Village Shop Fined OVER £1800!

The owner, Ms Ponnuthurai of Hirwaun Village Stores in Rhondda Cynon Taf was successfully prosecuted by Rhondda Cynon Taf Council’s Trading Standards department for exposing for sale, food past its use by date.

Under the General Food Regulations 2004 it is an offence to contravene or fail to comply with specified EU provisions, including the Assimilated EC Regulation 178/2002 which lays down rules relating to the requirements of food law, food safety, presentation – or labelling, traceability and withdrawal, recall and notification. The Regulations provides that food "shall not be placed on the market if it is unsafe". 

The offence was discovered following a complaint received by the Trading Standards department. A visit was then conducted to check compliance, where the Trading Standards Officer found FOUR food products (TGI Fridays BBQ beef brisket) displayed for sale that were 132 days past their use by date and ONE food product (TGI Fridays Buffalo chicken wings) that was 153 (almost 6 Months) past its use by date.

If the regular checks were carried out as advised, every two weeks for the durability date on the products, they would have been missed on 9 checks and 11 checks by the business owner and those they were responsible for.

Other food products were also found exposed for sale past their best before date. Whilst it is not an offence to display for sale food past its best before date, it raises the question as to whether appropriate date checking, and stock rotation had been carried out at this shop. The milk found was 10 months past its best before date, there was no notice to inform the customer of this and it was not price reduced.

The business owner, Ms Ponnuthurai of Hirwaun Village Stores was remorseful and pleaded guilty to the offence and was made to pay a total fine, which was over £1800.

The fine consisted of a £371 fine, £1302.29 costs and £148 victim surcharge.

Councillor Bob Harris, Cabinet Member for Public Health and Communities, said:

"Food businesses in our County Borough have a responsibility to ensure the goods they sell are safe for customers to consume. It's completely unacceptable for a business to continue to sell out of date food, particularly when the team has been alerted that this is something that a member of the public had spotted before, it shows that this is not a ‘one-off’ and could be regularly happening and putting customers at risk.

"The dedicated Trading Standards department offers plenty of advice and help to food businesses on a regular basis and most, thankfully, conduct business in a safe manner, which does not put consumers at risk.

"I'm confident this latest action sends out a message to businesses across the County Borough to have proper measures in place to ensure they comply with food safety regulations, or they will face the consequences."

For more information on Food Safety Regulations in Rhondda Cynon Taf visit www.rctcbc.gov.uk/TradingStandards

Photo by Sonder Quest on Unsplash