Fire risk management officer Stuart Ide said at least six such fires had occurred in Queenstown in the past six months.
"We have decided it is time to take this issue seriously, and try to work with restaurants and other businesses to prevent this tendency from increasing further," he said.
Businesses which had had fires were being advised how to prevent similar fires in the future.
After New Year, the service would approach other restaurants, cafes and shops in town to educate staff about preventing fires.
"We cannot force anyone to start cleaning their flues and ventilation pipes.
"But we can encourage them to meet the risk.
"I know maintenance can be costly, but so can interruption to their business by a fire callout; not to mention the risk of losing your business if the building burns down."
The extreme heat from cooking in a commercial kitchen, along with fumes, made restaurant ventilation systems prone to clogging from smoke residue.
Mr Ide said many restaurants would have clogged flues without anyone noticing until a fire started.
"Warm ashes can be smouldering for a while, but once a fire develops in a ventilation system, it can easily develop into an extensive fire, which could take down the entire building."
Mr Ide said the Queenstown Volunteer Fire Brigade also attended many false alarms.
"We are always happy to tend to 'genuine' false alarms, where someone for example sees smoke, which turns out to be a neighbour welding.
"But there has been a disturbing tendency in Queenstown for people to set off fire alarms at hotels, apartment buildings and the like.
"Such behaviour puts a drain on our limited resources as a volunteer service, and we take a very hard line on it.
"Hotels typically have cameras, so we often catch the offenders.
"Anyone caught setting off a fire alarm deliberately without valid reason will be referred to the police for cost recovery," Mr Ide said.
