Restaurants live and die on profit margins, and it's difficult to cut costs without reducing quality and losing loyal customers. This is precisely why businesses across Brisbane are rushing to upgrade their Eat Safe ratings – the higher your Eat Safe rating, the lower your licence fee. It's an efficient way to reduce costs to cope with the cost-of-living crisis while increasing quality rather than compromising it. 

So, as a Brisbane business owner, what can you do to improve your rating? 

Eat Safe

The first step is to ensure all your food-handling employees are properly trained to handle food, including personal hygiene, cross-contamination, cleaning, sanitising, and handling food safely. Every licenced food business needs a food safety supervisor who has completed the registered training. That's the foundation of a food-safe business. 

The next steps are around managing processes and the documentation that serves as supporting evidence. In addition to evidence of employee training, safe food handling requires evidence. You can use council-created templates to take intake temperatures from deliveries, storage temperatures to ensure food is held at the correct temperature, cooking temperatures, and the cooling and reheating processes. 

Employees must frequently wash their hands during shifts; business owners must ensure hot, running water, soap, and disposable hand towels. You must also provide the correct types of cleaning products for the tasks, and your employees need to be trained to utilise them properly, whether it's a spray to clean tables and chairs or the right detergent for a dishwasher. You must be able to evidence this as well. 

Business Operation 

Business owners set the tone, and if a business is rundown, the employees may not follow the correct steps. If an appliance, fitting, or piece of equipment should be plumbed in, it must be plumbed in and in working order. Otherwise, it should be decommissioned. Any appliance that no longer works should be decommissioned and removed from the premises as soon as possible. 

Grease traps are an essential component for any restaurant, and while it's important to keep oils, fats, and grease from hitting the draining system, unclean grease traps are a beacon to pests. Your water supply must be adequate for the needs of the business, in volume, pressure, and temperature. If you have water issues or need help cleaning a grease trap, then a plumber can most certainly ensure your supply is up to scratch. 

It's always wise to have reliable contractors you can call to ensure your business meets food safety standards, so your customers always walk away happy with the service.