Can a Restaurant Consultant help with my food hygiene rating?

23rd Nov 2017

An exposé by Simon Rimmer on Channel 4 called “Tricks of the restaurant trade” and the news in the hospitality press that a Head Chef and his General manager were sacked for a 1 out of 5 rating in their hotel only goes to show just how important effective food safety procedures are, in order for catering and hospitality businesses to survive.

Its been a sensation few weeks in the industry with big names like Subway and Marco Pierre White being named and shamed as their poor scores also for some of their business.

But what does a poor score actually mean? The Food Standards Agency in the UK is responsible for ensuring that all catering outlets, from burger vans to fine dining restaurants adhere to a common set of guidelines. These guidelines and a business’s adherence to them are then scored from one to five, five being the highest score. These are set out to ensure that all food is handled, prepared, served and stored safely and posing no risk to the health of the workers and the customers purchasing the items. They are able to inspect any premises without notice and can award a rating from one to five for the standards achieved. From 2013, it became compulsory to all businesses to display stickers of their scores and the term “scores on the doors” was coined.

Most of these poor scores will often have very little to do with cleanliness of the kitchen and how the food is being cooked. It is usually much more to do with the paperwork that is involved to monitor and trace all actions that take place behind that kitchen door.

But the bottom line is that a business needs to be consistent in all areas of food handling. We find that a lot of businesses are just bumbling along trying to do what is expected of them without actually understanding why they are doing everything.

At Loves Consultancy we spend a great deal of time with our clients, ensuring that they are all compliant and fully trained on all aspects.  We believe that this is a key area that will not only ensure the success of a business but ultimately, some of the procedures we put in place will be able to increase GP’s and save money. Manuals are designed for each client with all the necessary paperwork provided and we oversee all training for food hygiene for all the relevant staff. Our clients always score 5 out of 5 and our manuals are consistently praised for their depth and easy to understand and complete.