Grades get us by with pretty much just about everything in this world. The most popular grading system is the one in school, if you don’t have good grades in school, you don’t go on to the next level. While many don’t agree with the that grading system, what about the grading system on other things such as restaurants and hotels?
According to Food Safety News, the local public health department conducts restaurant inspections, but it’s usually up to the local laws on how often they occur and what specific items to look for.
Inspections aren’t a swift scan of the area, there is actually a lot more to it. FSW states: “in general, environmental health inspectors check that safeguards are in place to protect food from contamination by food handlers, cross-contamination, and contamination from other sources in the restaurant.” Some of that means making sure there is soap stocked, employees wash their hands regularly, if there is need for glove changes it is being done in the correct way, and if employees take the proper steps when dealing with customer allergies.
Inspections are one of the main aspects to keeping a restaurant afloat with a C being the lowest they can receive without being shut down, how important are the grades to you?
In a survey conducted here at Entity we found our participants ranged all over the spectrum. 38% said they would only eat at the restaurant if it was an A, 29% if it was B and up, and the remaining 33% could care less as long as the food was good.
But do these same grades and choices translate when it comes to picking a hotel?
So they might not be A, B, C but the star ratings on a hotel translate about the same: 5-Star, 4-Star, 3-Star etc. Well it turns out, about 67% of our participants stated they will only stay at a 3-star hotel and up, they will never drop to a two. Guess people aren’t as picky when it comes to where they are staying.
How are they actually rated? USA Today states hotels are rated by independent groups like the AAA on their basic facts: room size bed size, pool size, internet access etc. These assessments usually coincide with the ratings that hotels put on display.
However, there is a different rating system now that may not match-up with what the hotel claims. According to CNN, “many sites [such as TripAdvisor] use their own “star” or points-based rating systems based on user reviews.” Further claiming, “each country has different requirements for awarding stars — a three-star rating in Baltimore, Maryland, is different from a three-star rating in Kerala, India.”
Hotels get a bit more complicated than restaurants when it comes to the rating system. Zoe Chan from Hotels.com stated there is no universal rating system when it comes to hotels.
So maybe grading systems all have their small flaws. Restaurant may be as flawed when it comes to their grades, after all they are being rated for health and safety purposes. But when it comes to hotels it’s probably best to look online for the people’s opinions and ratings, not the hotels.
