Restaurant Grading

Making the Grade

Since 1963 the Riverside County Department of Environmental Health has been issuing grades to any food facility that handles open food.  Food facilities such as restaurants, bakeries, delis and bars receive unannounced inspections throughout the year and are issued a grade after each one of those inspections. The grade that a facility receives should be posted in an publicly viewable area, usually near the front door or front register.

What's in an Inspection?
Each time a food facility receives an inspection the Health Inspector goes through a checklist of important food safety principles to comfirm that those principles are being followed by the food staff. The Department's official inspection report covers 53 areas of concern. Since the inspection is the basis for the grade that facility will receive, the facility will start with one hundred (100) points at the beginning of the inspection. Most of the 53 items have a point value associated with them that will be subtracted from the facility's score at the end of the inspection. Some violations can be marked as MAJOR violations. These violations are considered to be severe in nature and generally require immediate correction and can sometimes cause a facility to be closed until it is corrected.

All currently open facilities that receive grades can be viewed through our Restaurant / Market grading website.

  Restaurant / Market Grading

The Grades
There are only three possible grades that a facility can receive during an inspection.

The "A" Grade
An "A" grade signifies that the facility passed their inspection and the facility has received a score from 90 to 100 points on their unannounced inspection. Unlike the grades you got in school, this is the only passing grade that a facility can get for an inspection .






The "B" Grade
A "B" grade signifies that the facility DID NOT PASS their unannounced inspection and received a score from 80 to 89 points. If you look closely at the grade card to the left you will note that at the top of the card it states "THIS ESTABLISHMENT DOES NOT COMPLY WITH MINIMUM SANITARY STANDARDS". Facilites that have received a "B" or lower grade are posted on our Food Facility Downgrades webpage and are required to raise their grade back up to an "A" within a short period of time.

The "C" Grade
A "C" grade signifies that the facility DID NOT PASS their unannounced inspection and received a score from 0 to 79 points. If you look closely at the grade card to the left you will note that at the top of the card it states "THIS ESTABLISHMENT DOES NOT COMPLY WITH MINIMUM SANITARY STANDARDS". Facilites that have received a "C" or lower grade are posted on our Food Facility Downgrades webpage. These facilities also may present a potential or immediate threat to the public's health and safety and may be closed as a result of the inspection and are required to raise their grade back up to an "A" within a short period of time.