Icicle’s Remote Audits and Inspections Keep Your Team Safe During COVID-19

Every food facility in the world is working to keep workers, customers, auditors, and inspectors safe during the COVID-19 pandemic – and it is not an easy task. Icicle can make it easier for you with the ability to conduct remote audits and inspections directly in our food production management platform.

Inspections and audits – whether internal or external – are a crucial aspect of responsive and preventative safety for every food business. Physical distancing requirements can make it harder to complete this important work effectively. In one high-profile case, a Cargill meat plant in Calgary was linked to more than 1,500 cases of coronavirus, the largest single outbreak in North America. Reports have also emerged for food safety inspectors and auditors sickening and dying from the virus.

Icicle’s capability for remote audits and inspections helps you minimize contact and protect your employees by removing the need for an auditor or inspector to do documentation reviews onsite, as well as reducing disruption significantly and saving you valuable time. Worried about all the work that goes into preparing for an audit? Icicle can relieve that burden as well by dramatically reducing prep time.

Be Prepared for Any Audit or Inspection with Icicle, Any Time

Audits and inspections don’t have to be stressful. Whether it’s internal or external, Icicle is designed to streamline the entire process and make sure everything goes smoothly –  saving you stress, time, money and paperwork.

First and foremost: with Icicle, all your records are kept in one place, making it easy to locate any information auditors or inspectors ask for at the click of a button. This means that there is little to no preparation required for audits because all of your records are already prepared for the auditor’s review, at any moment.

“We’ve got nothing but wonderful compliments about our food safety system from auditors because everything is organized, all the documentation is there, the HACCP logs are there – it’s just one click and they can see everything.”

Dave Maguire, HACCP Coordinator at Hayter’s Farm

Icicle accomplishes this task by automatically propagating all updates throughout the whole system, meaning that any change you make, anywhere in Icicle, is automatically updated everywhere so you can be confident that your data is correct and up-to-date. So whether you are adding a new product to your production line, changing a formula, updating your packaging, or implementing new procedures, you only have to do the work once.

Since food safety is at the core of Icicle’s design, Icicle pulls information from the whole system to generate HACCP plans with one click; all the relevant changes are already filled in automatically for whatever work you are doing. Its intelligent system understands the relationship between ingredients, allergens, hazards, and regulatory requirements, helps you make those associations, and updates changes automatically to make your processes much more efficient.

Be Safe During the COVID-19 Pandemic with Icicle’s Remote Audits and Inspections

Icicle enables audits and inspections to be carried out remotely, a huge advantage in the current pandemic. External auditors and inspectors can be granted read-only access to your documents so that they can carry out their procedures remotely, reducing the need for unnecessary (and potentially harmful) physical interaction.

The document sharing process is extremely simple and easy to access from the Icicle homepage. Auditor/inspector roles can be assigned to specific people, who can then view all the documents you choose to give them access to, all in one place.

Access permissions are 100% controllable by the user and no information is given without specific authorization, ensuring that your data is protected securely.

Satisfy Requests from Inspectors and Auditors in a Flash with Icicle

As well as helping you protect your business by minimizing physical contact, using Icicle can streamline your processes by storing all your information in one place, with no more mountains of paperwork. Immediately, the stress of searching for a specific document at the sudden request of an auditor or inspector is removed.

Take P&S Frozen Foods, for example. Due to Canada’s heavy regulation of the meat industry, inspections from CIFA took an average of 90 minutes per day. Much of this time would be spent locating physical documents in response to questions asked by the inspector. However, once the company started implementing Icicle the inspector was able to view the necessary documents remotely from his office, saving P&S Operations Manager Paul valuable time he used to focus on running the business itself.

Icicle makes communication with auditors and inspectors easy, enhancing transparency and providing all the information they need at the click of a button.

“Icicle has made it much easier to bridge the gap between the needs of the company, the requirements of third-party auditors, and the requirements of federal inspectors, because they’re not always the same!”

Paul Tolnai, P&S Frozen Foods

Icicle’s easy-to-use system ensures that you’re prepared for all kinds of inspections and audits – even at the last minute.

Adapt to the “New Normal” with Icicle

The shift to remote audits and inspections is essential for ensuring that your business remains compliant as COVID-19 defines the “new normal.” By granting auditors and inspectors remote access to your documentation, you can protect your employees and consumers from potential virus outbreaks as well as reducing stress, saving time and increasing efficiency across the board. Documentation can even be exported to PDF format for those who don’t want to grant access, or in cases where the auditor refuses to use the tool. 

Icicle streamlines the entire process by providing a straightforward and comprehensive solution you need to run a safe, efficient and compliant food manufacturing business. And it’s not just audits and inspections — Icicle can help you manage the COVID-19 crisis at every step with our COVID-19 Prevention and Control System.

Want to learn more about Icicle’s inspection and audit capabilities? Take a look at our case study with P&S Frozen Foods to learn how they use Icicle for everything from regular CFIA inspections to SQF Audits >>

Check out our handy guide to passing your SQF audit with flying colours in 7 steps >>

Request a demo of Icicle today >>