In a shocking revelation, another American Express Centurion Lounge has been hit with a terrible health inspection, this time in Charlotte. This comes a few months after the AmEx lounge at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport (ATL) failed its health inspection.
At first glance the lounge’s score of an 86.5% doesn’t seem all that bad, considering the Atlanta lounge failed with a score of 69%. However, while I don’t live in Mecklenburg County and can’t speak to the scrutiny of the health inspectors, the lounge earned the fifth lowest score for the month of December. Just for reference, there are more than 1.1 million people living in the county.
According to the inspector’s report, the lounge was hit with the following violations:
- The PIC chef in the kitchen had several priority item violations and is does not have food protection manager training.
- Observed employee handle raw chicken then proceed to use a fryer utensil that is used for other RTE food items.
- Observed dented cans stored with food supply that is in use and not in the designated damaged food bin.
- Observed raw sausage stored above overnight oats.
- Observed raw hamburger stored above salad.
- Observed raw eggs stored above cheese.
- Observed a salad with berries that did not cool to 41F within 4 hours, cooked farrow that had been held out for a period of time in the kitchen that did not cool properly (observed a lot of condensation in the container indicating improper cooling), and melons prepared this morning that had a zero degree cooling rate.
- Observed cooked apples used at 8:30 this morning ant 48F in a covered container.
- Observed garlic and oil mixture on preparation table at 70F. Item discarded.
- Observed Piquat on the stove at 110F, per PIC the product had been prepared over 4 hours ago.
- Observed cooked vegetables sitting on a sheet rack in the kitchen awaiting to be placed in the oven at 55F.
- Observed tofu at 41 -42F sitting at the fryer and no staff actively working on the food preparation of the item.
- Observed TPHC logs not being maintained for milk at beverage stations, food in warming cabinet, and in low boy refrigerator for salads.
- Observed beef roast being prepared and was cooked to 110F.
- Observed melons, farrow, salads cooling in covered containers.
- Observed several containers of dry goods with no labeling.
On a recent trip through Charlotte, I had the chance to visit the CLT Centurion Lounge. While it was plagued by crowding, like many of the Centurion Lounges, I found the space to be very enjoyable.
It’s unfortunate that the company is having these issues as it is affecting the American Express brand more than expected.
After reporting on the issues with the Atlanta Centurion Lounge, American Express quickly reached out to me with a statement. It will be interesting to see how the company addressed this as the story continues to gain traction.
While I can’t say that I’ll be boycotting the lounges in the near future, I will be approaching Centurion Lounges with more caution. As they say; once is by chance, twice is a coincidence, three times is a pattern.
Summary
American Express has received another troubling health inspection, this time it occurs at Charlotte Douglas International Airport (CLT). I’m hoping AmEx, or the company that they contract to, provides us with an update shortly as this is the second lounge to have massive health findings in recent months.
