Karo at 1 Market Square, Westerham was given a food hygiene rating of 0 on 5 August, with all three inspection scores in the worst band on the FSA scale.
A catering business on Westerham’s Market Square has been given the lowest possible food hygiene rating. Karo, at 1 Market Square, was rated 0 at an inspection on 5 August, a score the Food Standards Agency describes as “urgent improvement necessary” (Food Standards Agency, Food Hygiene Rating Scheme register, Karo, Westerham).
It is the district’s only zero on the register, and the only rating below 3 published for any Sevenoaks district premises since the start of August.
What the inspectors scored
A hygiene rating is built from three component scores, where a lower number is better. Karo’s inspection scored 20 on all three, the worst band on the agency’s scale:
- hygienic food handling: 20
- cleanliness and condition of facilities and building: 20
- management of food safety: 20
The register classifies the premises as “other catering premises” and records Sevenoaks District Council as the inspecting authority. No “right to reply” from the business has been published on the register, and no new rating is marked as pending.
Two things are worth saying plainly. The rating reflects what inspectors found on 5 August, and the business may have improved since. Operators can also appeal a rating, publish a right to reply, and request a re-inspection once improvements are made; none of those is yet recorded on Karo’s register entry.
The rest of the register: mostly 5s
The same register shows 22 ratings published for the district since 1 August. Eighteen are 5s, the top rating, including The Dukes Head at Dunton Green, Emma’s Kitchen at Hever Church of England Primary School, Chiddingstone Nursery School and The Chocolate Shop in Sevenoaks.
Three premises took mid-table scores:
- New Ash Green Pavilion, Punch Croft, New Ash Green: rated 4 on 4 August
- Knockholt Village Stores, Main Road, Knockholt: rated 4 on 12 August
- Giacomos, Sevenoaks Weald: rated 3, “generally satisfactory”, on 12 August
One caveat on the 5s: the agency’s register publishes top ratings quickly and lower ones more slowly, because businesses get time to appeal before publication. Recent weeks therefore always look better at first than they end up. Our August round-up showed the same pattern, when July’s “all 5s” list later gained a 1 and a 2.
Check any venue yourself
Every rating in the district, including any update to Karo’s, is free to search on the Food Standards Agency register. Displaying the rating sticker is not mandatory in England, so the register is the reliable place to look.
Sources
- Food Standards Agency, Food Hygiene Rating Scheme register, Karo, 1 Market Square, Westerham (the rating, the inspection date, the three component scores and the premises classification)
- Food Standards Agency, Food Hygiene Rating Scheme register, Sevenoaks local authority listing (all 22 ratings published since 1 August, retrieved via the FSA API on 21 September 2026)
Image: Statue of Winston Churchill, Westerham Green by David Howard, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Geograph. The photograph shows Westerham’s green, not the rated premises. Chart by Sevenoaks Online.
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