Current food safety cases and what should have been done

At least 110 people have been diagnosed as having food poisoning from a Chinese restaurant south of Brisbane. Around 30 of those have been hospitalised as well.
There were about 150 people who ate at the restaurant over the weekend of the 3 and 4 January and the Health Department in Queensland expects that most of these will eventually end up on the food poisoning list for this outbreak.
This is now ranking as one of the biggest food poisoning outbreaks in Queensland history. It has just been confirmed that the likely cause is a bad batch of eggs used in the Deep Fried Ice cream. This is obviously a high risk food with hot and cold being served together.
The mayonnaise used in salads at a family function on Christmas Day in Victoria was the cause of at least 30 people with food poisoning.
In both cases it was Salmonella from bad eggs.
So as we start 2015, eggs continue to be the number one cause of food poisoning in Australia.
In Japan, a site of an international quick serve chain has had a very bad week. A deep fried tooth was found in a pack of fries. This is on top of plastic being found in chicken products at other sites of the chain recently. To make matters worse, the chain had a major shortage of fries late in 2014 and had to bring in special deliveries.
In both the Chain and the Chinese restaurant, the stories going around are not just about the food safety issues but the poor customer service once people had made the complaint.
What were bad situations have been made significantly worse by the customers being poorly handled and treated.
Every food business must have a set, agreed and understood method for dealing with such complaints and issues. The method must include the following as a minimum;
• Completion of the record
• Being polite at all times
• Never admitting liability at any time
• The process for collection and storage of required records – eg; temperature, cleaning and training reports
• Who is to be involved in the process
• Who is to be the spokesperson for the business
The record needs to contain all details of the complaint and the person making it. These details include;
• The food
• The symptoms
• The duration
• The onset
• What the complainant and all affected people did – eg; Doctor’s visit or hospital
Written by Rachelle Williams, The Green Food Safety Coach.