Compliance training is instruction that employees must receive because a law, a certification scheme or a client contract requires it, covering the rules that apply to their job and their site. It is often treated as a checkbox exercise, which is precisely where it stops reducing risk.
The frameworks that actually apply here
The generic list, GDPR, anti-harassment, AML, describes a different market. In Benelux frontline operations, six frameworks do most of the work, and only some of them are law.
The Codex over het welzijn op het werk (Belgium). Art. I.2-21 requires sufficient and adapted training aimed at the worker's workpost or function, at entry, on a change of function, and on new work equipment or new technology, during working hours and at the employer's cost.
The Arbowet (Netherlands). Art. 8 requires effective information about the work and its risks, instruction adapted to distinct tasks, and, in lid 4, supervision of compliance with the instructions given.
VCA. Not law: a client requirement. Chapter 3 separates diplomas from company instruction and site instruction, in separate must questions.
HACCP, through Regulation (EC) 852/2004. Annex II Chapter XII requires training in food hygiene in line with the person's occupational activity, and adequate HACCP training for those who develop and maintain the procedure.
BRCGS Food Safety, Issue 9. Clause 7.1.1 requires that all personnel, including agency-supplied staff, temporary staff and contractors, be appropriately trained prior to commencing work and adequately supervised throughout. Clause 7.1.4 requires allergen awareness training for all staff.
IFS Food, version 8. Clause 3.3.1 requires a documented training programme covering content, frequency, the worker's task, languages, a qualified trainer and evaluation of effectiveness. Clause 3.3.3 requires records with a signed participant list, date, duration, content and trainer.
One hard interval, and it is not the one people quote
None of these prescribes a refresher interval. Not the Codex, not the Arbowet, not 852/2004, not BRCGS, not IFS. The single hard term in the list is the ten year validity of VCA personal diplomas, after which a full re-examination is required rather than a refresher.
That is liberating and uncomfortable at once. You set the frequency, and you are then measured against your own standard: IFS explicitly asks you to state the frequency and evaluate effectiveness.
Concretely, a Belgian food plant that wrote "annually" into its own training matrix and delivers it every fourteen months has a non-conformity of its own making, even though no regulator ever asked for twelve months.
Why the record is half the deliverable
Every framework above ends up asking the same question: show me who received what, when, at which site. Our guide on compliance completion tracking for auditors covers what to have ready before the request arrives.
Bring your next audit date to a demo and we will look at the gaps together.