Saturday night: nothing left on the pass

At half past seven on a Saturday, the owner of the sample restaurant in this tour is on the floor rather than in the office. The room is full, takeaways are being collected at the door, and the question that matters every minute is simple: which food is up and has not gone out yet, and who has been waiting too long? This tour answers it with one screen, Orders, in four stops.

Below, each stop is expanded into what you look at, what it means and what to do about it. After that come tips, mistakes and where to go next.

What does the Orders screen show at the top?

The header gives you the evening in one line. In the sample at 19:30 it reads: five orders still open, two ready to hand over, £288.00 taken in cash and £1,612.40 on card so far.

Underneath is a row of status chips (All, New, Confirmed, Preparing, Ready, Served, Completed, Cancelled) and a search box that takes an order number, a guest or a table. Most of the night you leave the chips on All and let the screen sort things for you.

Step by step

1. Open Orders and read the header. Five open, two ready. If the "ready" number is anything other than zero, something is sitting on the pass. That is the first thing to fix.
2. Look at the top group: Ready to hand over. Its label says it plainly: food is up, take it to the table or the counter. In the sample, order #255 for table 9 (moussaka and a Greek salad, £24.50) has been ready for eleven minutes, so its waiting time is highlighted. Below it is a takeaway, two falafel wraps for £17.00, ready for two minutes.
3. Act on the highlighted one first. Eleven minutes on the pass means the moussaka is cooling. Send someone with it now. Once it is served, mark it served and it leaves the top group.
4. Move down to In the kitchen. This group holds new, confirmed and cooking orders, oldest first. Order #256 for table 4 (two lamb flatbreads and chips, £29.50) has waited nine minutes and is preparing. Order #259 for table 2 is next at four minutes. The newest, a takeaway chicken souvlaki at £14.50, came in a minute ago and is marked New.
5. Use the waiting time to talk to the kitchen. Nine minutes for flatbreads may be fine; nine minutes for a starter is not. The number lets you ask a precise question at the pass instead of "where's table 4?".
6. Let served orders fold away. Everything served, closed or cancelled today sits in one line at the bottom with a count, 48 in the sample. The list on screen is only what still needs doing.
7. Open any order when a guest asks. Tap an order and it shows what was ordered, the VAT included, any tip and how it was paid. Useful when a guest queries a bill or a takeaway customer says they paid by card.
8. Search when the room is full. Type a table number or an order number into the search box to jump straight to it rather than scrolling.

How is the evening laid out in the sample?

Two things stand out. The open orders add up to £111.50 of food that has not been paid for yet, which is why the takings figure in the header is lower than the room feels. And the order that needs attention most, #255, is not the oldest one in the kitchen: it is the one already cooked. Putting ready food first is what stops that order getting lost behind newer tickets.

Why does "ready first" matter so much?

Because a finished plate is the most expensive thing in the building to waste. The ingredients are bought, the cook's time is spent, and the only thing left is to carry it twenty steps. If it sits on the pass, it goes back to the kitchen to be redone or goes out cold and earns a complaint. Ordering the screen around that single risk is a deliberate choice: the kitchen display handles cooking, and Orders handles getting food to people.

Waiting times do a second job. Over a few weekends, they show you where service slows. If takeaways regularly wait more than ten minutes once ready, the issue is the handover at the door, not the kitchen. Our guide on running a restaurant has more on planning the floor around those patterns.

Tips for busy nights

• Give one person the screen. On a tablet by the pass, Orders works best when one person owns it and calls food out, rather than everyone glancing at it.
• Mark food served when it lands. The screen is only as good as its statuses. A plate taken to table 9 but not marked served still looks ready.
• Use the chips for a quick check. Tap Ready on its own when you only want to see what is on the pass.
• Watch takeaways separately. Takeaway customers stand at the door watching. A two-minute wait for them feels longer than ten minutes at a table with drinks.
• Read the header at quiet moments. Cash against card so far tells you roughly what will be in the drawer at close, which helps when you cash up later.

Common mistakes

• Treating Orders as the kitchen screen. Cooks need ticket-by-ticket detail; the floor needs order status and value. Use the kitchen display in the kitchen and Orders on the floor.
• Leaving cancelled orders open. A cancelled takeaway left in the kitchen group makes the evening look busier than it is and skews the waiting times.
• Ignoring the small orders. A single souvlaki can wait behind big tables. Oldest first means it gets its turn, but only if someone acts on the list in order.
• Reading takings as the whole evening. Cash and card so far exclude open orders. Do not judge the night until the last bill is paid.

What should you do next?

Earlier in the day, the lunch service tour shows tables, QR orders and a split bill. After the last table, how the day went turns the evening into busy hours, best sellers and cash against card. If you are comparing systems, our guide on choosing a POS system lists what a restaurant till should do on a full night, and cash flow for a small business explains why the gap between food served and money paid matters.

How EasyTaskr helps

EasyTaskr's Orders screen keeps ready food first and the kitchen oldest first, with waiting times on every order and cash and card taken so far in the header. Each order opens to show its items, VAT, tip and payment. The restaurant and figures here are sample data.