Opening or taking over a bar in Spain: licences, APPCC and allergens

Getting a bar up and running is not one single procedure but a package: the municipal authorisation that lets you operate (a declaración responsable, a self declaration filed with the town hall, or an activity licence), the food safety registry of your comunidad autónoma (your region), the APPCC self control plan (the Spanish acronym for HACCP, Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points), the information on the 14 allergens and the music licences. On top of that come the tax registration (modelo 036, which has a simplified version) and registration with the Seguridad Social (the Spanish social security system).

If instead of starting from scratch you take over a business that is already trading, you inherit much of that structure. The advantage is that you can step into the existing licence. The risk is that you also inherit its defects: a licence that does not cover the activity actually carried out, an expired food safety registration or an APPCC plan that does not exist. That is why a takeover always starts with an audit.

Managora audits the starting point, prepares each document and files it with the authorities for you. You can see the details and the current price on the Hospitality business takeover page.

In a takeover, what changes is who holds the activity licence, not the licence itself. That change is formalised through a notification of change of holder to the town hall, which evidences that the new holder steps into the rights and duties of the original licence.

For that step in to be valid, three conditions are usually required: that the previous holder authorises the transfer, that the activity has not stopped at the premises for longer than the local ordinance allows (frequently six months) and that no works have been carried out that alter the conditions of the licence. The notification is filed within a short deadline from the transfer, usually one month.

The audit consists of checking that the inherited licence really covers what you are going to do (kitchen, terrace, capacity, opening hours, live music) before you sign the takeover. Managora reviews the licence, spots the mismatches and files the change of holder for you.

A bar or restaurant registers in the food safety registry of its comunidad autónoma, not in the national Registro General Sanitario de Empresas Alimentarias y Alimentos (RGSEAA, the national food business registry) run by AESAN, the Spanish food safety agency. The reason: its activity is sale or service direct to the final consumer within the local health unit, in other words retail trade.

The national RGSEAA is reserved for businesses that produce or distribute in order to supply other establishments beyond their own locality. A bar would only fall there if, on a more than marginal basis, it prepared food to sell to third parties outside its local area. Confusing the two registries is a frequent mistake that delays opening.

Managora identifies the regional registry that applies to you and files the registration. The price is shown on the Regional food safety registration page.

Every establishment that handles food must have a self control plan in place based on the APPCC system (Análisis de Peligros y Puntos de Control Crítico, the Spanish name for HACCP), as required by Reglamento (CE) 852/2004 (the EU Regulation on the hygiene of foodstuffs). It is a living document that identifies the hazards in the process (goods in, cold storage, cooking, cleaning) and sets out how to control and record them.

The carné de manipulador de alimentos (the old official food handler card) no longer exists. Real Decreto 109/2010 repealed Real Decreto 202/2000 and moved responsibility for training onto the business itself. Today there is no official card issued by the administration and no courses approved by ministries or by AESAN: it is the owner of the bar who must guarantee and evidence that staff have hygiene training appropriate to their job.

Managora writes the APPCC plan tailored to your premises and organises the hygiene training for your team. You can see the scope and the price on the APPCC self control plan page.

Reglamento (UE) 1169/2011 (the EU food information Regulation) requires you to give information on the 14 allergens subject to mandatory declaration for every dish you serve unpackaged. In Spain, Real Decreto 126/2015 sets out how to do it for non prepacked food served in bars, restaurants and mass caterers.

The information has to be available clearly and accessibly before the customer orders, and in documented form. It can sit on the menu, on a separate support, on the digital menu or on a card for each dish. Pointing customers generically to the staff with nothing in writing behind it is not enough: you must be able to show, dish by dish, which allergens each preparation contains.

Managora builds the allergen matrix by cross checking your menu against the 14 mandatory groups and hands you the support ready to use. The details are on the Menu allergen matrix page.

Playing music in a bar is an act of public communication that generates two separate and independent rights, so you pay for two licences, not one. SGAE manages the rights of the authors and composers of the works. AGEDI-AIE manages those of the record producers (AGEDI) and of the performers (AIE) for recorded music.

These rights are compatible and cumulative: having a contract with SGAE does not release you from the contract with AGEDI-AIE, or the other way round. It applies whether the music comes from the radio, from your own playlist, from a piped music service or from the internet. Only royalty free music would fall outside, and that is worth documenting.

Managora contracts and sets up both licences for you. The handling fee is shown on the Music licences for your premises page; the tariffs of each body are set by SGAE and AGEDI-AIE.