We’ve got you covered: the Food Fraud Vulnerability Assessment Tool is compatible with Microsoft Excel versions 2004 onwards (file extension .xlsx) and Microsoft Excel for Mac, from 2011 and onwards. There are no macros in the spreadsheet.
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Our fantastic free supplier questionnaire will soon be available to purchasers of the Vulnerability Assessment Tool.
Send the questionnaire to your suppliers, then copy their answers straight into the Vulnerability Assessment Tool with the click of a button. Easy!
Buy it today, download it instantly and have your first vulnerability assessment done in no time.
This tool is suitable for food fraud vulnerability assessments of:
This tool is designed for any business that is purchasing food, beverage or supplement ingredients, raw materials, intermediate products or finished products, including:
Yes, this tool has an ‘Initial Screening’ option that allows for a quick assessment of risk. Pre-filter or pre-screening processes are recommended by some experts as a means to quickly prioritise at-risk materials without having to complete a full-vulnerability assessment one each one. Initial screening results may satisfy the requirements of some food safety regulations and standards, but will not be sufficient to meet the requirements of GFSI food safety management system standards. Learn more about initial screening in this 2016 paper by Dr John Spink, Dr Douglas Moyer and Dr Cheri Speier-Pero of Michigan State University’s Food Fraud Initiative: Spink, et al (2016). Introducing the Food Fraud Initial Screening model (FFIS). Food Control (69), pp306–314.
To obtain an accurate calculated result you should answer all the questions. However, if you are short on time you can override the calculated results with your own estimates of likelihood and consequences. This means that if you already have a good understanding of the vulnerability of a material you may choose to simply enter your best estimates instead of completing all the data fields. Note that if you do this the resulting vulnerability assessment reports are unlikely to be acceptable to an auditor because they will not contain a complete explanation of how the assessment was performed. To obtain a complete report, every question should be answered.
Absolutely! You can change your answers at any time, then print or save a new report. It’s simple to review and update your assessments.
It is easy to override the calculated results if they don’t seem right for your product or material. The Vulnerability Assessment Tool calculates likelihood and consequences using information entered by the user, however you can also enter your own estimates. The overall vulnerability is determined by the user’s estimates if they have been entered; if not, calculated results are used.
The tool was created with Microsoft Excel because most of its intended users are familiar with Excel and so can begin entering data as soon as they open the spreadsheet, with no special training. Data can be copied, pasted and searched just as you would in any spreadsheet and results can be easily extracted for use in other documents. The tool can and should be incorporated into a company’s controlled documents and record-keeping systems and Microsoft Excel files are better suited to this purpose than special software or apps.
The tabular format of the data entry pages allows users to have a ‘whole picture’ visual understanding of the data that has been entered and the gaps that need to be filled. Other types of software such as questionnaire-style assessments do not provide a visual overview and require information to be entered in a defined series of steps which can be frustrating. Within the tables of the Vulnerability Assessment Tool, colour-coding functions provide instant feedback about whether an answer affects vulnerability in a positive or negative way, which can be a valuable learning tool.
Yes. The data can be copied, pasted, sorted and manipulated as in any spreadsheet. When copying from the tool use the Excel function ‘paste special – values’, which will prevent pasting formulas that might return error values in a different document.
Password protection has been applied to many of the cells in the spreadsheet. There are a number of reasons for this, the most important of which is so that users do not accidentally ‘break’ the formulas which would be very easy to do if it was unlocked.
This means that users are not able to make changes to the wording of the questions or the automatically generated answers. To get an idea of how the cells are protected, download our free trial spreadsheet: Try it free v3.0s
Want to buy an unlocked version that is fully customisable? Request a quote here.
No, you may make as many copies of this spreadsheet as you need for ONE food business in one manufacturing location. You may not share it with other locations, other food businesses or take it when you change jobs. You may not share it with your suppliers. For complete terms and conditions click here.
Real-time support is coming soon. Until then, please email support@foodfraudadvisors.com with your query, including your preferred contact details and geographical location (for time zone purposes). We will contact you by telephone or Skype or send an email, whichever you prefer.
If you disagree with the results the tool allows you to override them; the reported results are based on the user’s estimates if they have been entered; if not, calculated results are used.
If you think the methodology, including the risk calculations should be amended or you think there is an error in any formula please contact us. We want the Vulnerability Assessment Tool to be the best that it can and value your feedback.
Want to buy an unlocked version that is fully customisable? Request a quote here.
No problem; the Vulnerability Assessment Tool has been created without macros to keep things safe and secure and to prevent headaches with your IT department.
All purchasers receive an itemised receipt in their confirmation email. There are no taxes included in the purchase price, with the exception of purchasers in Australia who have 10% GST included in the purchase price.
Australian purchasers receive a tax invoice for GST purposes in their confirmation email.
Need something else?
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Use the information on this page to help answer questions in the Supplier Questionnaire for Food Fraud Advisors’ Vulnerability Assessment Tool:
Trading properties
Raw materials traded on specific properties are those for which the price paid for this raw material is based upon the content of water, dairy fat, nitrogen (protein), cocoa solids or some other key component. Answer ‘yes’ here if
If you are unsure, speak to your purchasing officer.
Direct Sourcing
Answer ‘yes’ in the Supplier Questionnaire if this material or ingredient is manufactured, produced, grown or slaughtered by the business you work for. For fish and seafood, answer ‘yes’ if your business is the first on-shore processing facility. Answer ‘no’ if the material is purchased from a distributor or importer, trader, broker, wholesaler or retailer.
Complexity of supply chain
Do you consider the supply chain of this material to be complex and/or long? An example of a short supply chain is wheat flour purchased directly from a flour mill that processes locally grown wheat. A complex supply chain is one that involves many different businesses handling, processing, storing and transporting a product and its component parts. Most imported materials have a long and complex supply chain.
Ease of access to material
Is the supply chain of a type that allows multiple points of entry for fraudulent material? Entry points for fraudulent materials are points in the supply chain at which a motivated person could adulterate or dilute the material or substitute an inauthentic material in its place. These points are most likely to be places where the material is blended, mixed, ground or where it is stored or transported in a manner that would allow a motivated person to easily gain access to the material.
Price
If the purchase price is more than USD20 per kg or USD20,000 per metric tonne or EUR18 per kg or 18,000 per metric tonne answer ‘yes very expensive’
If the purchase price is less than EUR600 or USD650 per metric tonne, answer ‘no’.
Size of market
Does the international market for this material have a large monetary value? Materials that have markets with large monetary values are those that are traded in very large quantities across many countries or materials that are very expensive. Tea, coffee, cocoa, sugar all have markets with a large monetary value.
Form of Ingredient
Answer ‘yes’ in the Supplier Questionnaire if this material or ingredient is sold to your customer in individual pieces which can be visually identified as such. Examples include chickpeas, whole peppers, chicken wings, bananas, frozen berries, rolled oats, coffee beans, whole cloves. If this material is sold as a powder, liquid, mince, paste, pre-mix, slurry or blend then answer ‘no’.
Special criteria
Answer ‘yes’ here if there are special criteria for this raw material or ingredient such as halal, organic, non-GMO, grass-fed, free-range or if there is a specific country of origin or grade of produce required for this material.
Availability of adulterants or substitutes
An example of a material that has easily available adulterants is honey, which can be adulterated with water, sugar syrups, invert syrups, all of which are easy to obtain.
What is my customer going to do with the information I provide?
The information that you provide about each ingredient or material will be used by your customer to complete a vulnerability assessment for each of the materials they purchase. Vulnerability assessments for food fraud are performed to meet the requirements of food safety management systems and to help businesses manage financial risks from food fraud. Your customer will put the your answers into Food Fraud Advisors’ Vulnerability Assessment Tool (BRC Method), which is a quick and easy way to calculate risks and produce auditor-friendly reports.
Why are some of the questions repeated?
The questions are based on recommendations provided by the British Retail Consortium in their document Understanding Vulnerability Assessment (2015) which requires some elements to be repeated.
May I share the Supplier Questionnaire with other businesses?
If your business has purchased a copy of the Vulnerability Assessment Tool, then you may send the Supplier Questionnaire to any business that supplies you with ingredients or materials. If you are a supplier, then you may not share the questionnaire with other businesses or take it with you when you change jobs: the business that provided you with the questionnaire (your customer) owns the licence for the questionnaire. For complete terms and conditions click here.
Why are some of the questions ‘greyed-out’?
Questions 20 – 23 and 26 are greyed-out because they cannot be properly answered by a supplier. The answers to these questions relate only to the business that is performing the vulnerability assessment (the customer). This is because the vulnerability is related to that business’ ability to detect fraud, not their suppliers’ ability to detect it. Customers: if you need to know about your supplier’s ability to detect food fraud in their products, you should ask them to provide you with a full vulnerability assessment that they have complete themselves. They will need to purchase their own copy of the Vulnerability Assessment Tool, the licence rules do not permit you to share it with your suppliers. Suppliers are eligible for a 40% discount. Contact us to request a discount code for your suppliers to use when they purchase the tool.
Is there a telephone number I can call for help and support with the questionnaire?
Please email support@foodfraudadvisors.com with your query, including your preferred contact details and geographical location (for time zone purposes). We will contact you by telephone or Skype or email an answer to you.
Something is not working properly, what should I do?
If there is an error in the spreadsheet please contact us. We want the Vulnerability Assessment Tool and Supplier Questionnaire to be the best they can and value your feedback.
My security settings will not allow me to run macros, is this a problem?
If you wish to use the Supplier Questionnaire you will need to enable macros.
My supplier(s) only have Microsoft Excel 1997 – 2003, will this be a problem?
If your supplier is using Excel 1997 – 2009 (file extension .xls) or Excel for Mac 2000 – 2008 they will not be able to use the questionnaire. You can contact us to request a free copy of a supplier questionnaire that is compatible with older versions of Excel. Alternatively, create a compatible version yourself by performing a ‘Save As’ and choosing ‘Excel 97 – 2003 Workbook’ from the drop down list. You will be shown a compatibility checker window. The compatibility checker lists functions that will be lost if you proceed. These lost functions relate to the look of the spreadsheet and will not prevent the supplier from answering questions: press ‘Continue’ to accept the loss of functions and create a file that your suppliers will be able to use.