Feature · Restaurant diary
The restaurant diary, kept at the door while the evening happens
A paper diary tells you who said they would come. The host stand tells you who is here, where they are sitting, how far through the meal they are, and which table will be free next.
It runs in the browser of a tablet or phone. Any number of them can be open on the same evening.
What the stand shows at 20:10
Due
Bookings arriving in the next stretch of the evening, already on their tables, with the guest's history one tap away.
Seated, and how far along
Each occupied table with where it has got to — starters, mains, dessert — and the ones that have asked for the bill.
Free now, and free shortly
What can be given away right now, and what will be shortly, so the answer to the couple at the door is a time rather than a guess.
Everything done from it, in a tap or two
- Mark a party arrived while half of them wait at the bar, then seat them when the rest turn up — an arrived party is never offered to you as a no-show.
- Seat a party when they arrive, on the table the booking already has or another one.
- Move a party to a different table, or a booking to a different time, by dragging it on the plan.
- Mark where a table has got to in the meal, and when the bill is settled.
- Mark the table laid again, so it comes back into play the moment it is ready.
- Record a cancellation as the guest's or as yours, and a no-show as a no-show.
- Take back a mis-tap: reopen a table finished by mistake or withdraw your own cancellation within 15 minutes, and undo a no-show until the booking's end, for the party that walks in late.
Settling a bill here tells the floor that the table is about to leave. The bill itself and its payments run in Slotora too, and a bill paid in full marks its table settled by itself.
The phone rings mid-service
“Have you got a table for three on Thursday at half seven?”
The real answer, straight away
The stand offers the times that are actually free for three on Thursday, worked out from your tables, turn times and pacing — the same answer your online booking page would give.
A regular found by name or number
Type the surname or the phone number and a returning guest comes up with their visits and no-shows, so you are not creating the same person for the fourth time. Add a note to the booking while you are there.
Every Thursday, booked once
The couple who have come in every Thursday for years become a standing booking: weekly or every two to eight weeks, until a date or for a number of times, up to half a year. Each week is checked like any other booking; a week with no table is named, and the rest still go in. One week cancelled, or this one and every later one.
The day on paper, for the people without a screen
The kitchen does not look at the door tablet. Print the day sheet instead: the day's bookings service by service, each with the time, covers, name, table and room, then the allergies, diets, access needs, occasions, notes, tags, first visits and earlier no-shows. Pin it at the pass, hand it to the bar, read it out at the line-up.
Questions from the door
What do we need to run it?
A tablet or phone with a web browser at the stand. Add more for the floor or the bar; they all show the same evening and update each other.
Can two people take phone bookings at once?
Yes. Each change appears on every other screen, so two people cannot sell the same table without seeing it go.
Does settling the bill take the payment?
No. Card payments stay on your own terminal and till. Marking a bill settled only tells the floor the table is about to come free.
The rest of the evening
- Taking phone bookings at the stand, step by step
- Running the stand on an iPad
- People without a booking, and the queue at the door
- The briefing the stand reads out before service
- Several tablets and phones on one floor
- Unlimited staff and devices in one price
- All features
Your diary used to come from Quandoo? What the closure means for the bookings already in it.