Answers, in plain language.

We pull your location's public health record from NYC Open Data, work out roughly when your next inspection is due, and give you one place to keep the private proof — service reports, certificates, photos and notes — beside the obligation each one satisfies.

No. Searching the public record by name or address is free and needs no account. You only need one when you want to attach a location and keep private records against it.

Search the name on your permit, or the street address. We search the DOHMH inspection dataset directly. If we find nothing, the business may be new, or listed under its legal entity or a previous DBA — try those.

The Health Department inspects roughly 24,000 food service establishments a year. Letter grading has been in place since July 2010.

Every violation carries points, and the points reflect risk to the public rather than how much work the fix takes. The totals at the end of the inspection are your score. Lower is better.

A public health hazard — food held at the wrong temperature, for instance — starts at 7 points, and if it cannot be corrected before the inspection ends the Health Department may close the restaurant until it is. A critical violation, such as serving unwashed produce, starts at 5 points. A general violation, such as failing to sanitise utensils properly, starts at 2 points.

Because of the condition level. Inspectors grade how extensive a problem is from 1 to 5 and add points accordingly. One contaminated food item is condition level 1 and scores 7 points; four or more is condition level 4 and scores 10.

0 to 13 points is an A, 14 to 27 is a B, and 28 or more is a C.

Points follow risk, not effort. A single critical condition can outweigh several housekeeping items, which is also why the cheapest fixes are often the highest-scoring ones.

It depends on your score, and the gap is set by the higher of your initial and re-inspection scores. Score 0 to 13 on the initial inspection and the next cycle begins in 11 to 13 months. Score 14 to 27 and it is 5 to 7 months. Score 28 or more and it is 3 to 5 months.

You are scored but not graded, and an inspector returns unannounced — at least seven days later and typically within a month. That re-inspection is the one that carries a grade. You have two chances at an A in every cycle.

Initial inspections scoring 14 or more, monitoring inspections, inspections at restaurants not yet open to the public, inspections for reopening after a closure, and some complaint-driven visits. Until you have a graded inspection the city lists you as Not Yet Graded.

If a re-inspection goes very badly, the Health Department may keep inspecting roughly once a month until the score drops below 28 — or close the restaurant for serious and persistent violations. Those visits are scored but not graded.

From the published cycle rules above together with your own inspection history. We always show a range, never a date, because complaint-driven visits can happen at any time.

Any violation code that appears in more than one published inspection. We build your focused walk from those, because they are the things most likely to be cited again.

They identify themselves and the purpose of the visit, then work through the kitchen, storage, service areas and bathrooms, citing conditions as they find them. You will be shown the report before they leave.

No. The inspection is not the place to contest anything — that is what the hearing is for, and arguing costs you the chance to record what was actually said. Cooperate, and write down each citation in the inspector's own words while it is fresh.

Open the live log and timestamp the arrival. Take a note as each thing is called, and photograph the condition before anyone corrects it — a photo taken after the fix proves nothing at a hearing. Every note is timestamped as you add it and photographs attach to the note they belong with.

You can, and for some conditions it is the right thing to do. It does not usually remove the citation, but photograph it before and after: a documented immediate correction helps at the hearing.

Ask for identification. Inspectors are required to identify themselves and the purpose of the inspection when they arrive, and the Health Department publishes guidance on what their credentials look like.

The Health Department publishes a Business Owner's Bill of Rights. You are entitled to courteous, professional treatment; inspectors who identify themselves and state the purpose of the visit; information on how long it will take; knowledgeable, fair and impartial enforcement; information about the rules, the violations and possible remedies; directions for contesting violations at OATH; an inspection as unobtrusive as is workable; and answers to reasonable questions.

If an inspector moves or dismantles equipment during the inspection, they are required to put it back or reassemble it.

You are entitled to information in languages other than English, and inspectors will use a language assistance programme if needed. There is no cost for this.

Yes, anonymously and without fear of retribution. The Health Department runs a confidential feedback survey for exactly this.

For certain first-time violations, you can correct the condition, send the Health Department proof, and pay no fine at all. If they accept it, no civil penalty is issued.

Seven calendar days from the inspection date on your summons. That is the single most missed deadline in this whole process. The exception is failing to post the Workplace Smoke-Free Air Act policy, which allows 30 days.

One cited on or after 6 March 2023 that is still pending — not already upheld or defaulted at OATH.

No. Curing does not change the inspection score or the letter grade. It removes the fine.

Curing means admitting the violation, and once it is accepted as cured you can no longer challenge it at OATH. If the Health Department rejects your proof, you can appeal to OATH.

Complete the Food Establishment Cure Affirmation Form and send it with your proof by email or in person, within the seven days. The Health Department notifies you in writing if it is accepted, and tells OATH there are no penalties.

An offer to pay less than the minimum recommended fine in exchange for admitting the violation and skipping the hearing. It arrives by post soon after the inspection, and you can accept online, in person or by mail.

At the OATH Hearings Division. Health Code summonses can be heard by mail, online, by telephone, or in person. Your hearing date is printed on the summons.

Request a telephone hearing at least three business days, and no more than one month, before your hearing date. For an in-person hearing, email the OATH live hearings address at least five business days beforehand.

You are found in violation by default and a higher fine may be imposed. Respond on or before the hearing date — by settling, appearing, writing in for a hearing by mail, or asking for an adjournment.

Yes, and more than people expect. You cannot apply for or renew a permit or licence while you owe outstanding fines.

No. We organise your evidence against the published grounds for review. We do not choose legal strategy, represent you, or appear at a hearing. Speak to counsel before one.

No. Nothing is owed until a hearing decides it. We show a range so you can plan. Violations you can disprove, or show you corrected, are often dropped.

NYC does not publish a fixed amount per violation code, and the final figure is set at the hearing. A single number would be us inventing one. We use the published bands for standard and serious violations instead.

Score 13 points or under and your cycle ends there — no re-inspection and nothing to pay. Over 13 and the inspector returns, and the violations cited can carry fines.

On a front window, door or outside wall where people passing by can easily see it. It must be within five feet of the entrance and between four and six feet off the ground. If there is no direct entrance to the street, the Health Department decides where it goes.

As soon as the inspector hands it to you.

Not posting a grade card can cost up to $1,000. Posting it incorrectly can cost $200. Repeated violations can cost you your permit. Every card is tracked by serial number, so the wrong card in the window is visible to the next inspector.

No. It must be the actual card.

Either, until you have had your chance at a hearing. That choice is yours.

If the hearing changed your grade you will be given a new card: post it and destroy both of the old ones. If your grade did not change, or you accepted a settlement, post the card the inspector gave you and destroy the Grade Pending card.

Post the card the inspector gave you and destroy the Grade Pending card. The same applies on a default decision — you were required to post it on the day you missed the hearing.

On a first adjournment you may keep posting either card. Ask for a second, or miss the second date, and you must post the card the inspector gave you.

Report it to the Bureau of Food Safety and Community Sanitation as soon as possible and submit a notarised replacement form. The replacement is sent to the establishment by certified mail.

Yes, and very few operators know it. The Health Department will send a Public Health Inspector for an educational visit that is neither graded nor fined. They identify problems and tell you how to fix them, scheduled with you during business hours.

$100 before your first inspection and letter grade, and $400 afterwards. The more expensive version also reviews your earlier inspection results and includes a session with your kitchen staff.

If you are carrying a B or C, or opening a second location, it is the cheapest way to find out what an inspector will actually see. One avoided re-inspection covers it.

At least one supervisor holding one must be on site whenever the establishment is operating — receiving food, preparing food, or open to the public.

The Health Academy runs a free self-paced online course of fifteen lessons, and a classroom course of fifteen hours across five days.

More than one. The Health Department itself recommends certifying extra staff so that holidays, sickness and shift changes never leave you without a certified supervisor — a gap that is citable and fineable.

Evidence alone is citable — droppings, gnaw marks, harbourage — without anything being seen alive. Two things matter on the day: a current pest control contract with visit reports, and evidence you acted on what those reports told you to fix.

Less than a year of monthly service reports and a record of the openings you sealed. Inspectors look for the conditions that allow pests, not only for pests themselves.

Seal cracks, crevices and holes in walls, cabinets and doors. Fit rodent-proof sweeps to outside doors. Store food and rubbish in pest-proof containers. Clean grease and food debris from surfaces, equipment and the floor beneath them, and keep range hoods free of grease. Use a pest control professional licensed to work in restaurants.

On the location, in your records, so they are to hand rather than in a drawer in the office. That is the difference between showing something in thirty seconds and looking for it while an inspector waits.

Cold holding at 41°F or below and hot holding at 140°F or above are checked most often. The range between them is where bacteria multiply, so food sitting in it is what gets cited. Confirm current thresholds against the Food Code — the city sets them, not us.

More than a single good reading. A log filled in consistently shows the checks are routine. One completed on the morning of an inspection shows the opposite.

Food left uncovered, hot and cold items stored together, raw food stored with ready-to-eat food, deeply grooved cutting boards, and food-contact surfaces not sanitised after use.

Ready-to-eat food should not be handled with bare hands. It is a critical violation and easy to observe, so it is worth being strict about with staff.

Yes, but not over points. The Health Department may order a closure to correct a public health hazard that cannot be fixed immediately, or when a restaurant is operating without a valid permit. A high score means a re-inspection and possible fines, not a closure.

You stay closed until the condition is corrected and re-inspected, and the reopening inspection is scored but not graded. That is a situation to call a person about rather than read a help page.

We track it as a set of obligations. FDNY publishes its requirements but not per-location service data, so we list what is owed and you attach the reports that satisfy each one.

Kitchen hood suppression system service, portable extinguisher inspection, hood and duct cleaning, and any certificate of fitness held by staff. Go by the tag on the equipment and your contractor's schedule for intervals.

No. They are separate agencies with separate inspections and separate penalties. A location can hold an A and still fail an FDNY inspection.

Only people signed into your account. We store uploaded files outside the public web root and never give them a public URL. Every request for a file checks that it belongs to a location on your account.

PDF, images (JPG, PNG, WebP, HEIC), Word, Excel, CSV and plain text, up to 12 MB per file. We check the type against the file's actual contents, not its extension.

Anything you would be asked to produce and could not find in five minutes: pest control reports, hood and extinguisher service, food protection certificates, licences and renewals, equipment repairs, staff training records, and photographs of anything you corrected after a violation.

We delete its records, violations, activity and uploaded files, including the files on disk. We do not touch the public DOHMH record, so you can add the location again later and it repopulates.

Yes. Each seat can be scoped to specific locations, so a general manager sees the one restaurant they run and nothing else on the account. The owner keeps full control of every seat's scope.

In the portal, open the member and set their role and the locations they cover. Leaving the locations empty gives them the whole account, which is what a seat did before scoping existed.

Yes. Changing a seat's scope sends them a note saying what they now have access to, so nobody is quietly locked out of something they were using.

Three are included with a location — enough for an owner, a GM, and whoever keeps the paperwork.

A short note once a week showing what moved on your locations: new inspections, grade changes, records falling due, and anything overdue. It is meant to be the thing you read instead of logging in on a quiet week.

Both, in account settings. Grade-change and inspection-window alerts are separate and can be switched independently.

You get a note with the new grade and what it means. An A says so and stops there. A B or C comes with the steps that actually matter next — what to fix, what the re-inspection looks at, and what to bring to a hearing.

Owners, admins and managers receive one note seven days before the estimated week and one each day during that week. No supported estimate means no timing email.

The help panel in the corner. She answers the questions that come up most often about grades, inspections and what Compliant Park does.

No, deliberately. She works from a fixed set of written answers and cannot generate a new one. These are questions about inspection procedure and money, and a confident wrong answer is worse than no answer — so when she does not recognise something she hands you to a person.

Tell us through the contact page. Every question she cannot answer is recorded, and the ones that come up repeatedly become new answers.

Unlimited public lookups, the current grade and score, and one attached location, so you can see the product working on your own restaurant before you pay us anything.

We bill annually, to match the inspection cycle rather than a monthly software subscription. Single Location is $199 a year — $16.58 a month — with three seats included.

Yes, in Account settings. We ask for your current password and require at least 12 characters.

Uploaded files are stored outside the public web root and have no public URL. Every request checks the file belongs to a location on your account, so a link cannot be shared or guessed into working.

After six failed attempts an account pauses for fifteen minutes, and repeated attempts from one address are throttled regardless of which account they target. Sessions are cookie-based, marked secure and HTTP-only, and regenerated when you sign in.

No. The private records you keep here are yours. The public inspection data is already public and comes from the city.

Closing the account removes everything held for it, including uploaded files on disk. We do not touch the public DOHMH record.

The DOHMH restaurant inspection dataset on NYC Open Data for grades, scores and violations, and DCWP records for licences. Both are published by the city.

As current as the city's publishing schedule. The dataset can lag the agency's own systems, and a grade can sit pending while a hearing is decided. We show you what the city has published and tell you when that is all we have.

Usually that lag. The card reflects what the inspector left you; the dataset reflects what has since been published and settled. When they disagree, the card in the window is the more recent fact on the ground.

No, and we never claim to. We organise public records and the evidence you supply. We do not certify a legal state, and we are not a substitute for a licensed professional.

No. Everything here summarises what the city publishes, and rules change. Where a number matters — a deadline, a penalty, a temperature — check it against the current DOHMH guidance or ask us and we will point you at the source.

FDNY publishes its requirements but not per-location service data, so we show those items as requirements and you add the records that satisfy them.

It is a private GM checklist for the selected location. The checks cover food safety, sanitation, records, and fire and life safety. It is not a DOHMH grade, an FDNY inspection, or a guarantee that the restaurant will pass.

Finish it by the day before the estimated inspection week, then keep those conditions steady. The week is a planning estimate from published DOHMH history, never an appointment.

Use it only when equipment or a requirement truly does not apply at that location. It resolves the task but is not an agency waiver. Every completion stays with that location and inspection cycle.