Wiltshire Council have apologised after mistakenly branding an Italian restaurant with a one-out-of-five food hygiene rating online.

One of Wiltshire Council’s Food and Safety Team officers visited Casa, at Bank Street in Melksham, in mid-March and awarded them a “good” food hygiene rating of four-out-of-five.

But a “data entry error” led to the council uploading the wrong grade to the Food Standards Agency website, which advertised Casa as requiring “major improvement” to their food hygiene standards.

Wiltshire Times: Casa in Melksham

The council have now apologised for this mistake and emphasised that the one-out-of-five mark did not reflect the standards at Casa.

Cllr Nick Holder, cabinet member for environment, said: “Unfortunately a data entry error for this rating for Casa was made which led to an incorrect upload to the Food Standards Agency website.

“We can confirm that Casa achieved a “good” food hygiene rating of four at their last inspection on March 16, 2023, and were notified of this on March 28, 2023.

“This error has been addressed with the business owner.

“We sincerely apologise for any confusion caused and we would like to reassure people that the originally posted rating was our error and did not accurately reflect the food hygiene compliance standards achieved by Casa.”

Reacting to the confusion at the time, a spokesperson for Casa added: “They came and gave us a four-star rating and we've been in contact with them about the online rating, which is wrong.

"They told us they are in the process of changing that. They didn't give us much explanation but said they're going to change it." 

While Casa’s rating of four indicates “good” levels of food hygiene, the rating originally posted online would have meant “major improvement” was necessary at the local Italian eatery.

The one-out-of-five rating was removed after communications with the restaurant, and a new four-star grade has now been uploaded to the Food Standards Agency website.

Food hygiene ratings are awarded based on how a business performs in three key categories.

These include a venue’s hygienic handling of food, the cleanliness and condition of their facilities and their management of food safety.

Inspectors found that Casa staff’s handling of food and the cleanliness of the restaurant were both at a “good” standard.

Meanwhile their management of food safety, which includes the systems in place to ensure food is safe to eat, was deemed to be “generally satisfactory.”