Restaurant, café and bar

What it is for#

This guide follows a table from start to finish: the guests sit down, the server opens a tab, orders in rounds, each dish shows up on its station's screen (kitchen or bar), it is served, the guest check is printed and the tab is charged whole, by dish or in equal parts. Every occupied table is a tab: the point of sale invoices it when it is charged, and the table is free again.

This is how each dish moves:

Which businesses it covers#

When the company is created, these business types bring Tables, Kitchen and Tables and stations into the menu:

In these businesses the catalog is called Menu, and you can sell without stock, because a dish is not counted like a product on a shelf. Fast food works at the counter, without tables: it has its own guide, Fast food.

Before you start#

• Your dishes and drinks in the Menu, each in its category (Load your data).
• Your servers and cooks as members of the company (Invite your team). The Waiter template (the tables, the tab and the payment) and the Kitchen template (only the kitchen screen) come with their permissions.
• An open cash register to charge (Your first day).

Your typical day#

1. Before opening, the kitchen and the bar turn on their screen in Kitchen, each with its station.
2. Guests arrive: the server taps a Free table, types how many Guests and opens the tab.
3. They order the first round and click Send to kitchen. Each dish shows up at its station.
4. The kitchen marks the dishes Ready; the server sees it on the floor and marks them Served. Dessert is another round.
5. The table Wants the check: you print the Guest check and charge the whole tab, by dish or in equal parts. The table is Free again.
6. At the end of the day, you close the cash register with the Z report.

1. Set up the floor and the stations#

Tables and stations (set up by whoever can manage the company) says how the floor is laid out and which screen each dish goes to.

1. Areas and tables

   In Areas create the parts of the place: Dining room, Patio, Bar. Below, each Table has its name (what servers call it: 1, 2, Bar 3), its Area and its Seats. Click Add table for each one.

2. Kitchen stations

   The company starts with two Kitchen stations: kitchen and bar. Each one has its own screen. Add another with New station if you have, say, a separate grill.

3. What goes to each station

   In What goes to each station, choose each Category's station: drinks to the bar, main courses to the kitchen. A category with No station only shows on the All screen.

   

2. Open the table#

Tables shows the floor by area. Each table says whether it is Free, Occupied (with what it owes, the server and the minutes), Dishes ready or Wants the check. The screen refreshes itself every few seconds.

1. Tap a free table

   Type how many Guests and click Open tab. You are the server; this can be changed later.

   

2. A tab without a table (optional)

   For takeout, the bar or delivery, click Tab without a table and give it a Name: "John, takeout".

3. Order in rounds#

1. Add the dishes

   The menu is on the left, with its search box and categories. Tap each dish: it goes on the tab as Not sent. Change the quantity with - and +, and use Note for what the kitchen must know: "No onion, medium".

   

2. Send the round

   Click Send to kitchen. The dishes move to In the kitchen, grouped as Round 1. What they order next is Round 2, and so on.

   

In each dish's ... menu you have:

• Served: when it is ready and has reached the table.
• Split: splits a line into two charged separately (two of the three beers to one person).
• Move to another tab: the dish moves to another open tab.
• Remove: for a dish not sent yet.
• Void: for a dish the kitchen already received. It asks for a reason and needs the Void sent dishes permission.

4. The kitchen screen#

Kitchen is one station's screen: at the top you choose All, the kitchen, the bar or one you created, and the browser remembers it. Each ticket is a table and a round, with its minutes: it turns amber at 15 and red at 25.

• Tap a dish to move it to Preparing, and again for Ready.
• All ready marks the whole ticket.
• Turn on sound makes every new round ring. Browsers keep a page silent until someone touches it, so click it when the shift starts.
• The Full screen button leaves it alone on the kitchen's monitor.

When dishes are ready, the table reads Dishes ready on the floor and the server marks them Served.

5. The guest check and the payment#

1. Print the guest check

   When the table asks for the check, click Guest check: an 80 mm ticket with what was ordered. It is not an invoice. In ..., Asked for the check marks the table on the floor so everyone sees it.

   

2. Choose how to charge

   Click Charge and choose:

   • Whole tab: everything still owed, in one invoice.
   • By dish: tick the dishes of whoever is paying and charge only those.
   • Equal parts: type how many Parts; each dish is shared among them and each part is its own invoice.

   

3. Charge each part

   With equal parts, the tab shows Charge part 1, Charge part 2... Each button opens the point of sale with that part.

   

4. Confirm at the point of sale

   The ticket says Charging and the table's name. Charge it like any sale: cash, card, transfer or split payment (Point of sale). The point of sale does not let you add other products or change quantities: what is charged is what is on the tab.

   

When everything is charged, the tab is Paid and the table is Free again. The invoice says which table tab it came from.

Other actions on the tab#

In the tab's ... menu:

• Table, server and guests: changing the table moves the whole tab.
• Merge with another tab: everything still to charge moves to the chosen tab and this one closes.
• Cancel tab: what wasn't sent is removed; what the kitchen already has is voided with the reason. It needs the Void sent dishes permission.

In Reports, sales can also be grouped by Waiter or specialist.

By country#

Common mistakes#

• "No tables yet." Create them in Tables and stations, or ask the administrator to.
• "The dish doesn't show on the kitchen screen." Its category has No station: it only shows on All. Give it one in What goes to each station.
• "The kitchen doesn't ring." Click Turn on sound on the kitchen screen; the browser does not let a page nobody has touched make sound.
• "I can't void a dish." The kitchen already received it: voiding it needs the Void sent dishes permission. If it was not sent yet, use Remove.
• "The point of sale won't let me add a product." While you charge a tab, the ticket is the table's. Add the dish to the tab, or click the x on the Charging notice to stop charging it.

Next step#

If you serve at the counter, see Fast food. To close the day, Your first day explains the Z close.