HCE - Hygiene Conscious Establishment

dear all,

would you please help me to know about what standards should i meet in order to get HCE Certification??


thanks & best regards

riz

dear all,

would you please help me to know about what standards should i meet in order to get HCE Certification??


thanks & best regards

riz

Not sure about HCE. Can you tell us a bit about it Riz.

Regards,
Simon

dear Simon,

i saw a catering company statement being certified with HCE (hygiene conscious establishment) and certification was awarded by SGS. it was new to me thats i posted here to get some knowledge about it.


regards.

riz

FIRST TIME AM HEARING ABOUT HCE. I WOULD LIKE TO KNOW MORE ABOUT THIS CERTIFICATION.

Appears to be a company-specific initiative. More details -

hce.pdf   263.85KB   123 downloads

Seems to be hygiene-FS "oriented" rather than MS but no personal direct experience.
"HACCP" not mentioned in brochure so presumably such documentation not relevant to this standard.

Rgds / Charles.C

dear charles,

you found the right document..this is only what i found earlier.


regards.

riz

Hi Riz,

It seems to me as a monthly hygiene check for small companies (restaurants, butchers, etc).
It does not seem like a real certification to me. More a program to check some microbiological parameters in your process, by SGS laboratory. Probably the SGS-person who is taking the samples and reports the results is also verifying some simple hygiene standards. e.g. cleanliness, sanitation, hand washing, pest control (?), separation of processes.
It can be very helpfull to the small organisations that are not yet required to have an own HACCP-system.

dear all,

would you please help me to know about what standards should i meet in order to get HCE Certification??


thanks & best regards

riz

This certification appears to be Singapore specific and may demonstrate some due diligence (I like the fact hey do some micro sampling), however, as Charles has pointed out why does it not cover HACCP?

Without the inclusion of HACCP this certification is clearly deficient.

Regards,

Tony

This certification appears to be Singapore specific and may demonstrate some due diligence (I like the fact hey do some micro sampling), however, as Charles has pointed out why does it not cover HACCP?

Without the inclusion of HACCP this certification is clearly deficient.

Regards,

Tony

Hi,
Now HCE has become Hygiene Monitored with a number of features added to it. The focus remians on the basics of food safety and hygiene. Reference to hacco is there but not in that big way. Anyway in a typical restaurant/catering operation we all know what HACC would bring in; it is the time temperature control which is addressed in the checklist. Now there is increased emphasis on the food testing on microbiological parameters; zero pathogen is the qualifying criteria and depending upon the score in the checklist you are awarded the certificate. Audit and testing minimum once in three months is done that too unannounced.

I believe a good program to implement for the beginners and for the stand alone restaurants, smaller hotels, chain of restaurants, butchery shop etc.

Thanks and Regards
Gourav

dear all,

would you please help me to know about what standards should i meet in order to get HCE Certification??


thanks & best regards

riz

Hi Riz,
See my post in this thread.
A have posted a presentation on HCE (Hygiene Monitored). Need any furher information do write back here.
Thanks
Gourav

Hygiene Monitored Presentation_17.pdf   393.16KB   75 downloads

Dear Gourav,

Nice to see yr various posts.

Thks for yr comments and the attachment.

I’m not sure I agree with all yr statements, eg –

Anyway in a typical restaurant/catering operation we all know what HACC would bring in; it is the time temperature control which is addressed in the checklist.

Which time-temperature controls are you referring to ?? Criteria ?

zero pathogen is the qualifying criteria

IMO this is not a very meaningful statement without some more specifics. I presume you are quoting the information in the attachment which I find not very satisfactory. For example consider this extract –

hce-microbiological requirements.png   56.6KB   25 downloads

IMO, at least three of the stated microbiological maxima are unrealistic / incorrect and a 4th is questionable. I would very much like to see the validations.

The sampling scheme is not mentioned but the usual procedure for pathogens like Salmonella is really only effective for detecting gross contamination. This is why the HACCP aspect is so important.

I noticed that “HACCP Plan” is included in the scheme’s list of requirements but there is seemingly no score / evaluation of that aspect ? Strange.

The scoring system used is unquestionably convenient and generates some pretty data layouts but IMO is inferior to evaluation procedures based on critical / major /minor defects etc.

Without seeing the full details I may be being a bit unfair but so far not very impressed by this methodology.

Rgds / Charles.C

Dear Gourav,

Nice to see yr various posts.

Thks for yr comments and the attachment.

I’m not sure I agree with all yr statements, eg –



Which time-temperature controls are you referring to ?? Criteria ?



IMO this is not a very meaningful statement without some more specifics. I presume you are quoting the information in the attachment which I find not very satisfactory. For example consider this extract –

hce-microbiological requirements.png   56.6KB   25 downloads

IMO, at least three of the stated microbiological maxima are unrealistic / incorrect and a 4th is questionable. I would very much like to see the validations.

The sampling scheme is not mentioned but the usual procedure for pathogens like Salmonella is really only effective for detecting gross contamination. This is why the HACCP aspect is so important.

I noticed that “HACCP Plan” is included in the scheme’s list of requirements but there is seemingly no score / evaluation of that aspect ? Strange.

The scoring system used is unquestionably convenient and generates some pretty data layouts but IMO is inferior to evaluation procedures based on critical / major /minor defects etc.

Without seeing the full details I may be being a bit unfair but so far not very impressed by this methodology.

Rgds / Charles.C

Hi Charles,
Thanks for your reply.
The zero pathogen in the food sample is the qualification criteria. However You have questioned the parameters selected for a proticular kind of food. I tend to agree with the choice of clostridium for freshly prepared food and not canned.

The checklist has the weighted marking for different points. I am attaching the partial checklist, just to strenghthen my point. Can not load full checklist for obvious reasons. Other wise checklist has following broad headings: -
Interface with customer
Receiving
Non refrigerated storage
Refrigerated and frozen storage
Personal Hygiene
Preparation
Processing
Table ware
Service to guest
management of waste and pest control
Cleaning Plan
Management control (under this the HACCPplans are covered)


I would once again say that complete HACCP is not there. This program majorly focuses on the PRPs. hence useful for stand alone restaurants, smaller hotels, butcher shops, retail shops etc.

Time and temperature control: -
Now a lot of validated data is available on combination of cooking temp and time, cooling time and temps to be achieved within given time, reheating temp.
IMO Moreover when implementing HACCP validation can be supported with industry accepted data form a relaible source e.g. above mentioned temp, pasteurization temps etc.

Thanks