Food hygiene rating in Scotland: how FHIS works

The short answer

If you run a café, restaurant, takeaway or food shop, your food hygiene rating in Scotland is an outcome under the Food Hygiene Information Scheme (FHIS), given by your council's food safety officer, not a number from 0 to 5. The outcome is Pass or Improvement Required, and a few businesses are shown as Awaiting Inspection or Exempt. Your result is published online whether or not you put the sticker in your window. If you think it is wrong you have 14 days to appeal, and you can also add a public reply or ask for a re-visit once you have fixed things. This note covers each of those, the legal position on display, and what the result means for your website and Google listing.

Pass, Improvement Required and the other statuses

FHIS is a partnership between Scotland's local authorities and Food Standards Scotland (FSS). FSS says every food outlet in Scotland must have a food hygiene inspection by its local authority, and that the scheme covers more than 54,000 food outlets across all 32 councils. The outcomes, as FSS describes them:

• Pass: the business meets the legal requirements for food hygiene.
• Improvement Required: the business did not meet the legal requirements and needs to make improvements.
• Awaiting Inspection: a new business, or a business with a new owner, that has not had a rating yet. It gets a temporary certificate and shows this status online.
• Exempt Premises: a very small number of low-risk premises, such as a newsagent or chemist, that met the pass criteria but fall outside the scheme. FSS's business guidance says the certificate is withheld only with the business's agreement.

You may also see Awaiting Publication. That is what the ratings website shows while an appeal is being considered.

Two details matter later. How often you are inspected depends on the risk your business poses to health, and the outcome belongs to a business at a specific address. A change of operator at that address means a fresh assessment.

How Scotland's food hygiene rating differs from the 0 to 5 scheme

England, Wales and Northern Ireland use the Food Standards Agency's Food Hygiene Rating Scheme (FHRS), which gives a number:

In both schemes the time to appeal includes weekends and public holidays. FHIS has no score. The FSA's open data notes say the inspection scores in its data apply to FHRS only, not FHIS, so a Pass should never be turned into a number or stars.

Do you have to display your food hygiene rating in Scotland?

No. After an inspection you receive a certificate and/or sticker to display on your door or window, and FSS notes that some businesses choose not to show their rating on their website or premises. Display is required by law in Wales, under section 7 of the Food Hygiene Rating (Wales) Act 2013, and in Northern Ireland, under section 7 of the Food Hygiene Rating Act (Northern Ireland) 2016. The Scottish Parliament's research briefing on the petition below puts it plainly: in Scotland and England, displaying the rating on the premises is voluntary. A search of legislation.gov.uk for food hygiene rating law turns up only Welsh and Northern Irish Acts and regulations.

That could change. A petition to the Scottish Parliament, PE2217, published on 24 June 2026, asks the Scottish Government to adopt the FSA's 0 to 5 scale and to make display on the front window mandatory. In its written reply of 26 August 2026 the Scottish Government said the power to require display already exists, and that its food law reform programme will explore new ways of telling consumers about compliance, including mandatory display. On 24 September 2026 the Parliament's Public Petitions Committee agreed to write to Food Standards Scotland for its views. The petition is still under consideration and nothing has been decided.

Where your result is published

Whether or not you display it, FSS says all FHIS ratings are shown on its website. Scottish results also appear on the FSA's ratings search at ratings.food.gov.uk, which covers all four nations and shows Scotland's statuses rather than numbers.

The same data is published as open data: downloadable files, including one for Scotland, updated daily, and an API that needs no registration. Anyone can build on it, which is why ratings turn up on other websites and apps, not just the official ones.

If you received Improvement Required

FSS describes three safeguards for businesses. Its business safeguards guidance is the place to read the detail before acting.

1. Appeal, if you think the outcome is wrong or unfair. You are told your outcome in writing, either at the inspection or within 14 days. Your appeal must be in writing, on the standard form or by letter or email, to your council's Lead Officer for Food, within 14 days of being notified. The officer who inspected you does not decide it, and you should hear the result within seven days of the council receiving it. Talking it over informally with your officer first is encouraged, but it does not extend the deadline.
2. Right to reply, to explain what you have improved since the inspection or any unusual circumstances on the day. There is no deadline before your next inspection. The council may edit out offensive, defamatory, clearly inaccurate or irrelevant remarks, and the reply is published online alongside your outcome until you get a new one. FSS is clear that this is not a place to criticise the scheme or your officer.
3. Re-visit, once you have made the improvements your officer set out. Ask the officer in writing, explaining what you did and including evidence such as receipts; the council can turn down a request without enough evidence. You get one re-visit between planned inspections, you cannot choose its date, and the officer looks at standards generally, so the outcome can become a Pass or stay the same. Asked whether a re-visit costs anything, FSS currently answers: not at the moment, though that may change.

What it means online

Your FHIS result is a public record attached to your business name and address. Individual result pages on the FSS site show up in ordinary web searches, and the open data can be reused anywhere. So a customer can check your result without visiting you, and some will.

Webtaro uses the same public data in its Glasgow Top 10 lists. As the method page sets out, food businesses with an Improvement Required outcome are left out, and among food businesses a Pass comes first, most recent inspection first. It is not a review of food, service or value.

Putting your result on your website honestly

• Show the outcome you hold now, with the inspection date, and link to your official record so a customer can check it.
• Write it in FHIS terms: Pass, not a score or stars.
• Keep the Eat Safe Award separate. FSS runs it alongside FHIS to recognise businesses that strive for excellence in food hygiene, so it is a different thing from a Pass.
• Update the page when you are re-inspected. An old Pass on your site next to a newer outcome on the official record is the kind of mismatch customers notice.
• The FSA's downloadable rating images are FHRS badges, and their use is governed by a brand standard and terms. A 0 to 5 badge does not belong on a Scottish business's site, and do not design your own.

Keep your Google listing, website and record consistent

Because the outcome is held against a business at an address, a customer comparing your Google Business Profile, your website and the ratings site should be able to tell they are the same place. Use the same trading name and address on all three; our Google Business Profile guide for Glasgow covers getting the listing right. If you have moved, rebranded or changed hands, expect to show Awaiting Inspection until the council has assessed you, and say so plainly rather than carrying over the old result. If the public record looks wrong, for example still listing a business that has stopped trading, FSS's advice is to contact your local authority.

If you run a café, restaurant or takeaway and want a website that keeps details like these accurate, see who we work with.