SQF Audit Preparation Checklist and What to Expect

1. Confirm your scope and audit arrangements

Agree the site's Food Sector Categories, products, processes, and applicable Code with your certification body. Confirm whether this is an initial certification, recertification, or surveillance audit, and whether the Quality Code or customer addendums are included.

Contact the certification body early to discuss audit duration, availability, and fees. Keep your registration and scope details accurate in the SQF Assessment Database, currently powered by CMX1.

For a recertification audit, review changes since the last audit, including new products, equipment, suppliers, processes, or operating areas. Discuss changes that may affect scope with the certification body before the audit.

2. Assign your practitioner and program responsibilities

Designate a primary and substitute SQF practitioner who meet your Code's requirements for employment, HACCP training, food safety plan competence, and knowledge of the SQF requirements relevant to your site.

Give each supporting program a clear owner. For example, identify who manages sanitation verification, supplier approvals, calibration, training, and corrective actions. Make sure coverage continues when a responsible employee is absent.

Senior management needs to provide the resources and authority to resolve problems. The practitioner coordinates the SQF system, while employees across the site carry out the activities that make it work.

3. Compare your current system with the official checklist

Use the SQFI checklist for your Code and edition to identify gaps. Include relevant amendments; an older downloaded Code may need to be read alongside published updates.

For each applicable requirement, identify the procedure, responsible person, operating records, and evidence that the requirement is followed. Record gaps in an action list with priorities, owners, and completion dates.

A gap assessment is useful for planning improvements. An internal audit evaluates the implemented system and is a required part of the SQF program. An optional pre-assessment can provide an additional readiness check. These activities have different purposes and should be planned accordingly.

4. Review your food safety plan and supporting programs

Check that your HACCP-based food safety plan reflects the products and processes actually used. Review process flows, hazards, control measures, monitoring, and the response to deviations. Revisit the plan when ingredients, equipment, or methods change.

Review the supporting programs that keep those controls effective, including sanitation, allergen management, supplier approval, maintenance, calibration, pest prevention, and employee hygiene. Check that procedures describe the work employees are expected to perform.

Keep validation and verification evidence distinct. Validation supports whether a control can manage the identified hazard. Verification checks that the system is implemented and operating as intended. For example, evidence supporting a process limit serves a different purpose from records showing that employees monitored and reviewed that limit.

5. Organize records and test traceability

Make records easy to retrieve by date, product, lot, equipment, or activity. Check that entries are legible, completed when the work occurs, and reviewed by the appropriate person. Include deviations and the actions taken to resolve them.

As a practical preparation exercise, select a finished-product lot and follow its records through receiving, production, rework where applicable, release, and dispatch. Check whether your team can connect ingredient and packaging lots with the finished products and customers involved.

Use the exercise to find missing links, unclear lot codes, or quantities that do not reconcile. Review your mock recall results and confirm that identified gaps have been addressed. Product identification and labeling records should support traceability throughout the process.

SQFI recommends at least 90 days of records before a site audit. This is preparation guidance, not a universal certification timeline. Your records need to demonstrate the activities relevant to your site and audit scope.

6. Train employees and verify daily implementation

Employees should be able to explain their own food safety responsibilities and demonstrate the work. Use practical questions during preparation:

• What do you check before starting this task?
• Where do you record the result?
• What do you do if the result is outside the limit?
• Who do you contact when you identify a food safety concern?

Observe how procedures are followed across relevant shifts. Check that temporary and newly assigned employees have received the training needed for their tasks. Record training and verify competence through appropriate demonstrations or assessments.

Your SQF training program should help employees perform their responsibilities accurately and know where to find instructions when they need them.

7. Complete internal auditing and management review

Complete an internal audit of the applicable SQF requirements and address the findings before the certification audit. Under the Food Manufacturing Code, internal audits cover the system at least annually. Use trained, competent auditors and arrange independence from the function being audited where practical.

Gather evidence through records, interviews, and observation. Investigate the causes of findings, assign corrective actions, and check that the actions worked. Review previous external findings as well, especially where similar issues have returned.

Bring the results into management review so leadership can evaluate performance, unresolved risks, and resource needs. Keep decisions, responsibilities, and follow-up actions documented.

For more detail, see our guides to developing an SQF internal audit program and conducting SQF management review. You can also arrange an optional pre-assessment to identify remaining gaps.

8. Confirm audit logistics and access to evidence

Review the audit plan with your certification body. Confirm production schedules, relevant shifts, key personnel, and any agreed remote activities. Plan for the auditor to observe production and cleaning activities and to speak with the employees responsible.

Make sure your team can retrieve current procedures, completed records, internal audit results, management review records, and previous corrective actions. Test access to electronic systems and arrange a practical way to share requested information.

For an unannounced audit, prepare reception and site personnel to verify the auditor's identity, contact the responsible team, and provide access promptly. Keep readiness activities active throughout the audit window.

Non-conformities are classified according to the evidence and their significance:

• Minor: An isolated or infrequent lapse that does not indicate a system breakdown or compromised food safety.
• Major: A system failure or serious departure from requirements that presents a food safety risk.
• Critical: A control failure likely to cause a significant public health risk or product contamination, or systemic falsification of food safety records.

The classification depends on the circumstances. A documentation problem is not automatically minor.

SQF audit scores start at 100, with deductions for non-conformities. Under Edition 9, a minor finding deducts one point and a major finding deducts five. Edition 10 retains those deductions for standard clauses and applies two points for a core-clause minor and seven for a core-clause major. Critical findings carry a 50-point deduction.

The rating bands differ by edition:

The Edition 9 bands come from its Food Manufacturing Code; the Edition 10 bands and recertification treatment come from the published Edition 10 rules.

A numerical passing score alone does not establish certification. Required corrective actions and certification-body review still need to be completed. Critical findings have separate consequences, including initial-audit failure or suspension of existing certification.