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Free course · 3 hours · kitchen, bakery and shop

HACCP course for Spain free, for supervisors

The 7 HACCP principles applied to a kitchen, a bakery or a shop: hazard analysis, critical control points, limits, monitoring, corrective actions, verification and records. A 30-question test and a PDF certificate, with no sign-up.

Who needs HACCP training? Every food business, except primary production, must have procedures based on the HACCP principles (in Spanish, APPCC; Regulation (EC) No 852/2004, Article 5). In Spain, bars, restaurants and food shops must have a person responsible for applying them (Royal Decree 1021/2022, Real Decreto 1021/2022, Article 20), and whoever develops and maintains the procedure must have adequate training in the HACCP principles (Regulation 852/2004, Annex II, Chapter XII). This is a free-format training course: it is not a qualification required by law, nor your premises' HACCP plan.

Note: this course trains you in the HACCP principles. It is not your premises' HACCP plan: your business must draw that up and apply it, with its own hazards and processes.

FreeCourse, test and certificate, no sign-up
8 modulesAbout 20 minutes each
30 questionsPass with 24, with explanation and source
For supervisorsKitchens, bakeries, shops, catering
  1. StudyThe 8 modules, at your own pace.
  2. Take the test30 questions; you can retake it.
  3. Download the PDFAnd use it to review your premises' HACCP plan.

Start the course

The course: 8 modules

Read them in order. Each one ends with a practical example and the rule it comes from. Tap a module to open it.

1What the law requires and of whom20 min
  • Every food business that produces, processes or distributes food after primary production must put in place, implement and maintain one or more permanent procedures based on the HACCP principles (Regulation (EC) No 852/2004, Article 5(1) and (3)).
  • In Spain, Royal Decree 1021/2022 repeats this for retail, which expressly includes restaurants and hospitality, street trading and distance selling (Article 2.2.a). And it adds that each establishment must have a person responsible for applying it (Article 20).
  • Whoever develops and maintains the procedure, or applies a sector guide, must have received adequate training in the application of the HACCP principles (Regulation 852/2004, Annex II, Chapter XII.2).

What you must be able to show

  • Evidence that you comply, when the authority asks for it, in line with the size and activity of the business (Article 5(4)(a)).
  • The documents describing your procedures, always up to date (Article 5(4)(b)).
  • The records, kept for an appropriate period (Article 5(4)(c)).

If the product, the process or any step changes, the procedure is reviewed and changed (Article 5(2)).

The European Commission makes it clear that adequate training does not necessarily mean a formal course: information and advice from professional organisations or the authorities also count (Notice 2022/C 355/01, section 8).

In practiceYou open a tapas bar with a kitchen. You are the food business operator: your premises need their own HACCP, which can be simplified, and a person responsible for applying it, who can be you or your head chef, trained in the principles.

Source: Regulation (EC) No 852/2004 on the hygiene of foodstuffs (consolidated text), Article 5 and Annex II, Chapter XII · Real Decreto 1021/2022, food hygiene in retail (consolidated text, in Spanish), Articles 2.2.a and 20 · Commission Notice 2022/C 355/01 on food safety management systems (good hygiene practices and procedures based on the HACCP principles), section 8

2The foundation: prerequisites and good hygiene practices20 min

HACCP does not start from scratch: it rests on prerequisite programmes (PRPs). These are the preventive practices and conditions, above all good hygiene practices (GHP), together with training and traceability, that create the basic conditions for applying HACCP (Notice 2022/C 355/01, section 3).

The food safety management system is just that: the prerequisites plus the control measures at critical points, where there are any.

The good practices the Commission gives as examples

  • Premises and equipment; cleaning and disinfection; pest control, with prevention first.
  • Raw materials: supplier selection and specifications.
  • Technical maintenance and calibration.
  • Allergens; waste management; water and air control.
  • Staff (hygiene and health); temperature control; working methods; food safety culture.

Why they matter to the supervisor

Many hazard control measures are already good practices, because they stop contamination coming from staff, pests, water or maintenance. Others are tied to a specific process, such as cooking or cooling, and those are the ones that can become critical control points (Annex II, section 5.2). Good practices are documented too, in a GHP plan that can be part of the HACCP plan.

In practiceYour cold-room checks rely on a thermometer. If nobody checks that it reads correctly, every temperature record could be wrong without anyone lying. Calibration is a prerequisite that HACCP depends on.

Source: Commission Notice 2022/C 355/01 on food safety management systems (good hygiene practices and procedures based on the HACCP principles), sections 3 and 5, Annex I, section 3, and Annex II, section 5.2

3Before the principles: the 5 preliminary steps20 min

The legislation does not name them, but the Commission considers them essential. Together with the 7 principles they make up the 12-step method (Notice 2022/C 355/01, Annex II, section 4).

  1. The HACCP team. People who know the hazards, the process and how the equipment is cleaned and works, backed by management. In a small business it can be a single person, with help from outside experts, as long as the business understands how its system works.
  2. Describe the end product: ingredients and their origin, composition and possible allergens, treatment (heat, cold, drying…), packaging, storage conditions, shelf life and instructions for use. If nothing is processed, the label information is enough.
  3. The intended use and who will eat it: a bar is not the same as a care home dining room, with vulnerable groups.
  4. The flow diagram: every step in order, from receiving raw materials to service or sale, with waiting times, times and temperatures, the route the products take and the separation between clean and dirty areas.
  5. Confirm the diagram on site, during working hours. Anything that does not match is corrected on the diagram.
In practiceYour diagram for Russian salad says: receipt, cold room, cooking, cooling, assembly, display. When you confirm it in the kitchen, you see the boiled potatoes sit on the worktop for an hour before going into the cold room. That wait goes on the diagram, because that is exactly where a hazard can arise.

Source: Commission Notice 2022/C 355/01 on food safety management systems (good hygiene practices and procedures based on the HACCP principles), Annex II, section 4

4Principle 1: hazard analysis25 min

A hazard is a biological, chemical or physical agent that can harm health. Allergens are a chemical hazard, but many businesses treat them as a fourth type (Notice 2022/C 355/01, Annex II, section 5.1).

How it is done

  1. At each step of the diagram, list the hazards that are reasonably expected.
  2. Decide which ones it is essential to prevent, eliminate or reduce: these are the significant hazards. Consider the likelihood and severity of harm, whether microbes can survive or multiply, toxins and chemical residues, foreign bodies such as glass or metal, who the food is for and what the customer might do wrong with it.
  3. For each hazard, describe the control measure that prevents, eliminates or reduces it. Control measures must be validated (section 5.2).

The worksheet

The Commission suggests a table with these columns: step; hazard (B biological, C chemical, P physical, A allergen); whether it is reasonably expected; why; and the measure that controls it (section 5.3).

  • Hazards with the same source and the same control can be grouped: for example, bacteria killed by cooking on one side and spore-forming bacteria on the other.
  • In a small business it is enough to describe, in a simple practical way, how each hazard is controlled, as long as all the significant ones are covered and it says what to do if something goes wrong.
In practiceStep «receiving chicken»: hazard B (Salmonella, Campylobacter). Reasonably expected? Yes: it is raw poultry. Measure: receive it chilled, put it in the cold room straight away and cook it thoroughly later. Step «dessert display»: hazard P (glass if a glass breaks). Measure: good practice for glassware and for what to do if something breaks.

Source: Regulation (EC) No 852/2004 on the hygiene of foodstuffs (consolidated text), Article 5(2)(a) · Commission Notice 2022/C 355/01 on food safety management systems (good hygiene practices and procedures based on the HACCP principles), Annex II, sections 5.1 to 5.3

5Principles 2 and 3: critical control points and limits25 min

A critical control point (CCP) is the step at which control is essential to prevent or eliminate a hazard or reduce it to an acceptable level (Regulation 852/2004, Article 5(2)(b)). The most common ones are about time and temperature.

How it is decided

  • A decision tree or another method is used. The Commission warns that no decision tree is perfect for everything (Notice 2022/C 355/01, Annex II, section 6).
  • If the hazard can be controlled later in the process, the step you are analysing is not a CCP.
  • If control cannot be measured against a limit or seen in time (for example, cross-contact with an allergen), it is managed as an operational prerequisite programme (OPRP): with criteria, monitoring and records, just like a CCP.
  • It may be that there is no CCP and good practices are enough. But this must be justified by the hazard analysis (section 3.2), and being small is not enough on its own if you serve vulnerable groups or advertise an allergen-free product.
  • Frying or roasting in a restaurant may not be a CCP: the high temperature is visible and eliminates the hazard.

Critical limits (principle 3)

They separate acceptable from unacceptable (Article 5(2)(c)). They can be a figure (temperature, time, pH) or something observable, such as a liquid boiling or meat being cooked through. They come from legislation, guides, science or proven experience (section 7).

The figures in Spanish law (Royal Decree 1086/2020, Article 30)

  • Prepared meals kept hot: at 63 °C or above.
  • Chilled: 4 °C or below if the shelf life is over 24 hours; 8 °C or below if less. Frozen: −18 °C or below.
  • Cooling cooked food: the core must drop from 60 °C to 10 °C in under two hours.
  • Reheating: at least 74 °C for 15 seconds at the core, within an hour of taking it out of the fridge. Reheated food that is not eaten is thrown away.

A business may use other figures only if it shows the authority they have a scientific basis.

In practiceYou make a stew in the afternoon to serve the next day. If your analysis says cooling is a CCP, the critical limit can be the legal one: from 60 to 10 °C in under two hours, measured at the core.

Source: Regulation (EC) No 852/2004 on the hygiene of foodstuffs (consolidated text), Article 5(2)(b) and (c) · Commission Notice 2022/C 355/01 on food safety management systems (good hygiene practices and procedures based on the HACCP principles), Annex II, sections 3.2, 6 and 7 · Real Decreto 1086/2020, flexibility in food hygiene and prepared meals (consolidated text, in Spanish), Article 30

6Principles 4 and 5: monitoring and correcting20 min

Monitoring (principle 4)

  • These are planned observations or measurements to know whether the CCP is under control and to spot a failure in time to correct it before the food reaches the customer (Notice 2022/C 355/01, Annex II, section 8).
  • The plan says who monitors, when and how. Where possible, monitoring is continuous; if not, at a frequency that allows a reaction.
  • Records are signed by whoever monitors and, when they are reviewed, by the responsible person who reviews them.
  • Measuring is not always needed: looking at the cold-room thermometer or checking when you cut that the food is cooked through may be enough. With calibrated equipment and a fixed procedure (an oven with its programme), you do not need to measure every item.
  • If the limit is exceeded, everything produced since the last correct check is reviewed.

Corrective actions (principle 5)

They are decided before they are needed, so they can be applied without hesitation (section 9). Each one states:

  1. Who applies it.
  2. What is done to correct the process.
  3. What is done with the affected product.
  4. How it is recorded: date, time, what was done, by whom and the follow-up check.
  5. What is changed so it does not happen again.

If the same correction keeps being needed, the good practices or the process itself must be reviewed.

In practiceAt 8:00, the prepared-meals cold room reads 9 °C and its limit is 4 °C. The last correct record is from 20:00 yesterday. The planned action is applied: what has been inside since then is assessed, what can be saved is moved to another cold room, the technician is called and everything is written down with the time and a signature.

Source: Regulation (EC) No 852/2004 on the hygiene of foodstuffs (consolidated text), Article 5(2)(d) and (e) · Commission Notice 2022/C 355/01 on food safety management systems (good hygiene practices and procedures based on the HACCP principles), Annex II, sections 8 and 9

7Principles 6 and 7: checking and documenting20 min

Validation and verification (principle 6)

  • Validating means gathering evidence that a control measure, properly applied, really controls the hazard: studies, your own trials, official guides. It is done at the start and whenever something changes: raw materials, equipment, packaging, the way the food is eaten or a new hazard (Notice 2022/C 355/01, Annex II, section 10).
  • Verifying means checking regularly that the system works: sample testing, internal audits of procedures and records, observing how work is done and confirming that monitoring takes place.

Documents and records (principle 7)

  • They are kept in line with the nature and size of the business (Regulation 852/2004, Article 5(2)(g)).
  • The plan contains the hazard analysis, the CCPs and their limits, monitoring, the planned corrections and the record templates. The records hold what was monitored, the deviations and what was done.
  • They are kept long enough to trace a food if there is an alert and for official controls (section 11).
  • In a small business the system can be simple and use what already exists: delivery notes or a checklist. Records are necessary, but they are not the goal in themselves.

Control samples

Care homes, day centres, school canteens, nurseries, hospitals, staff canteens, transport catering, event companies and orders for more than 40 people keep a control sample (comida testigo) of each dish of the day. It is a portion of at least 100 g, labelled and dated, chilled at 4 °C or below or frozen at −18 °C or below, for at least seven days (Royal Decree 1086/2020, Article 30.8 to 30.10).

In practiceYou replace the oven with a new one. Before trusting the usual programme, you check with a probe that the core of the chicken reaches the temperature in your plan (validation), and each month you pick a few record sheets at random to see they are filled in properly (verification).

Source: Regulation (EC) No 852/2004 on the hygiene of foodstuffs (consolidated text), Article 5(2)(f) and (g) and 5(4) · Commission Notice 2022/C 355/01 on food safety management systems (good hygiene practices and procedures based on the HACCP principles), Annex II, sections 10 and 11 · Real Decreto 1086/2020, flexibility in food hygiene and prepared meals (consolidated text, in Spanish), Article 30.8 to 30.10

8Flexibility, guides, training and culture20 min

Flexibility for small businesses

HACCP must be workable in every business, including small ones. Regulation 852/2004 recognises that some have no CCPs, that good practices can replace monitoring of them, that a limit need not be a figure and that documents should not be an excessive burden (recital 15, quoted in Notice 2022/C 355/01, Annex II, section 3.1). In Spain, shops and restaurants can apply it in a simplified way following the Commission's guidance for retailers (Royal Decree 1021/2022, Article 20).

Sector guides

  • Guides to good hygiene practice and to the application of HACCP are voluntary (Article 7) and help you comply.
  • If you use a generic guide, check that it covers everything you do. Anything it does not cover needs your own procedures (Notice, Annex II, section 3.3).

Training the team

All staff need hygiene training suited to their work. Those who monitor or verify CCPs also need training in the HACCP procedures for their task: front-of-house staff need a hygiene level; kitchen staff also need hygienic food preparation (Notice, section 8).

Management commitment

Since 2021, management must make everyone's roles clear, keep the system in place when there are changes, verify that controls are carried out and documentation is up to date, ensure staff training and supervision, comply with legal requirements and seek continuous improvement (Regulation 852/2004, Annex II, Chapter XIa, point 2).

In practiceYour restaurant follows a sector guide, but this year you start serving marinated raw fish. The guide does not cover it: you add that preparation to your plan, with its own hazard analysis and controls.

Source: Regulation (EC) No 852/2004 on the hygiene of foodstuffs (consolidated text), Article 7 and Annex II, Chapters XIa and XII · Commission Notice 2022/C 355/01 on food safety management systems (good hygiene practices and procedures based on the HACCP principles), sections 6 and 8 and Annex II, section 3 · Real Decreto 1021/2022, food hygiene in retail (consolidated text, in Spanish), Article 20

Final test: 30 questions

Answer all 30 questions. You pass with 24 or more correct (80%). When it is marked you will see the explanation and the rule behind each answer. You can retake it as many times as you like.

1. Which food businesses must have procedures based on the HACCP principles?
2. Under Royal Decree 1021/2022, is a restaurant «retail»?
3. What does Royal Decree 1021/2022 add about HACCP in a shop or restaurant?
4. What training does Regulation 852/2004 require of whoever develops and maintains HACCP?
5. According to the European Commission, does «adequate training» always require a formal course?
6. You change a dish's recipe or the preparation process. What happens to the HACCP procedure?
7. What are prerequisite programmes (PRPs)?
8. Why does thermometer calibration matter in HACCP?
9. How many steps does the classic method combining the preliminary steps and the HACCP principles have?
10. In a small business, can the HACCP team be a single person?
11. What must the flow diagram include?
12. Once the flow diagram is drawn up, what must be done?
13. In the hazard analysis, what types of hazard are looked for?
14. What is a «significant hazard»?
15. What columns does the Commission's hazard analysis worksheet have?
16. Can hazards be grouped in the analysis?
17. What is a critical control point (CCP)?
18. A hazard can be controlled at a later step in the process. The step you are analysing…
19. Cross-contact with an allergen cannot be measured against a limit in real time. How is it managed?
20. Can a business have no CCP at all?
21. Must a critical limit always be a number?
22. Under Royal Decree 1086/2020, at what temperature is a hot prepared meal kept?
23. A chilled prepared meal with a shelf life of more than 24 hours is kept at…
24. When cooling a meal prepared hot, what must happen at the core of the product?
25. At what temperature is a prepared meal reheated?
26. What must the plan say about monitoring a CCP?
27. Monitoring shows a critical limit has been exceeded. Which production is reviewed?
28. What must the planned corrective actions include?
29. What is the difference between validation and verification?
30. What must a school canteen keep from each dish it serves?

Your PDF training certificate

Unlocked when you pass the test (24 out of 30).

Your name and ID number never leave this device: the PDF is created in your browser and LaborIA does not receive or store them.

This is a training certificate in free format. It is not a qualification required by law, and it does not replace your business's HACCP plan, which must be based on the hazards and processes of its own premises.

Free food handler courseThe basics for all staff: hygiene, temperatures, allergens and your part in HACCP

Frequently asked questions

Are the course and certificate really free?
Yes. The 8 modules, the test and the PDF certificate are free and you don't need to sign up. LaborIA is funded by advertising.
Is a HACCP course compulsory?
The law requires whoever develops and maintains HACCP to have adequate training in its principles (Regulation (EC) No 852/2004, Annex II, Chapter XII.2). It does not require a particular course or number of hours, and the European Commission makes it clear that this training need not be a formal course. This is a free-format training certificate: it is not a qualification required by law.
Does this course give me my restaurant's HACCP plan?
No. It teaches you to understand it, draw it up and review it. The plan must come from your business's own hazards, processes and premises, and it can be based on a sector guide to good practice.
How is it different from the food handler course?
The food handler course is for all staff and explains HACCP in one module, from the worker's side. This one is for the person in charge: the preliminary steps, hazard analysis, CCPs, limits, monitoring, corrections, verification and records.
Does a small bar need the same as a factory?
No. HACCP is applied according to the nature and size of the business, and in Spain shops and restaurants can apply it in a simplified way (Royal Decree 1021/2022, Article 20). What does not change is that hazards must be analysed and controlled.
Do you keep my name or ID number?
No. The PDF is created in your browser: your name and ID number are not sent to LaborIA or anyone else.

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Rules and official sources

Texts read on 22 October 2026. General information: your employer must also give you the training for your specific job.