When a restaurant refrigeration unit fails, use the first hour to stop the temperature climb, move the highest-risk food into working cold storage, record temperatures with times, and give dispatch precise information. Do not decide alone what to throw away. Follow county environmental health guidance and the California Retail Food Code, and document everything for your insurer.
- The first hour decides how much product you save. Start with keeping doors closed and moving the highest-risk food first.
- Triage by food risk, not by cost alone. Raw proteins, dairy and cut produce come before sealed beverages.
- Write down time, unit, air temperature and product temperature, and keep logging until the unit is stable.
- Tell dispatch what they cannot see: unit ID, symptoms, sounds, breaker state, and what you already tried.
- Discard decisions belong to health department guidance and the California Retail Food Code. Your cook's judgment and a technician's opinion are not substitutes.
Minute zero to ten: stop making it worse
The instinct when a walk-in alarms is to open the door and look. That is the one thing to avoid. A closed, insulated box holds cold much longer than most people expect, and every opening lets warm kitchen air in. Decide who is in charge before anyone touches the door.
- Name an incident lead. One person makes decisions and keeps the log. Everyone else moves product when told.
- Keep the failing unit closed. Put a note on the door. Open it only when product is ready to move.
- Read the air temperature from outside if you can. A digital display or a sensor reading tells you where you stand without opening anything.
- Record the time you noticed. Write the actual time, not an estimate. If your monitoring system has an alert timestamp, note that too.
- Check the obvious. Look at the unit's power switch and breaker, whether the outdoor or rooftop condensing unit is running, and whether a door has been left ajar. Do not reset breakers repeatedly and do not open electrical panels.
- Call dispatch. Do not troubleshoot for an hour first. Making the call early costs nothing, and the technician can talk you through what to check while the clock runs.
If you smell burning or see smoke, shut off power at the disconnect if it is safe to do so and move people away. That is a safety event, not a refrigeration problem.
Triage by food risk, not by dollar value
Once the box is confirmed failing and you have somewhere to move product, move in order of food-safety risk. Cost matters, but it is the wrong first question, because a cheap item that spoils can cause more harm than an expensive one that holds.
| Priority | Examples | Reason |
|---|---|---|
| First | Raw meat, poultry, seafood, shell eggs, dairy, cooked and cut items, prepared sauces and soups held cold | Highest risk when temperature rises |
| Second | Cut produce and fresh herbs, deli items, opened packaged goods | Moderate risk, shorter safe holding time once warm |
| Third | Whole produce, sealed packaged goods, condiments | Usually more tolerant, but check labels |
| Last | Bottled and canned beverages, ice, items labeled shelf-stable | Low food-safety risk |
Frozen product follows the same logic. A freezer that has stopped but kept its door closed may hold frozen product longer than a failing cooler holds fresh product, so cooler product normally goes first. If a freezer is failing, do not assume frozen means safe. Check for signs of thawing and refreezing and follow guidance from your local program.
Use your risk ranking to know where to send product. If you have done it in advance, the tiers tell you which working units have room and which ones will be overloaded. If you have not, the quick version is to ask which units are working, how full each is, and what is the coldest.
Overloaded reach-ins lose airflow and recovery. Moving product into them can turn one failing unit into two. Leave space around evaporator discharge, keep doors closed between trips, and use coolers with ice or an outside source for overflow if you have them.
Log temperatures and times as you go
Your log is what lets you, the health department and your insurer reconstruct what happened. It does not have to be elegant. It needs to be dated, timed and specific.
| Field | Example entry style |
|---|---|
| Date and time | Actual clock time of each entry |
| Unit ID | The label on the unit, such as WI-C1 |
| Air temperature | Reading from the unit display or a calibrated thermometer, with the instrument noted |
| Product temperature | Probe reading of the product, with the item named |
| Action taken | Door closed, product moved to RI-02, breaker checked, dispatch called |
| Who | Initials of the person who did it |
| Photos | Display reading, label, product condition, any water or damage |
Take readings at the start, at each major step, and at regular intervals until the unit is stable. Take them on the highest-risk product first, and probe product in several places, because the center of a large item stays colder than its surface. Photograph display readings and any visible damage. A timestamped photo of the thermometer is stronger than a number on a napkin.
Normal practice for logs, thermometers and what inspectors ask for is covered in restaurant temperature logs and health inspections. During an incident, the purpose is simpler: capture the sequence.
What to tell dispatch
A technician cannot see your kitchen. The quality of the information you give on the phone decides the van's contents, the time on site and sometimes whether a second trip is needed. Have this ready before you call.
- Business name, address, and how to reach the person on site.
- The unit ID and type, and whether the compressor is in the box, on the roof, or outdoors.
- What happened and when: first noticed time, what was observed, and whether it was gradual or sudden.
- The current air temperature and product temperature, and whether it is still climbing.
- What you hear and see: fans running, compressor humming, silence, ice on the coil, water on the floor, an alarm on a display.
- What power checks you made and the breaker state. Say what you did, not what you assume.
- Whether anything changed recently: a hood cleaning, a power outage, a new shelf, a heavy delivery, a door that was left open.
- Priority information: what is at risk and whether service is affected tonight.
If the unit has a QR record in the DaVinci Portal, scanning it gives you the last readings and service in seconds. That can save several minutes and prevents describing the wrong unit. When a call is repeated for the same symptom, say so. Repeat failures are exactly what the second-opinion diagnostic approach is meant to address. Ask about timing and availability on the call; no response time is promised by this page.
Discard decisions belong to health guidance
The hardest decisions come after the unit is stable: what do you keep, and what do you throw away. This page deliberately does not give a rule of thumb, because the answer depends on the product, how long it was out of temperature and how warm it got.
- The California Retail Food Code sets cold holding at 41 F or below for potentially hazardous food, and your county environmental health program interprets and enforces it.
- Call your local environmental health program when product has been out of temperature. They can tell you what they expect and may want to know about the event.
- Your technician can tell you how long the unit was out of range from readings and evidence, but they do not decide what is safe to serve.
- When in doubt about a specific item, the conservative course is to hold it aside, label it, and ask before serving.
- Keep the discarded product list with item, quantity and time, and keep photos.
Rules and guidance can change. Confirm current requirements with your county program rather than relying on remembered numbers.
Documentation for insurance
Spoilage coverage, where a policy includes it, usually depends on documentation. Read your own policy now, not during a loss, and ask your agent about notice requirements, exclusions and what proof the carrier expects. Do not assume coverage exists.
- Notify your insurer or agent promptly, using the process in your policy.
- Save the incident log, photos and the inventory listing for the affected unit.
- Keep a written list of discarded product with item, quantity and cost basis from your own invoices.
- Request a written service report from your technician with the cause found and the work done.
- Keep the maintenance history. Dated service records for the unit show how it was cared for.
- Do not discard evidence such as a failed component if your insurer may want to inspect it. Ask first.
A unit with a documented maintenance record and a clear incident log makes every one of those steps easier. After the incident, review what happened: why the alert came late, whether the backup worked, and whether it is time to plan a replacement. The broader context for these decisions is in the multi-unit service guide.