The Food Standards Agency FSA and The Food Hygiene Rating Scheme FHRS (2014-12-02)

'Look before you book' this Christmas, says Food Standards Agency.
This is despite 34% of people reporting that they had a bad experience when eating out and suspecting they contracted food poisoning from a restaurant or takeaway.

The Food Standards Agency (FSA) is calling on people to check the food hygiene ratings of restaurants before booking Christmas meals out with family and friends. A poll found that almost half of the UK public (46%) never check food hygiene ratings of places they plan to eat in.

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The Food Hygiene Rating Scheme (FHRS) will help you choose where to eat out or shop for food by giving you information about the hygiene standards in restaurants, pubs, cafes, takeaways, hotels, and other places you eat out. Supermarkets and other food shops are also included in the scheme.

The scheme is run by local authorities in England, Northern Ireland and Wales and in partnership with the Food Standards Agency.

Each business is given a ‘hygiene rating’ when it is inspected by a food safety officer from the business’s local authority. The hygiene rating shows how closely the business is meeting the requirements of food hygiene law.

In England and Northern Ireland, when you eat out or shop for food, you might see a sticker in the window or on the door, or a certificate on display, showing you the hygiene rating for that business. Businesses are encouraged to display these stickers and certificates at their premises in a place where you can easily see them when you visit. In Wales, from 28 November 2013, those businesses who receive a new FHRS sticker that includes the Welsh Government logo will have to display it in a prominent place – such as the front door, entrance or window and provide information on their rating verbally, if asked.

If you’re planning to eat out or buy food, you can search this website to find out if the scheme is run in your area (http://ratings.food.gov.uk/). You can only search for hygiene ratings of businesses in areas where the scheme is run.

The food hygiene rating or inspection result given to a business reflects the standards of food hygiene found on the date of inspection or visit by the local authority. The food hygiene rating is not a guide to food quality.

A business can be given one of these hygiene ratings.

The food safety officer inspecting a business checks how well the business is meeting the law by looking at:

- how hygienically the food is handled – how it is prepared, cooked, re-heated, cooled and stored;

- the condition of the structure of the buildings – the cleanliness, layout, lighting, ventilation and other facilities;

- how the business manages and records what it does to make sure food is safe.

At the end of the inspection, the business is given one of the six ratings. The top rating of ‘5’ means that the business was found to have ‘very good’ hygiene standards. Any business should be able to reach this top rating.

The food safety officer will explain to the person who owns or manages the business what improvements are needed and how they can achieve the top rating of '5'. The local authority will check that these improvements are made.

The FHRS has been designed to make sure that the ratings given to businesses are fair.

For more information
Find out more about food hygiene ratings

MDN