Compliance & responsibility
Compliance fails far more often from being forgotten than from being refused. A calendar is the cheapest control you can put on the whole thing.
The short answer
Most duct-compliance failures are not decisions - they are omissions. The clean that slipped a quarter, the certificate that expired unnoticed, the new site nobody added to the schedule. A year-round compliance calendar fixes that by turning an open-ended duty into a set of booked dates: each system's clean at the right interval, its inspections, its certificate renewals and its reminders, all visible in one place and set before they fall due rather than chased after they lapse.
What goes on the calendar
The calendar starts from frequency, and frequency starts from cooking volume. Place each kitchen on the TR19 usage band its cooking justifies - heavy about every three months, moderate about six, light about twelve - and let a risk assessment shorten that where the grease load demands. From those intervals the clean dates follow, and around each clean sit the things that must not drift: the inspection points, which should not exceed twelve months apart even for light users, and the certificate that needs to stay current.
For a single site this is a short list. For a multi-site operator it is the difference between control and chaos, so the visits are staggered rather than bunched, and each site's next-due date, last certificate and status sit on the same view. The value of putting it on a calendar rather than in someone's memory is that a gap becomes visible weeks ahead - while there is still time to book the clean - instead of the day an inspector asks for the certificate.
Why the calendar is a compliance control
A schedule is not just admin; it is the mechanism that keeps grease below the thresholds. The reason intervals matter is that mean grease must stay under 200µm between cleans and inspections must not exceed twelve months - stretch the gap and the deposits carbonise, the readings climb and you breach the standard in the interval even though the last clean passed. A calendar that books the next clean before the current interval expires is what stops that gap ever opening.
It also builds the evidence trail as a by-product. Every booked-and-completed clean adds a certificate to the file, so the calendar and the record grow together - and at any moment you can show not just that the system is clean today, but that it has been kept clean on a defensible schedule. That combination, a forward plan plus a backward record, is exactly what a fire officer, insurer or auditor wants to see.
Making it run itself
The easiest compliance calendar is one where the visits are already booked. Set the right interval for each kitchen from its cooking volume, put the cleans in ahead of time, and let each visit produce its certificate for the file. From there the calendar largely runs itself - the next clean is always booked, the record always current, and nothing waiting to be forgotten.
Questions
Each system's cleaning interval set by cooking volume, the booked clean dates, inspection points within twelve months, certificate renewals, and reminders that fire before each is due - all in one forward view.
Start from the TR19 usage band your cooking justifies - heavy about every 3 months, moderate 6, light 12 - then let a cleanliness risk assessment shorten it where the grease load is higher than the hours suggest.
Because grease must stay below 200µm between cleans and inspections cannot exceed twelve months. Booking the next clean before the interval expires is what stops a non-compliant gap opening between visits.
Stagger the visits so the estate is never all due at once, and keep every site's next-due date, last certificate and status on one view so a drifting site is visible weeks ahead.
Yes. Every completed clean adds a certificate to the file, so the schedule and the record grow together - giving you a forward plan and a backward history to show at any inspection or renewal.
Phoenix Duct Clean · by the numbers
We set the right interval for your kitchen and book the visits ahead, so the calendar runs itself.