Restaurant or cafe

A restaurant or cafe seats customers at tables, takes their order in rounds and sends each item to the kitchen or the bar that makes it. Kila treats it as a restaurant, with the food safety rules that come with serving food.

What is special

• Tables first. The till opens on the table plan, and waiters take orders on their phones in Kila Floor: Seat guests at a table.
• Courses. Mains and desserts can wait at the kitchen until the waiter fires them: Hold and fire courses.
• Bookings and the waitlist. The host stand keeps tonight’s bookings, deposits and the walk-ins waiting for a table: Take a booking and run the waitlist.
• The kitchen display shows each station its tickets: Work the kitchen display.

At Jikoni Grill and Cafe, a restaurant with a bar, all of these are in use.

How Kila sets it up

The main screen is Tables and tabs.

Rules it follows:

• Food safety: Expiry, waste, temperature and hygiene checks

Its words:

Most businesses	Restaurant or cafe
customer	guest
product	menu item
sale	order
branch	outlet
staff	waiter

Its set-up steps

1. Business details, KRA PIN and licence
2. Tables and areas
3. Menu: categories, items, options, prices
4. Kitchen and bar stations and printers
5. Courses: which categories are served when
6. Recipe cards with yields: plate cost and food cost
7. Opening stock of ingredients and drinks
8. Suppliers
9. Staff and their roles: waiters, kitchen, cashiers
10. M-Pesa till or paybill
11. Reservations: tables kept, deposits, no-shows
12. Delivery apps (Glovo, Uber Eats, Bolt Food)
13. QR codes on the tables (optional)
14. First order

Its home page

• Last night: sales, covers, cash-ups and the log
• Open bills now, their value and the oldest
• Bills waiting to pay or to close
• Bills by waiter
• The kitchen now: waiting, held, late
• Reservations today
• The waitlist now
• Today’s briefing and the log
• Sales today by outlet and by hour
• Covers and average spend
• Top menu items; items out of stock
• Off today (86)
• Food cost this week
• Labour cost against sales
• Delivery apps today
• Waste and write-offs today
• Approvals and reviews waiting
• Payments waiting for confirmation
• Licences, permits and returns due

Roles it starts with

• Waiter: Opens bills for guests on Kila Floor, adds rounds, prints the bill and sends an M-Pesa prompt at the table; hands their bills over at shift change; the cashier closes them. No discounts, voids or refunds.
• Bartender: Serves at the bar, runs bills and their own shift, takes M-Pesa at the table, counts the bar (open bottles by tenths or weight) and switches drinks off when they run out. No discounts or refunds.
• Kitchen: Works the kitchen display, bumping tickets item by item; makes the prep list; switches dishes off for the day, records waste and completes kitchen checklists. No sales.
• Head chef: Runs the kitchen: tickets and the pass, recipe cards and plate costs, the 86 list, waste, kitchen counts and requisitions from the store. No sales or prices.
• Host: Works the host stand: the reservation book and the waitlist, deposits, texts when a table is ready, seats guests (opening their bill) and looks after guest records. No payments or discounts.
• Floor supervisor: Runs the floor: moves and hands over bills between waiters, fires courses, keeps the reservation book, the 86 list, the briefing and the log, clears waiters at the end of their shift, approves discounts and removals within limits, reviews shifts. No settings or refunds approval.

Where to go next

• Restaurants and bars: everything a restaurant needs.
• Food safety: the kitchen’s checks, the temperature log, waste and the hygiene inspection.