Effective allergen management starts with understanding the risks and addressing them at every level of the customer experience.
Serve Legal’s exclusive 2025 allergen compliance data provides a crucial lens into the challenges faced by foodservice providers and retailers. Our audits, tailored to client needs, leverage real-world scenarios to uncover compliance gaps and recommend actionable solutions.
Serve Legal’s audits are grounded in key safety metrics designed to evaluate whether staff provide accurate allergen guidance, serve correct food, and follow established procedures. Using a “secret shopper” approach, auditors simulate real-world scenarios, posing as customers with allergies, and monitoring:
This 'near-miss' reporting system allows businesses to proactively identify and address potential issues before they lead to actual incidents and customer harm.
Additionally, Serve Legal’s established expertise in age verification compliance provides access to a mystery shopper pool heavily skewed toward the 18–24 demographic—a group disproportionately affected by poor allergen management.
Beyond simple pass or fail results, Serve Legal data provides clients with valuable insights into non-compliance patterns, helping them focus their efforts where it matters most.
Our 2025 YTD audit data highlights that a notable trend emerges during high-traffic periods, such as evenings and weekends, where allergen compliance often declines. For instance, compliance rates drop significantly from 82% in the mornings to 47% in the evenings, a time when part-time or less experienced staff are more likely to be working. Similarly, weekends present additional challenges, with Saturday compliance rates falling 15% below those of Sundays.
These insights enable businesses to strategically direct training and resources to the times and days where risks are highest, ensuring a more consistent standard of safety and service.
Serve Legal’s audit programmes provide businesses with a feedback loop to monitor the success of training initiatives and identify gaps before they cause harm.
With over 200,000 audits annually across the UK and Ireland, Serve Legal is uniquely positioned to provide comprehensive insights and support for allergen compliance. Whether your business operates a small café or a nationwide chain, our tailored solutions ensure your customers can dine with confidence.
Access key resources HERE to get in touch with our team to learn more!