Food or feed incidents: recalls and withdrawals
What to do
Gather information about the incident and trace your suppliers and business customers, so you know what food or feed has been affected and what the risks are to consumers.
Then you must:
- immediately withdraw the food or feed from the supply chain
- issue a recall if the product has reached consumers or animals
- tell your local authority’s food safety team or port health authority
- tell the Food Standards Agency (FSA) about the incident if your business has been approved by the FSA veterinary team
- tell your local authority or the FSA if the product has been distributed outside of the UK
- take action to prevent future incidents
If you do not deal with an incident, your business could be stopped from producing food or feed. You could be fined or in serious cases prosecuted.
Your local authority will inform the FSA incidents team. You can also tell the FSA yourself if the food or feed has already reached consumers or animals.
This guide is also available in Welsh (Cymraeg).
Withdrawals
You must withdraw unsafe, mislabelled or non-compliant food or feed from the supply chain. Do this immediately, before it reaches consumers or animals.
You must tell any other businesses you have sold the food or feed to about the incident. Tell them:
- exactly which product and batch is affected
- why it has been withdrawn
- what they should do next, for example return or safely dispose of the product
Recalls
If the food or feed has already reached consumers or animal owners, you need to recall the product.
You must contact consumers. Share accurate information about:
- the product details, such as the name, size, best before or use by dates and batch code
- an image of the product
- the reason for the recall
- what they should do if they bought the product, including whether it can be eaten, if they should return it and whether they can get a refund
- how to safely dispose of the product - speak to your local authority about this
- where to get more information
You must communicate with consumers effectively. You could use posters in your store, your website, social media or marketing communications. You could also contact specific consumer, patient or allergy organisations.
If you have sold the product to another business, tell them to contact their customers about the recall.
Use these template documents to help you carry out a recall.
What to do with unsafe food and feed
When you have unsafe, mislabelled or non-compliant food or feed, you should:
- store unsafe food away from non-affected food
- label it clearly
- have a plan for what you will do with unsafe food that is returned to you
- safely dispose of the food - speak to your local authority and follow relevant waste disposal laws, including those for animal products
- document what you do with the food, including how you safely dispose of it
You might be able to make the food or feed safe, for example by re-labelling a food so it states it contains an allergen. You must get permission from your local authority’s food safety team or port health authority before you do this.