A Vermont temporary-food inspection can pass or fail without a numeric score. A retail-food inspection uses a different test: the operation must score at least 70 and have no uncorrected critical violations. Read each outcome under its own test; a missing temporary-food score is not a zero.
Use the Vermont Department of Health’s Inspection Reports page to open the official portal and confirm which kind of operation and visit you are reading. Keep that type with the inspection date before comparing outcomes.
Apply the retail pass test in two parts
For a retail food service establishment, a score of 70 or higher is necessary but not sufficient. The report must also have no critical violation left uncorrected. A report at or above 70 can therefore fail if a critical item remains open.
The state’s report-reading guide explains how the score is assembled. Critical items appear in red with an asterisk and lower the score by four or five points. Non-critical items appear in black and lower it by one or two points. Within an item, a zero means a violation was observed; a number greater than zero means the points were awarded because no violation was observed for that item.
Read the item comment before treating the number as the whole result. COS, or corrected on site, means the condition was addressed during the inspection. An uncorrected critical item has a different consequence from a critical item marked COS, even when both appear in the findings.
The site’s violation-reading guide can help preserve the item, correction status, and report outcome as separate fields.
An unscored temporary report still has a pass rule
Vermont does not assign a score to temporary food service inspections. The temporary operation must have no uncorrected critical violations to pass. Do not enter a missing score as zero or compare it with a restaurant’s 70-point threshold.
The Health Department describes temporary food service as a food or beverage stand at a temporary event such as a fair, festival, or farmers market. Its Temporary Food Service page distinguishes calendar-year and single-event licensing and notes that a vendor may be inspected at the first listed event or whenever it operates.
For a temporary report, retain these facts:
- The operation and event identity.
- The inspection date and report type.
- Each critical violation and whether it was corrected.
- The stated pass or fail outcome.
That creates a complete event record without inventing a score the state did not issue.
Search by identity and date, then open the report
The Vermont inspection portal accepts a full or partial establishment name, street, city, region, county, ZIP code, and inspection date range. Search with fewer words if a full business name returns nothing. Then confirm the address and operation type before opening the inspection icon.
The portal says the inspection icon exposes violations from the last inspection, inspector comments, and the score when the report is scored. It also lets a reader print or download the report. Save the dated report rather than copying only the result shown in a search list.
An inspection is a snapshot of the conditions observed during that visit. The portal warns that it may not represent the establishment’s overall, long-term compliance. A corrected-on-site notation establishes what happened to that item during the visit; it does not substitute for later history.
Build the sequence around findings and correction
Vermont says inspections can occur before opening, after a complaint, or as follow-up to determine whether earlier violations were fixed. Those events should remain on separate dated lines.
Start with the original report’s facility type, score status, critical findings, COS notes, and outcome. Then locate the later report that actually documents follow-up. Do not describe a complaint as confirmed merely because it led to an inspection, and do not describe a correction as verified by a later visit unless the later report says so.
For a scored retail sequence, preserve both parts of the pass test at every visit. For a temporary sequence, omit the score field and compare the critical findings and outcome. The site’s reinspection follow-up guide provides a simple chronology for original and later reports.
The online record begins in May 2016
The portal covers retail food service and temporary food service inspections from May 2016 to the present. The Health Department directs readers to request any other inspection reports from the Food & Lodging Program at FoodLodging@vermont.gov or 802-863-7221.
Use that route for an earlier report, another Food & Lodging inspection type, or a record that cannot be matched reliably online. Provide the operation name, full address, facility type, approximate date or event, and the kind of report needed. If the business changed name or location, include both identities without assuming they share one inspection history.
For a closure question, request the dated closure or permit action and any later written authorization to resume from the Food & Lodging Program. Neither a passing score nor a corrected-on-site mark is a substitute for those documents.
A blank portal result supports only a narrow conclusion: the search did not locate a recent electronic retail or temporary-food report under those terms. The department says an establishment may not have a recent electronic inspection on file. It does not say that a blank search proves no inspection or no regulatory record.
Official sources checked September 27, 2026.