A regulator or major customer has raised a compliance issue.

A regulator, certifier or major retail customer has questioned a claim, a label, a specification or a process. Trading may continue, but the exposure sits across product, marketing and supply at once.

These issues are rarely isolated. The same gap in control usually exists in several places, and the response is judged as much as the original problem.

• The response is written by whoever received the letter.
• Claims are defended before the evidence behind them has been checked.
• Similar exposures elsewhere in the range are not reviewed.
• Commercial teams keep selling against the claim under review.
• Remediation is agreed without the operational capacity to deliver it.

• What exactly is being questioned, and what evidence supports the current position?
• Where else in the range or the supply chain does the same exposure exist?
• What must stop today, and what can continue safely?
• Who owns the response, the evidence pack and the relationship?
• What does the regulator or customer actually need to see to close it?

• Establish the factual position and the evidence behind every affected claim.
• Contain the immediate exposure and stop anything that cannot be substantiated.
• Agree a remediation plan the operation can genuinely deliver, with dates and owners.
• Fix the control that allowed it, not only the instance that was found.
• Rebuild confidence with the customer or regulator through delivery rather than correspondence.