 'an establishment where food is prepared on the premises for delivery to the ultimate consumer and is ready for consumption without further preparation'. This means for the consumption on the premises or for 'take away'.

Part 5 - Transport of products from the establishment

You must tell us how you will be transporting your produce to other establishments.

Part 6 - Supply of products from the establishment to other establishments

This means what types of businesses will you or do you supply to. It is important that you tick every type of customer, even if it is a small proportion of your customers.

Part 7 - Other activities on the same site

If you have already been approved for these activities, please add your approval number.

If not, please tick the relevant 'yes' or 'no' boxes.

Part 8 - Information and documentation

This information is required in order to process your application.

A description of the (proposed) food safety management system based on HACCP principles must be submitted with this application either in hard copy or electronically:

This may contain other elements of documentation required and if so, the relevant boxes on the form should be ticked.

All other documentation should be submitted electronically with this application. If it is not possible to submit this documentation with the application form, please note you will be required to submit it or make it available for inspection before your application can be finally determined. Failure to do so may result in a refusal to grant approval.

If you are submitting information electronically, please either email us foodandhealth&safety@breckland.gov.uk or telephone our Food, Health & Safety Team on 01362 656313 to advise what information you are sending. This is because messages that are of a large file-size may be blocked by the council's firewall security settings without informing the sender or proposed recipient.

Part 9 - Products being handled, activities and the amount

a) In this section, you are required to give specific details of what activity you undertake for each product of animal origin that you are handling. You must state all of the stages of your involvement for the product types. For example this could mean storage, cutting, re-wrapping, curing, drying, cooking, slicing.

b) You are required to give the amount of each food type that you handle each week in metric tonnes. If you do not know this because you work in kg or lbs, please give that figure.

Part 10 - Application

You must sign the application form by ticking the online declaration and provide full name details. Failure to do so will result in your application being incomplete and unable to be processed until missing information is supplied; this could delay your ability to trade.

Once you have checked the form and are satisfied that it is fully completed and you have the appropriate accompanying documentation to be submitted with it, please press submit.