# What paperwork does a bakery need, and where should it keep it?

> A bakery needs registration, food safety certificates, insurance, staff training records, supplier allergen specs and contracts. What each country asks for, and where to keep them.

A bakery needs six groups of paperwork: its food business registration or
licence, food safety certificates and food safety program, insurance, staff
training records, supplier specifications with allergen statements, and its
contracts and policies. Keep them in one place, with an expiry date against
everything that lapses and access set by who needs to see each one. What
counts as required depends on where you trade, so check the details with your
council or food authority.

## What each country asks for

**United Kingdom.** Register your food business with your local council at
least 28 days before you start trading. Registration is free and applies to
home kitchens too. A food hygiene certificate is not compulsory, but you must
make sure food handlers are trained and supervised, and a Level 2 Food Hygiene
course with its certificate is a common way to show it. In England, Wales and
Northern Ireland your council inspects and awards a food hygiene rating from 0
to 5.

**Australia.** A home-based business selling direct to customers notifies or
registers with its local council; in New South Wales, one selling to cafes or
shops for resale notifies the NSW Food Authority instead. In Victoria, councils
charge a registration fee and registration renews every year. Under Standard
3.2.2A, food service, catering and related retail businesses handling unpackaged, ready-to-eat
potentially hazardous food must appoint a certified Food Safety Supervisor,
with a certificate from the past five years, and keep the record.

**New Zealand.** Under a Food Notice issued by MPI on 30 October 2025,
home-based makers and decorators of shelf-stable cakes sold directly to
customers are exempt from registering a food control plan or national
programme until 31 October 2028, but still need to be able to trace
ingredients and run a recall. Cakes that need refrigeration, and cakes made for
resale, still register under the Food Act 2014.

**United States.** Home baking runs under each state's cottage food rules.
Texas, for example, requires a food handler course for cottage food operators,
and New York requires a home processor registration with its Department
of Agriculture and Markets. Keep the permit or registration and any training
certificate together. The state-by-state detail is in
[cottage food law](/glossary/cottage-food-law).

**Canada.** Rules are provincial. In Ontario, a home-based business making
low-risk foods such as cakes, cookies and breads tells its local public health
unit before it starts selling.

## The full list

**Six groups, one place**

- **Registration and licences.** The current certificate, renewal date and any
  conditions, plus market or event permits.
- **Food safety.** Each person's certificate with its issue or expiry date,
  your written food safety program if you have one, and its evidence:
  inspection reports, pest control, equipment calibration, test and tag.
- **Insurance.** Policy schedule and certificate of currency for public and
  product liability, plus equipment, vehicle and workers' or employer's cover
  where it applies. Venues and wholesale buyers ask for the liability
  certificate by name, often days before an event.
- **Staff training.** Food safety and allergen training per person, dated, and
  ID or right-to-work documents, kept as the most private files you hold.
- **Supplier specifications.** Each ingredient's specification with its
  allergen statement. When a supplier reformulates, file the new version next
  to the old one rather than over it, because these are the source of every
  allergen declaration you make.
- **Contracts and policies.** Lease, supply and venue agreements, your customer
  terms, and your allergen, refund and cleaning policies. The clauses a custom
  order needs are in
  [what a cake order contract should include](/answers/how-do-i-get-a-cake-order-or-contract-signed-online).

## Keeping it under control

Put an expiry date on everything that lapses and a reminder a month before.
Keep old versions, because when the question is what was true on a past date,
the old version is the answer. Let the whole team open cleaning and allergen
policies, and keep insurance, contracts and staff ID private.

ibakepro keeps all of this in the Vault, in Business, on every plan with unlimited
files. Each document has a category, an expiry date that flags it before it
lapses, and a level: the whole team, managers and the owner, or the owner
only. Insurance, contracts and ID start private, staff see a watermarked copy
rather than the original, and every view is logged. Contracts go out for
signature from the same place. On the Growth and Business plans,
[Compliance](/features/food-safety-and-compliance) holds your
daily temperature, cleaning and corrective action records, with an inspector
pack you can print for any date range. More on the
[Vault](/features/business-vault-document-storage).