Restaurant Scheduling Software: Food Service Staff Management

Staff management is among the biggest challenges in the food service sector. Businesses create restaurant training programs, tip-sharing policies, and other strategies to simultaneously improve their service and reduce the employee turnover rate. Shift scheduling is also very important as restaurant employees often search for flexible work arrangements. To help with this, businesses use restaurant scheduling software or the scheduling features of complex restaurant solutions. In this post, we’ll learn more about employee scheduling solutions for the restaurant industry. If you operate a food service business, you might benefit from our guide on how to deal with restaurant fraud and how to do food inventory management in restaurants.

Key takeaway: Restaurant scheduling software allows food service businesses to manage employees and track working hours. These solutions can help restaurant data analytics, reduce overtime, and minimize under and over-staffing.

What Is Restaurant Scheduling Software

This is a solution that helps food service businesses create and manage employee work schedules. In the past, restaurant schedules were written on paper and many businesses might still use a printed template for scheduling employees’ hours. However, restaurant scheduling software streamlines the staff planning process and automates shift assignments. Thanks to its features, restaurant managers can optimize work schedules, reduce conflicts, manage time-off requests, and ensure compliance with labor laws. Restaurant scheduling software needs to be integrated with other restaurant technologies in order to calculate labor costs and payroll. Lots of food service businesses use specialized solutions for employee scheduling. However, well-known restaurant management systems like Toast and Square for Restaurant have built-in solutions or add-ons that allow business owners and managers to benefit from staff scheduling capabilities.

Features of Restaurant Employee Scheduling Software

Food service scheduling software has various tools and functionalities. Some of them are related to planning and scheduling shifts while others help with tracking labor costs. Let’s examine the main features of these platforms.

1. Shift scheduling. With templates for recurring shifts and automatic scheduling for staff members, restaurant scheduling software makes shift planning easy. There are also tools that help minimize over- or under-staffing. Schedule conflicts are also minimized thanks to these platforms.
2. Time-off management. Employees can submit PTO requests via the restaurant scheduling software. Managers can more easily approve time-off requests and check for potential availability issues.
3. Labor cost analytics and tracking. As a restaurant employee scheduling system tracks hours and wages, it can be used to analyze labor costs.
4. Clock-in and clock-out integration. Buddy punching and time tracking are among the challenges in the food and beverage industry. Staff scheduling platforms can be synced with payroll systems and time-tracking solutions.
5. Compliance. Ensuring labor law compliance related to breaks and overtime can be tricky. That’s yet another thing restaurant scheduling software can help with.
6. Communication. Most staff scheduling systems have built-in notifications and messaging capabilities. This allows employees to see shift updates in real time.

Alternatives to Restaurant Scheduling Software

Businesses that don’t want to use a separate shift planning platform have a few alternatives. One of them is to use old-school methods like printed schedule templates or spreadsheets. Although this might work for a family-owned restaurant or a food service business with only a few employees, it’s not suitable for most restaurants.

Large restaurant operators might choose to develop their own employee scheduling system. It can be done by adding additional functionalities to restaurant systems already in place. This approach is only suitable for large chains that require multiple customization options and prefer to develop in-house solutions.

Some of the best restaurant management systems have scheduling and labor forecasting functionalities. Examples include Toast, TouchBistro, Square for Restaurants, and Lightspeed Restaurant. Businesses that already use their platforms are likely to use their built-in scheduling feature or purchase add-ons offered by the same company.

Popular Restaurant Employee Scheduling Software

There are multiple innovations in the food service sector. These restaurant technology trends are aimed at streamlining operations and improving customer service. That’s why there are multiple solutions that have employee scheduling capabilities. Here are some of the popular ones. 

1. 7shifts is among the most popular solutions for employee scheduling in the food service sector. It’s suitable for restaurants of all sizes and has various features for forecasting and labor law compliance.
2. When I Work is popular among small food service businesses. It’s a more affordable option than other brands of restaurant scheduling software.
3. HotSchedules has all of the important tools an employee scheduling platform needs. It’s popular among medium to large restaurant operators.
4. There are other solutions that allow restaurant managers to create and manage staff schedules. Examples include Sling, Fourth, ZoomShift, and Homebase.

In addition to these standalone restaurant scheduling platforms, well-established restaurant management systems like Toast, Square, and Lightspeed POS are also top choices. Food service businesses that want a full-scale system that combines inventory management, employee scheduling, sales tracking, restaurant accounting software, and dozens of other features should opt for them.

Frequently Asked Questions about Restaurant Scheduling Software

From tips on how to increase wholesale sales to guides on restaurant marketing and restaurant success, you’ll find plenty of useful resources on BlueCart. Check out our answers to a few common questions regarding restaurant scheduling software and its features.

How to Choose Restaurant Scheduling Software?

There are various factors to consider when choosing an employee scheduling software. POS integration is a major consideration. Food service businesses that already use Toast or another type of restaurant POS with scheduling capabilities might choose to use a product from the same ecosystem. Another important factor is related to the ease of use of the solution. Modern software needs to be user-friendly and easy to use on mobile devices. Labor forecasting features are also important for restaurant businesses. Labor law compliance features and team communication tools are also among the most sought-after functionalities in restaurant employee scheduling software.

How Many Shifts Do Restaurants Have?

Traditionally, most restaurants operate in two shifts. Eateries with extended work time often have three shifts. The number of shifts in a restaurant depends primarily on its focus and hours of operation. For example, a place that focuses primarily on brunch might need more staff before midday. On the other hand, some fine dining restaurants often focus on serving only dinner. Naturally, they might have one shift. Restaurant managers might need to make major changes in employees’ schedules during special events, holidays, or other occasions that are likely to increase diners or food delivery orders.

What Are the Different Types of Restaurant Work Schedules?

There are a few different scheduling types used by restaurants and other businesses. Here are the main ones.

1. A fixed schedule is when employees work on set days and during set hours;
2. A rotating schedule is a system that includes changing shifts on a predictable rotation schedule;
3. A split schedule is when the schedule of certain staff members is split into two parts, usually morning and evening;
4. A flexible schedule is a type of work schedule that has core and flexible hours. Staff members have core hours that are non-flexible but are allowed to choose when to work their remaining hours.

BlueCart: A Solution for Restaurants and Distributors

Our SaaS platform acts as an intermediary between specialized or broadline distributors and businesses in the hospitality sector. Our platform also offers various integration options with some of the most popular software solutions in the food service sector. Suppliers can schedule a demo and witness our wholesale ordering software’s features. If you operate a business in the restaurant sector, make sure to sign up for BlueCart as a buyer. Whether you want to find vendors or wish to use BlueCart’s kitchen and bar inventory management features, our platform is the right choice!