Christmas can be a fantastic time for the hospitality industry. Festive spirits – not to mention plenty of office parties – can lead to huge increases in bookings, higher spend per customer, and much more chance of the elusive second service. But if there’s one thing that stops businesses taking advantage of the season, it’s an inability to cope with this boost in demand. One common solution is to bring in temporary employees to help an overstretched workforce. But this means that your busiest time is potentially also when your team is the least experienced.
Our free getWaiter! app and cloud-based merchant service portal can help make sure you get the most out of the Christmas rush, by turning even those working their first ever shift into veterans who know the place inside out.
One of the main problems is that new staff don’t know the layout of the venue and may not fully understand which areas are their responsibility. Collaboration between staff is really important too, but if teams are constantly changing during the holiday period, this lack of consistency, experience and communication could become an issue.
getWaiter! solves all that by connecting employees directly to the customers who need their attention. Diners use the getWaiter! app on their smartphone to call for the waiter, so staff know exactly who needs them, and where they are in the restaurant. getWaiter! calls are displayed via a cloud-based web portal on your own internet-enabled tablet at the bar or waiter station. This avoids the need for senior staff shadowing the new-starters, and means the new recruits can concentrate on quality table service, confident they won’t miss anyone.
Senior staff can also set a time-limit for attending to tables to help new recruits know which customers are the priority. For example, choose a three-minute target, and when diners have been waiting that long, the screen alerts are displayed on your merchant tablet to remind staff who’s waiting. It’s another way to help staff deliver really responsive service.
And don’t worry about complex induction processes. The software is so easy to use for both customers and employees that new staff will quickly get it, and be up and running straight away.
Think of getWaiter! as an extra member of the team, managing everyone for optimal performance so your entire workforce are operating like a well-oiled machine. And that’s not all! The customer can also quickly provide feedback via their app on both service and food, giving you invaluable insight into your customers’ experience.
Once you’ve tried getWaiter! though, you’ll realise how useful it will be all year round to improving performance and profit. That’s because – wait for it – getWaiter! is for life, not just for Christmas.
Find out more about how getWaiter! can help you here. Registering an account is free, and only takes a few minutes, so sign up today.
Thanks to www.elsabio.co.uk and www.spicevillagecuckfield.co.uk for the use of the images.
