Vikki Banks, Office Administrator

The main project that I have been working on is an overhaul of the compliancy within the Butchery at Bowhouse. Since Euan has taken over and the plans for the butchery are to grow, I have been making sure that the systems we have in place reflect everything we do.

 

As a butchery shop we need to comply from an Environmental Health point of view, which is my background. I’ve been going through our operations and making sure that everything is super duper with no faults at all which will all feed into our HACCP. Initially I started with a full internal audit that covered everything from what we use to clean the floors to where delivery notes are kept, temperature checks to the intake of meat and where it goes. Next, I will be completing a full traceability audit that ensures we keep track of the meat that goes through the butchery so that each piece can be fully traced back to the animal it came from. Essentially, it’s a monumental amount of paperwork that needs to be done, which I know a lot of people would find boring but I love it!

 

 

Aside from the work with the Butchery I have also been working on various compliance tasks within the office, ensuring that all our contractors insurance details are up to date, and we’re registered for the correct council tax bands across all of our properties on the estate.

Our electricity contractors are currently up for renewal and as you can imagine the prices aren’t looking great just now but I have been helping Jane gather quotes from various suppliers so we can compare and get the best deal we can. It’s staggering the difference in standing charges that companies offer just now but we’re getting there.

An ongoing task that I undertake is the data entry forms which are forms that need completed every time we have a lease termination, lease renewal, new lease or rent review so although they can be quite simple there can be a lot of them to keep on top of. Once completed they are then sent down to our sister company in London and processed on our property management system to ensure that all details are kept digitally and up to date.

Across the estate we have all been given the opportunity to speak to an external agency about our career development and where we would like to go within Balcaskie. I had my meeting last week and as my role has changed so massively so quickly it was great to speak to someone about going forward and where my skill set would be best suited.