Following changes to the Victorian Food Act, in 1998, Local Government Environmental Health Officers found themselves with a potential administrative headache.
“The new standards meant many new tasks and a huge increase in our administrative workload,” said Sally Kelton, Team Leader Environmental Health Unit at the City of Greater Dandenong. “We had to spend far more time in the office, which meant compromising the time we could spend in the field.”
Relief came for Sally and her team in the form of AUDIT-Easy, a program developed for Councils by Performance Management Systems. It is a comprehensive assessment, planning and auditing tool designed to help organisations in any sector quickly and effectively monitor compliance.
She said the program gives an instant ‘inspection window’. It lets staff record any contact with a business. This can be inputted while a phone discussion is in progress, eliminating double handling of data. It also helps record any complaints against the business, capture details of advice given and automatically create close off and compliance dates with an accompanying audit action alert.
With over 1,200 registered premises to monitor Sally Kelton said the new system has allowed for a much better flow of information between Council and local businesses. “It has provided a framework to manage food safety programs for the City which saves time and allows us to deliver a high quality program,” she said.
“It frees up time so that we can get out of the office and back to where we should be. Talking to people and educating them about safety in food handling is one of our most important roles.”
She said a particularly good aspect of the program is the constant improvements that are introduced. These include the development of pro forma questions and responses, and the introduction of a palm held PC which can record discussions for future reference.
“This ensures both consistency and transparency,” Sally Kelton said. “By using the palm device in the field, owners can see the same criteria and standards are applied to everyone.” She said this is especially important in multicultural areas such as Dandenong.
For further information contact Sally Kelton, telephone (03) 9238 1443
