How FSSAI Inspection Marks and Grades Are Calculated

When a Food Safety Officer inspects a food business using an FSSAI checklist, each requirement is marked with a finding, the marks are added up, and the total is used to grade the business. Understanding how this works helps you focus your effort where it matters most.

The four possible findings

FSSAI’s marking and grading system defines four findings for every checklist item:

• Compliance (C): the requirement is fully documented and implemented, with no major or minor non conformance observed.
• Non compliance (NC): the requirement is not documented and not implemented, and a major non conformance is observed.
• Partial compliance (PC): the requirement is implemented but not documented, or documented but not implemented. A non conformity that, in the judgement of the officer, is not likely to cause failure of the food safety system. Partial compliance does not apply to starred items.
• Not applicable or not observed (NA): the requirement does not apply to the business and so cannot be observed.

How many marks each finding earns

On top of the marks, there is one overriding rule: failure in any starred item leads to non compliance, regardless of the total score.

What changed in 2022: not applicable items are left out

The original marking scheme awarded full marks for a not applicable finding. An FSSAI order dated 2 November 2022, effective from 28 October 2022, changed this. Marks are now given only to requirements that apply to the kind of business, and requirements that are not applicable are omitted when evaluating the score and grade. In practice, both the marks you could earn and the marks you did earn leave out those items.

What changed in 2025: packaging became critical

An FSSAI order dated 3 April 2025 reclassified the item on food grade packaging material as critical. In the Catering checklist that is item 32, which moved from 2 marks to 4 marks. With that change, the Catering checklist has 11 critical items and a maximum of 116 marks when every item applies.

A worked example

Imagine a restaurant that does not transport food in its own vehicles. Items 29 and 30 are about transport, so both are not applicable. Item 29 is critical and worth 4 marks, and item 30 is worth 2 marks, so the applicable total becomes 116 minus 6, which is 110 marks.

1. Suppose every applicable item is compliant except three ordinary items.
2. Two of those are partially compliant, so the restaurant loses 1 mark on each: 2 marks lost.
3. One is non compliant, so the restaurant loses both marks on that item: 2 marks lost.
4. The score is 110 minus 4, which is 106 out of 110, or about 96.4 percent.

Now change one detail: the pest check (item 37, critical) is non compliant. The score drops only to 102 out of 110, about 92.7 percent, yet the outcome is non compliance because a starred item failed. A high percentage cannot make up for a critical failure.

How grades are worked out

FSSAI’s marking and grading scheme, published with its 2018 order and on its inspection checklists page, divides results into four grades based on the marks obtained:

One caution. The printed Catering checklist form shows a different grading box based on raw points out of 114 (A+ for 100 to 114, A for 91 to 99, B for 77 to 90, and no grade below 77). Those point bands do not match the percentage bands above, and they cannot account for not applicable items or for the new 116 mark total. Because the two official sources disagree, any grade you calculate yourself should be treated as indicative only.