Our Frequently Asked Questions page includes answers to many commonly asked questions about Food Safety First and food safety training requirements throughout Australia.
Still can't find what you're looking for? Why not get in touch and ask us directly? We'll be happy to help!
A Food Handler is anyone that prepares, handles or serves food as part of their day-to-day job. There are many professions that handle food in some capacity even if it is not the main focus of their job and under Australian law, they must be trained in food safety.
A Food Safety Supervisor is a little different. In many parts of Australia, including Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria and the Australian Capital Territory, it is a legal requirement that at least one person from every food business is nominated as a Food Safety Supervisor. This is necessary in order for food businesses to obtain a food business licence, which is required to operate legally.
Food Safety Supervisors need to undertake more comprehensive food safety training than Food Handlers. Both types of training can be undertaken via an online short course.
Food Safety Supervisors require Level 1 and Level 2 training - whereas Food Handlers only need Level 1 training, or it's equivalent. Often those embarking on Food Safety Supervisor training have already done Level 1 and only need to complete the Level 2 part of the course.
Food Safety First offer both Food Safety Supervisor (Level 2) and Food Safety Supervisor (Level 1 & 2) training, as well as the Food Handling Certificate (Level 1) course.
If you are taking Food Safety Supervisor (Level 1 and 2) then you will be awarded a Statement of Attainment for one or more of the following industries:
- Retail
- Hospitality
- Health & Community
- Food Processing
- Transport & Distribution
Simply select the appropriate industry or industries when completing the Final Submission at the end of the course.
If you complete an accredited course with Food Safety First, you will receive a Statement of Attainment that is recognised across all states and territories of Australia.
The Statement of Attainment will contain details of the units of competency attained, the date on which it was awarded and information about the Registered Training Organisation (RTO) issuing the document.
If you intend to work as a Food Safety Supervisor in New South Wales, you will also need a Food Safety Supervisor certificate from the NSW Food Authority. Food Safety First is an approved provider of these NSW certificates and you can select this as an option for purchase when you enrol on the Food Safety Supervisor course. There is a small fee associated with issuing this certificate.
This Student Handbook is designed to provide you with all of the information that you need to make an informed choice, and as a reference guide throughout your training and assessment.
Please click here to download the document.
If you require further information or have any questions about the content of this handbook please send us an email via our Contact Us page or call 1300 856 836.
Each state and territory in Australia has different requirements for food safety and food safety refresher training.
Here are some useful links to find out more about the legislation in your area:
ACT Health - Food Safety (ACT) - https://health.act.gov.au/businesses/food-safety-regulation
Food Authority (NSW) - http://www.foodauthority.nsw.gov.au/
Department of Health - Food Safety (NT) - https://nt.gov.au/industry/hospitality/
Queensland Health - Food Safety (QLD) - http://www.health.qld.gov.au/foodsafety/
Department of Health - Food Safety (SA) - https://www.sahealth.sa.gov.au/
Department of Health & Human Services - Food Safety (TAS) - https://www.dhhs.tas.gov.au/publichealth/
Department of Health - Food Safety (VIC) - https://www2.health.vic.gov.au/public-health/food-safety
Department of Health - Food Safety (WA) - https://ww2.health.wa.gov.au/Health-for/Licensing-and-industry/Food
Paying for your course is easy! Simply click on 'Enrol now' for the course you want and follow the prompts.
Food Safety First accepts payment by Visa, MasterCard, American Express and PayPal. As soon as your payment has been made you will be sent an email immediately with details of your username, password and how to access the course.
All the prices on our website are in Australian Dollars (AUD). Please check the price of our products before placing an order.
Nationally accredited courses in Australia are GST exclusive, and so GST is not included on our tax invoices for these products. Non-accredited courses are subject to GST and this is included in the price advertised online.
As soon as you have placed an order with Food Safety First you can log on and get started with the course straightaway.
Upon successful payment, you will receive three emails within a few minutes:
1. A welcome email containing your user name and password
2. A course enrolment detail with instructions for accessing the course
3. A copy of a tax invoice for your records (please note that accredited training courses in Australia are GST exclusive).
To enrol in the course, you simply need to supply us with your name, address and other contact details.
Later on, we ask you for further personal details including:
- Unique Student Identifier (USI)
- Date of Birth
- Gender
- Employment status
- When you left school
- Where you were born and what language you speak at home
- Other traineeships or qualifications that you've completed
- Disabilities
- Aboriginal / Torres Strait Islander status
- Your reason for studying
We are required to ask you the above by law in order to comply with the Standards for Registered Training Organisations 2015.
We also ask you to tell us how satisfied you were with the course and to give us some ideas on how we can improve in future.
You can rest assured that all data we collect is kept secure and private. Please see our Privacy Policy for more information.
Our policies and procedures on complaints and appeals are designed to establish a fair and equitable company process and procedure for dealing with client/participant complaints and appeals.
Complaint & Appeal Procedures
If you are studying with Food Safety First, then you must complete a Complaint or Appeal Form as appropriate, both of which are located here.
You will receive written acknowledgement of your complaint within 7 working days, and where possible a resolution will be sought within the same time period. Please refer to the Participant Handbook for further information about how the process works.
When you start your course, you will be asked to supply your Unique Student Identifier (USI). If you don't already have a USI you'll be asked to create one.
The USI system is a Government initiative launched on 1st January 2015, making it compulsory for all students participating in nationally recognised training to have this unique reference ID. The reference ID is 10 characters long and is comprised of numbers and letters. You can apply for a USI here. Once you have a USI, this unique number is assigned to you permanently.
One of the benefits of having this USI is that you can easily access details of any nationally recognised training that you have completed by looking it up on the USI website. This means that if you lose your Statement of Attainment, can't remember the units that formed your qualification or don't know the name of the Registered Training Organisation (RTO) that issued your qualification it doesn't matter, as all of this information is stored in one central location.
If you are exempt from requiring an USI, then the results of your training will not be accessible through the Commonwealth and will not appear on any authenticated transcript prepared by the Registrar.
Please note that your USI is different to the student ID that you were provided by Food Safety First when you enrolled onto the course.
Applying for a Unique Student Identifier (USI) is free of charge and just takes a few minutes to do.
Begin by visiting the USI website. You'll need to have a form of ID ready to complete your application. This could be any of the following:
- Driver's Licence
- Medicare Card
- Australian Passport
- Visa
- Australian Birth Certificate
- Certificate of Registration by Descent
- Citizenship Certificate
- ImmiCard
You'll then need to supply some personal information including your name, date of birth, place of birth, gender and country in which you intend to study.
Finally, you need to provide answers to some check questions that you will be asked the next time you try to access the website.
Once you have completed the online form, you will be issued with a USI that can be used to access your account and check training details at any time.
All of our forms are located here.
The forms that are available at this location are:
- Participant Information Handbook
- Information Release Form
- Statutory Declaration Form
- National Recognition Application Form
- Complaints Form
- Refund Request Form
- Appeals Form
- RPL Application Form
- SOA Reissue Request
For the following courses an Observer Report is a mandatory part of the assessment:
- Food Safety Supervisor (Level 1 & 2)
- Food Safety Supervisor (Level 2)
- Food Handling Certificate (Level 1)
As these courses are accredited, it’s important that we adhere to the rules and regulations set out by the Vocational Education and Training (VET) authorities and relevant Industry Skills Councils.
The course content that we need to deliver is determined by the Industry Skills Councils. They also have rules about how training organisations need to assess students training to be a Food Safety Supervisor.
One of the rules is that students need to be observed practising food safety skills. As we deliver online training, we can’t see you doing that through your computer. It can be difficult to arrange classroom assessments at dates and times that suit everyone, and we have many students that live in remote and regional areas who wouldn’t be able to travel so far.
At Food Safety First, we have found the easiest way to meet this requirement is to provide you with an Observer Report so that you can ask someone in your workplace to confirm that they have seen you do things like washing your hands correctly and wearing appropriate clothing for work.
Our aim is to make this course as simple as possible for you and to not provide any roadblocks that will prevent you getting your Statement of Attainment as soon as possible.
If you wish to do a course that does not have an Observer Report requirement, then why not consider the non-accredited Basic Food Safety course?
For most of our students, the Food Safety Supervisor (Level 1 and 2) course takes between 6 and 8 hours to complete. This includes lessons, case studies, assessments and getting your Observer Report completed.
Our other courses usually take between 2 and 4 hours.
Don't forget that you don't have to do the entire course all in one go. You can do as little or as much as you'd like in any one session, and log on and log off as many times as you please.
The assessment tasks that you need to complete depend on what course you are doing:
Food Safety Supervisor (Level 1 & 2):
- 7 * Quizzes (multiple choice)
- 2 * Case Studies
- 3 * Reading Activities / Case Studies (NSW only)
- 1 * Observer Report
Food Safety Supervisor (Level 2):
- 6 * Quizzes (multiple choice)
- 2 * Case Studies
- 3 * Reading Activities / Case Studies (NSW only)
- 1 * Observer Report
Food Handling Certificate (Level 1):
- 4 * Quizzes (multiple choice)
- 1 * Reading Exercise
- 1 * Case Study
- 1 * Observer Report
Basic Food Safety (non-accredited):
- 4 * Quizzes (multiple choice)
Observer Reports are a fundamental part of the assessment process at Food Safety First.
It's a mandatory requirement for accredited food safety courses that students are observed performing certain tasks and so Observer Reports are a good way for us to do this without requiring you to come to a classroom or to send videos to us.
Your Observer Report can be signed off by anyone who works in the food industry who has observed you working with food over a period of time. It could be someone you work with currently, someone you have worked with previously or even someone from a church or community organisation where you have volunteered your time.
The person you choose to sign off the report does not need to be a Food Safety Supervisor themselves.
At the end of each lesson you need to complete a multiple-choice quiz in order to be able to move onto the next lesson. You have five attempts for each quiz and must score 100% to continue.
If you use up all five attempts, don't worry! Simply get in touch and let us know your name, student ID and which course and lesson you were working on. One of our Support Team will then be in touch to help you progress onto the next part of the course.
Don't worry, there's always a solution to this! We often have students who aren't working in the food industry at the moment - sometimes because they are starting a new food business or sometimes because they are trying to start a new career in the industry.
Whatever the reason, if you've worked in another food business in the last 12 months and you think that someone there has seen you do all of the tasks that are listed, then you could ask them to complete the form.
Or you could volunteer to work for a few shifts with a charity, community organisation or other food business. Many places are happy to have volunteers help out in return for observing you do the tasks listed on the Observer Report.
If you're still not sure, then why not contact us and we can discuss some options in your local area?
Maybe - it depends on a few things.
First of all you should check the Statement of Attainment or Testamur from your previous qualification and ensure that the units of competency listed on there match the units of competency on our course pages. If they don't, you will probably need to take the course - but get in touch with us first to check.
If you are in NSW or ACT, you should check the date on your Statement of Attainment - if you are in either of these places, you need to renew your training every five years. And if you are in NSW, you also need to check that the Registered Training Organisation (RTO) is on the NSW Food Authority approved list. Food Safety First (RTO 41127) is an approved provider on this list although may be listed under alternate trading names - please contact us for more information.
National recognition is offered to course participants who have already completed one or more of the required units of competency through previous formal education or training.
Participants who wish to apply for national recognition will be required to submit a certified true copy of their Statement of Attainment or qualification.
The following guidelines also apply:
- Any student is entitled to apply for national recognition in a course or qualification in which they are currently enrolled.
- Students may not apply for national recognition for units of competency or qualifications which are not included in our scope of registration.
- Whilst students may apply for national recognition at any time, they are encouraged to apply before commencing a training program. This will reduce unnecessary training and guide the student down a more efficient path to competence.
- The student does not incur any fees for national recognition and we do not receive any funding when national recognition is granted.
- National recognition may only be awarded for whole units of competency.
- National recognition will only be issued when the student’s enrolment includes at least one other unit of competency for which the student is participating in training or is seeking recognition.
- The recognition of a unit of competency under a national recognition arrangement is not contingent on the applicant demonstrating their currency. If the unit has been previously awarded and equivalence can be demonstrated then the unit can be recognised. The currency of the applicant is not a factor to be considered.
To learn more about National Recognition, or to find out how to apply, please contact us for more information.
Recognition of Prior Learning is offered to course participants who believe that they can already meet the skills and knowledge requirements of the course through previous work experience and formal, non-formal and informal learning.
To assess whether a course participant has sufficient experience we request that applicants complete the online quiz components of their chosen course, and that they also provide documentary evidence to demonstrate when and where the required skill were performed. We provide a Recognition of Prior Learning form to participants to assist in gathering this evidence.
To learn more about Recognition of Prior Learning, or to find out how to apply, please contact us for more information.
If you have completed the Food Safety Supervisor course with Food Safety First for the Hospitality or Retail industries and contact us within 90 days of completing the course we may be able to assist you with a NSW upgrade.
You need to make sure that you have the following in order to be able to complete a Food Safety First course:
1. A modern web browser Our courses use some of the latest eLearning technologies to deliver the courses. You will need to have a modern web browser to view and complete the course, and it's important that you have Javascript enabled.
2. An email address During the registration process, we will ask you for your email address. This is a mandatory requirement for you to be able to access our systems. Email addresses cannot be shared by students.
3. Adobe PDF Reader or Adobe Acrobat Some of the forms that you need to complete (such as the Observer Report) are in PDF format. To get the latest version of Adobe PDF Reader, go here.
Food Safety First courses work on most computers, laptops and tablet devices. Due to the small screen size, we don't recommend using the course on mobile phones.
Food Safety First courses work on most computers, laptops and tablet devices. Due to the small screen size, we don't recommend using the course on mobile phones.
We recommend using the Google Chrome web browser for the best course experience.
If you've forgotten your password, simply click on the 'Login' button at the top right of the screen. Enter your Food Safety First User ID and then click on the 'Forgotten password?' link. You will receive an email inviting you to reset your password.
If you've forgotten your User ID, be sure to check the emails we sent you when you first enrolled. If you still can't find it, click on the 'Contact Us' button and send us a message telling us your full name and the course that you are enrolled on. We'll get back to you within 1-2 business days with the correct details.
We have tried to make our Food Safety First website and associated courses as easy to follow as possible. But we do know that, from time to time, our students may have some issues.
If you do have a technical issue, and can't find the answer in our FAQ section, please do contact us and we will be happy to help you!
But before you do that, perhaps try some of the following hints and tips to see if you can resolve the issue:
- Clear the browsing history, cache and cookies from your machine
- Ensure you have downloaded the latest version of Adobe Reader
- Log out and log back in again
- Check you are using the correct User ID (the first three characters are letters, the rest are numbers)
That depends on which industry you select when competing the Final Submission form at the end of the course.
The Food Safety Supervisor (Level 1 & 2) course is available for the following industries:
Retail:
SIRRFSA001 Handle food safely in a retail environment
(Supersedes old unit: SIRRFSA001A Apply Retail Food Safety Practices)
Hospitality:
SITXFSA001 Use hygienic practices for food safety
SITXFSA002 Participate in safe food handling practices
(Supersedes old units: SITXFSA101 Use hygienic practices for food safety, SITXFSA201 Participate in safe food handling practices)
Health & Community:
HLTFSE001 Follow basic food safety practices
HLTFSE005 Apply and monitor food safety requirements
HLTFSE007 Oversee the day-to-day implementation of food safety in the workplace
(Supersedes old units: HLTFS207C Follow basic food safety practice, HLTFS309C Oversee the day-to-day implementation of food safety in the workplace, HLTFS310C Apply and monitor food safety requirements)
Food Processing:
FBPFSY1001 - Follow work procedures to maintain food safety
FBPFSY2001 - Implement the food safety program and procedures
(Supersedes old units: FDFFS1001A Follow work procedures to maintain food safety, FDFFS2001A Implement the food safety program and procedures)
Transport & Distribution:
SITXFSA001 Use hygienic practices for food safety
SITXFSA002 Participate in safe food handling practices
(Supersedes old units: SITXFSA101 Use hygienic practices for food safety, SITXFSA201 Participate in safe food handling practices)
Please note that if you are in New South Wales, only the Retail and Hospitality units are recognised by the NSW Food Authority.
If you are taking Food Safety Supervisor (Level 2) then the unit of competency attained is:
- SITXFSA002 Participate in safe food handling practices
If you are taking the Food Handling Certificate (Level 1) course then the unit of competency attained is:
- SITXFSA001 Use hygienic practices for food safety
Nationally recognised training is sometimes referred to as accredited training. It refers to vocational training that has been developed based on the National Training Package for the given industry and is sometimes considered as "training by industry for industry".
When you complete an accredited course you receive a Statement of Attainment listing the units of competency that you have achieved competency in. These units of competency are recognised across Australia and can be used towards further qualifications (such as Certificate III in Commercial Cookery) or skillsets (such as Food Safety Supervisor recognition).
Non-accredited training is not recognised with the Vocational Education & Training (VET) framework. This isn’t necessarily a reflection on the quality of the course – in fact, many industries develop their own training requirements outside of the VET framework.
Food Safety First offer the following accredited courses:
- Food Safety Supervisor (Level 1 and 2)
- Food Safety Supervisor (Level 2)
- Food Handling Certificate (Level 1)
Food Safety First offer the following non-accredited courses:
Your Statement of Attainment will be issued by Food Safety First Registered Training Organisation (RTO number 41127).
Visit the training.gov.au website to learn more.
That depends on where in Australia you will be working.
Food Safety Supervisors working in New South Wales or the Australian Capital Territory must renew their training every five years.
For other Australian states and territories there is no expiry period - however, you should always check that the units of competency on your Statement of Attainment have not been superseded with more recent versions.
To view the latest units, go to the 'Units of Competency' tab on the appropriate course page on the Food Safety First website.
We can only issue Statement of Attainment copies for documents that were originally issued by Food Safety First RTO. We cannot access or see your results for training completed with other Registered Training Organisations (RTOs).
If you require us to issue a replacement, please go to the Contact Us page and send a request via the 'Student Support' tab.
There is a $30.00 charge associated with re-issuing a Statement of Attainment.
You sure can! If you are considering doing another qualification such as a Certificate IV in Hospitality or Certificate III in Catering Operations, then talk to the Registered Training Organisation (RTO) with whom you are doing the course and let them know about your food safety training with Food Safety First.
There are many courses that include the units that you attain with Food Safety First and so there is a good chance that you won't need to study the same thing again and you can get your qualification faster!
To find out which qualifications your units of competency can be used as credit towards, visit the training.gov.au website, search for the codes listed on your Statement of Attainment and view the list of qualifications that include that unit of competency.
The Statement of Attainment is issued to the person who completed the course with Food Safety First. It is not possible to issue a Statement of Attainment in a business name.
This means that an individual can move from one food business to another, and their qualification is carried to the new place of work with them. But don't forget that some states and territories (such as NSW and ACT) need Food Safety Supervisors to get re-certified every five years!
If you operate a food business and your Food Safety Supervisor leaves, you will need to nominate another Food Safety Supervisor and let your local council know. Of course, the new Food Safety Supervisor will need to hold a current Food Safety Supervisor certificate before you nominate them.