Why does this place have no food hygiene rating?
Not every food business carries a rating. Some have not been inspected yet, some sell too little food to count, and a few have had theirs taken away.
Who gets rated
The scheme covers businesses that supply food straight to the public. Restaurants, cafes, takeaways, sandwich shops, mobile traders and food shops are all in. So are places the public cannot walk into but where food is cooked and served: schools, nurseries and residential care homes.
A registered business in that group gets a rating at its next inspection. Four things stop that happening.
It has not been inspected yet
A new food business must register with the council at least 28 days before it opens. The first inspection comes after that, so a business can trade for a while with nothing to show. Our listings say Awaiting inspection while that is the case.
A rating can only follow an inspection, a partial inspection or an audit. No business can be rated on what it says about itself.
It sells food, but nobody thinks of it as a food shop
Some businesses have to register because they sell food, but the food is a sideline nobody notices. The FSA's guidance names the cases:
- visitor centres selling tins of biscuits and other wrapped goods among everything else
- leisure centres whose only food is a drinks machine
- newsagents selling pre-packed sweets that need no refrigeration, and petrol stations that amount to the same thing rather than a small supermarket
- chemists selling pre-packed confectionery or health foods
- off-licences selling drinks and pre-wrapped goods
Each case is judged on its own, on what is sold and what keeping it safe involves. These show as Exempt.
Being low risk is not enough on its own. The guidance is explicit that a home caterer stays in the scheme and keeps a published record, however low its risk category.
It runs from someone's home
Childminders are the main case, along with others caring for people in a family home. They were taken out of the scheme in 2014. A business that had opted in before July that year keeps the rating it had until its next inspection.
It has been closed down
A business shut over an imminent risk to public health loses its rating while it stays closed, and nothing about it is published at all. It gets a new rating when it reopens, based on its most recent inspection.
So a missing record is not always reassuring. It is rare, but if somewhere you expected to find has disappeared from the listings, check the FSA's own search.
Scotland
Scotland runs the Food Hygiene Information Scheme instead, which gives Pass or Improvement Required rather than a number. Its scope and exemptions are set separately by Food Standards Scotland.
The rules above come from the FSA's Brand Standard, version 8. See how inspections work
Common questions
What does "awaiting inspection" mean?
The business has registered but has not been inspected yet. A new food business has to register with its council at least 28 days before it starts trading, and the first inspection follows once it is open. It also applies when a business changes hands or moves premises, so a long-established place under new ownership starts again with nothing to show.
What does "exempt" mean?
The business is registered as a food business but is not rated, because food is a small part of what it does and customers would not think of it as a food business. Newsagents selling only pre-packed sweets are the usual example.
Can a business ask to be rated?
Not if it falls outside the scheme. Councils are told to explain that the business is out of scope and will not be rated, so that the same businesses are treated the same way in England, Wales and Northern Ireland.
Does no rating mean the business is unsafe?
Usually the opposite: most unrated businesses are low-risk shops or brand new. The exception is a business closed over an imminent risk to public health, which has its rating removed while it stays shut.