By Adelle Chong
With the competitiveness in the restaurant industry today, it’s time to take advantage of the software out there that makes running a restaurant a whole lot easier. There are plenty of POS systems, time tracking apps, and accounting systems out there, but here’s what we think are the best of the best for your restaurant!
Restaurant Shift Scheduling
7shifts
App rating on Capterra: 4.7/5
Pricing:
- Comp plan – Free
- The Appetizer plan: $17.99 per month
- The Entree plan: $39.99 per month
- The Works plan: $69.99 per month
Being a restaurant manager bears tons of responsibility, including preparing work schedules, which could be rather overbearing especially if there is a huge number of staff working shift work. 7Shifts helps with intuitive scheduling, communication and time tracking.
Overview
7Shifts is an online employee scheduling software system which helps with maximising efficiency through communication, time tracking and intuitive scheduling. There are over 300,000 restaurants that use 7Shifts.
How would 7Shifts help your business?
This software serves to be a huge time saver for restaurant owners and managers with the functions it provides. Managers would be avoiding the hassle and headaches that come with arranging work schedules, especially for those who have employees doing shift work.
The basic plan comes free of charge but only includes simple features such as simple time clock and shift trading for 10 employees. However, should you wish to utilise more advanced features such as POS and payroll integration, there are 3 other plans to opt for.
Overall, it functions as a user friendly tool for both the managers and employees to handle without complications.
POS System
Toast POS System
App rating on Capterra: 4.2/5
Pricing:
- Starter: $69/month
- Essentials: $99/month
- Growth: $199
The POS (Point of Sale) system is crucial to help keep track of sales and accept customer payments. You don’t want a POS system that doesn’t work or often malfunctions. For this reason, it is essential to implement a reliable POS system in your business.
Overview
Toast provides a POS system, which is a flexible cloud based system that was designed exclusively for restaurants. It’s perfect for any eatery, from cafes and bakeries to nightclubs and fine dining.
How would Toast benefit your restaurant?
Being a cloud based software, its greatest benefit is permitting access to managers to the back end from any device connected. This means changes can be made online instead of onsite.
Other features include online ordering, inventory, gift cards, and loyalties. Toast offers detailed sales reports and analytics, which is helpful in aiding in cost savings, and determining best selling items.
Verification can be implemented for certain features so that only certain personnel are allowed to have access to it, which provides an additional blanket of security.
Time Tracking
Jibble
App rating on Capterra: 4.8/5
Pricing
- Free
- Premium: $2/ per user a month
- Ultimate : $4/ per user a month
Accurate attendance is crucial for payroll, but it can be difficult to ensure that attendance data is correct. That’s where Jibble comes in.
Overview
Jibble is a time and attendance tracking app with GPS location and facial recognition features. It allows you to create work schedules to track overtime and auto-generate timesheets.
How would Jibble benefit your business?
Employees will clock in through mobile the moment they arrive at the restaurant – the geolocation feature ensures that they are on site and with facial recognition, you can get an alert if it’s the wrong person clocking in.
Alternatively, you can set up a shared tablet at your worksite that everyone clocks in and out through.
With work schedules, you can set up overtime rules and breaks according to your employees’ schedules. Detailed reports are automatically generated, along with timesheets for payroll, which is definitely a bonus!
Online Ordering
FlipDish
App rating on Capterra: 5/5
Pricing: One time payment of $445.00
Nowadays, many restaurants are implementing online ordering and delivery to bring in more business. This app helps in bringing in more happy customers!
Overview
FlipDish is a cloud-based solution that offers an online ordering system which helps restaurants, hotels and bars grow their business through customized websites and apps. Brand logos, images, and menus can be created to your liking, and a domain name will make it more identifiable.
How would FlipDish benefit your restaurant?
When implementing FlipDish, you get a website for your restaurant that comes fully integrated with an online ordering system. You will have absolute creative control over how you want your website to be and represent your brand.
Users have often praised it for being user friendly and easy to navigate. With FlipDish, customers key in their own orders, and can include any special instructions for the restaurant to take note of. In addition, restaurants can give customers discounts and promo codes, which builds solid customer loyalty.
FlipDish have been awarded with the “Best Ease of Use Restaurant Management Software” and “Best Value Restaurant Management Software” awards.
Accounting System
Restaurant365
App rating on Capterra: 4.2 /5
Pricing:
- Core Operations: $249
- Core Accounting: $249
- Essential: $369
- Professional: $459
Keeping track of a restaurant’s accounting and financial records can get pretty messy at times, especially when there are multiple chains involved. It’s easy to overlook minor transactions, which lead to incurring higher costs. For that reason, Restaurant365 might be what you need to solve your accounting problems.
Overview
Restaurant365 is a restaurant-specific accounting and operations platform that integrates with POS, vendors, and payroll. It provides a general ledger inclusive of cash forecasting and customizable financial reports. Accounts are streamlined so that one account can be used by multiple locations, which is convenient for everyone.
How would Restaurant365 benefit your restaurant?
Sales data can be automatically entered into the general ledger from the POS system and an invoice would be automatically generated over a specific period too. Besides that, R365 allows for efficient budget creating, fixed assets management, receivables & payables management, financial reporting and more!
Aside from it being an excellent accounting system, R365 also offers functions to help with labor scheduling, real-time inventory evaluation, payroll and so on.
Jibble is a free time and attendance tracking software with 10,000s of users around the globe. Check it out here!
