Easiest To Use
Spring 2022
Scheduling can take hours when you have to use the anarchic method of pen and paper or the complicated method of Excel. Investing in restaurant scheduling software will save you time, and it will grant you the flexibility to focus on growing your business. Here are 5 features to look for in restaurant scheduling software to save time:
When investing in online restaurant scheduling software, having the ability to view everything from employee availability, time off requests and labor costs, is important to expedite your scheduling process and save time.
Seeing your schedule in different views, like monthly or weekly, will allow you to be more flexible, and grant you the ability to create different templates if necessary. Powering through making schedules in advance will allow you to make minor adjustments if the occasion arises, rather than scrambling to make changes to a last minute schedule.
Seeing your schedule in different views will also allow you to easily add or remove shifts as needed and you should be able to clearly see which shifts need to be filled, and how many hours are within your labor cost budget. An intuitive and easy to read scheduling platform should ultimately eliminate the confusion of excel sheets and paper schedules.
Cloud based restaurant scheduling systems should allow you to make or adjust the schedule from anywhere. Most scheduling software providers have the capability for you to approve or reject shift requests from your phone!
This way, you'll no longer have to be in your office to approve shift swaps or changes; granting you more time interacting with your employees and your guests.
Every restaurant scheduling software provider should have the ability to notify employees when there has been a change in their schedule. They’ll be able to view their revised schedule instantly - eliminating the amount of calls to the workplace.
Employees should also be able to submit their availability and request forms from their own personal phone or desktops. This will significantly decrease the number of written sticky notes, and phone calls regarding employee schedules or shift requests.
Restaurant scheduling software providers should also have a centralized message centre. Message centres are a great tool to broadcast messages to your team, without having to play phone tag!
Restaurant scheduling software should also have the capability to allow you to make small notes on weekly or daily schedules. It is crucial to know about community events, peak times, weather and game days to schedule properly. If you own a pub, and Tuesdays are usually slow, it's likely that you are going to schedule less staff. But there could be a popular game playing on a Tuesday.
Seeing a visible reminder on your employee schedule will keep you aware and ensure you have enough staff to cover your demands!
You'll be able to schedule easier with instant access to sales and labor reports. With integration with a point of sales system, you can have real time sales vs scheduled labor comparisons. You'll no longer have to do manual calculations for actual vs scheduled labor - your software does the math for you. You’ll know exactly how many hours are available, how much you're spending on labor and where you could be saving on labor cost!
If you feel it's time to take the next step in your scheduling journey, be sure to check out the Push scheduling software suite!
If you are still wanting to learn more tips, be sure to download our free guide below that covers scheduling best practices.
“In the labor numbers, we were reporting about a $300 to $400 difference than what we were getting through Push!”
-Tara Hardie, ZZA Hospitality Group, 16 locations
