Labor Management. NOW Simple.

Our team is proud to announce the latest version of simple employee scheduling … TimeForge version 1.8.6! This version includes a number of minor bug-fixes, as well as some major new features, all designed to save you time!

Some of the new features include:

• Split Shifts. TimeForge’s AutoScheduler will try to not assign employees to split shifts. Employees who close your business will not be scheduled to open the next morning, if at all possible. This makes employees and managers happy!

• Reports. The main report which runs when you click on “Print” from the schedule page now prints only scheduled employees (not all employees). This makes the printout more concise, and easier to read! There’s also a new report, which can be found on the Reports page, and is called “Costs by Position”. This report gives managers a quick, graphical summary of where labor dollars are being spent on the schedule.

• Day Parts and Availability. You asked for it, and you got it! One of the most requested features from TimeForge users is to be able to use the request and availability editors with your own “time of day”. For example, your “Morning” shift may run from 6am , 11am, and your “Afternoon” shift may go from 11am , 4pm, and now you can setup requests and availability using “Morning” or “Afternoon” times.Login to TimeForge, and click on “Schedules”, and then choose “Day Parts”. Enter your shifts (such as open, morning, afternoon, evening, or close), and select a start time, end time, and a description. Day part periods cannot overlap. Once you have entered all of your time periods, you can save the Day Parts.Once Day Parts are in TimeForge, you can create and edit requests and availability using them. You, and your employees, will have the option of entering a time range, or you can pick a Day Part instead.

Look out for Version 1.9 and Version 2.0! Employee Scheduling will be faster and easier! Spend time doing what you want to do…

How long does it take to make your employee schedules? It should take less than 5 minutes! Did you know that TimeForge can streamline and minimize labor expenses through effective employee labor management at your business, bar, club, or restaurant.

Related articles or pages

• What’s New in TimeForge? (Part 1)
• Workforce Labor Scheduling Updates (Part 2)
• Workforce Labor Scheduling Updates (Part 1)
• Supercharged Scheduling from Nations Restaurant News
• Simple Employee Scheduling – Version 1.8.5 (Part 2)

Our team is proud to announce the latest version of simple employee scheduling … TimeForge version 1.8.6! This version includes a number of minor bug-fixes, as well as some major new features, all designed to save you time!

Some of the new features include:

• Employee Messaging. Managers and supervisors can send messages to employees using TimeForge! To send a message, click on the “Schedules” tab, and then click on “Messages”. You can choose to send messages to everyone who works a certain position (e.g. all Cooks), select employees (e.g., Sarah and Joe), everyone who is scheduled to work (e.g. Everyone on next weeks schedule), or everyone who is not scheduled to work. Messages are sent via email to each employee, and employees can retrieve the messages at any time by logging into TimeForge.com You can also send schedules directly from the positions, employees, and schedules pages!

• Security. If you were not already aware, TimeForge is now secure. When you connect to TimeForge, you will notice that your location bar / url turns to “https”, which means that your connection is secure! TimeForge is using 128-bit SSL technology, the same kind your bank uses!

• Templates. Templates received a major upgrade on Monday night and can now be used on an existing schedule. You will see a link to “Use” and “Make” templates on the schedule page (if you have templates). Also, positions are grouped together when editing a template to make editing more simple.

Version 1.9 and 2.0 are coming soon!

How long does it take to make your employee schedules? It should take less than 5 minutes! Did you know that TimeForge can streamline and minimize labor expenses through effective employee labor management at your business, bar, club, or restaurant.

Related articles or pages

• What’s New in Employee Scheduling? (Part 2)
• Workforce Labor Scheduling Updates (Part 2)
• Workforce Labor Scheduling Updates (Part 1)
• Supercharged Scheduling from Nations Restaurant News
• Simple Employee Scheduling – Version 1.8.5 (Part 1)

Nation’s Restaurant News published an article entitled “Supercharged Scheduling” on Oct 8, 2007. If, like us, you receive the e-mail newsletter, you probably received the story in a “Tech Trends from NRN-Online” email last week.

The teaser introduction starts: “Why does one restaurant hum along, making schedules with little more than pencil and paper or a spreadsheet, while others see reason to spend tens of thousands of dollars on sophisticated labor optimization technology? Selecting what’s right for a particular operation means making a clear-eyed assessment of the complexity of labor demands and the goals of the business.”

At TimeForge, we believe that every restaurant, bar, club, hotel, motel, or catering business should be using an employee scheduling program. However, we do take issue with the idea that it takes “thousands of dollars” worth of investment to get sophisticated employee scheduling software. In fact, you can get started with TimeForge for $1.50 per month!

The article goes on to discuss four different products, including some “best of breed” and “all in one solutions”. These included:

• Radiant Software’s MenuLink featuring their installation at Fazoli’s
• Time Management’s TMx featuring their integration with Squirrel POS for Logan’s Roadhouse
• Deterministics scheduling package, featuring T.G.I. Friday’s
• TDR3′s HotSchedules software, featuring Kona Grill

If you were at FS-TEC this year, you probably saw all four products on the show floor.

Our favorite quote is one we hear from TimeForge users all the time: “It really improved managers’ quality of life and made it easier to write schedules, and [helped] shifts go smoother.”

How long does it take to make your employee schedules? It should take less than 5 minutes! Did you know that TimeForge can streamline and minimize labor expenses through effective employee labor management at your business, bar, club, or restaurant.

Related articles or pages

• Workforce Labor Scheduling Updates (Part 1)
• Simple Employee Scheduling – Version 1.8.5 (Part 1)
• What’s New in TimeForge? (Part 1)
• What’s New in Employee Scheduling? (Part 2)
• TimeForge Workforce Scheduling is Now Listed in FindApps.com

On Sunday night, we released the latest version of TimeForge, the groundbreaking, simple and easy to use employee scheduling software. This new version continues to improve the TimeForge software, adding many new features so you can go home sooner!

What’s New?

Schedule without Wages. Just want a simple scheduling tool? TimeForge can now schedule employees without having any wage information entered into the software. All that is required are the names of your employees and the positions that they can work. That’s it! Of course, TimeForge can do much more …

Turn off the AutoScheduler. For many businesses, the AutoScheduler saves hours of management time by correctly placing the right employee into the right shift on the schedule. However a few of our users would like to do this process themselves, and want to turn the AutoScheduler off. To do so, login to TimeForge.com, and click on the “Settings” tab. Then, click on the “Settings for this Location“, and locate the “TimeForge configuration” section. One of the options is to enable or disable the AutoScheduler. Setting this option to “No” will disable the AutoScheduler.

Double Alerts. If an employee shift swap will result in a double shift (where an employee will work more than one shift that day) … you’ll be notified when you approve or deny the shift!

How long does it take to make your employee schedules? It should take less than 5 minutes! Did you know that TimeForge can streamline and minimize labor expenses through effective employee labor management at your business, bar, club, or restaurant.

Related articles or pages

• What’s New in Employee Scheduling? (Part 2)
• Supercharged Scheduling from Nations Restaurant News
• Simple Employee Scheduling – Version 1.8.5 (Part 1)
• Workforce Labor Scheduling Updates (Part 1)
• What’s New in TimeForge? (Part 1)

On Sunday night, we released the latest version of TimeForge, the groundbreaking, simple and easy to use employee scheduling software. This new version continues to improve the TimeForge software, adding many new features so you can go home sooner!

What’s New?

Supervisor role. Do you have multiple managers at your location who create employee schedules? Do all of your managers need access to TimeForge.com, but they should not be able to see each other’s wages? Then they are TimeForge supervisors! Within TimeForge, turning an employee into a supervisor (or manager) is simple! Edit the employee and change their “Employee Type” to be “A Supervisor“.

Hint: You can control what permissions supervisors have by changing your Location Settings. Login to TimeForge.com, and click on the “Settings” tab. Then, click on the “Settings for this Location“, and find the “TimeForge configuration” section. At your discretion, supervisors can change employees, requests, and shift swaps.

New Pricing Model. Due to overwhelming demand, the TimeForge pricing model for our simple scheduling software has become even simpler. TimeForge now comes in two flavors: a basic version (at $1.50 per employee per month) and an enhanced version (at $2.00 per employee per month). Existing customers can continue with their current price, or upgrade to the new model at their discretion.

Faster. Most of TimeForge.com received significant speed improvements, including the AutoScheduler and the requests / availability areas. A faster TimeForge means that you get done scheduling faster , and go home sooner!

How long does it take to make your employee schedules? It should take less than 5 minutes! Did you know that TimeForge can streamline and minimize labor expenses through effective employee labor management at your business, bar, club, or restaurant.

Related articles or pages

• Supercharged Scheduling from Nations Restaurant News
• Workforce Labor Scheduling Updates (Part 1)
• What’s New in TimeForge? (Part 1)
• What’s New in Employee Scheduling? (Part 2)
• Simple Employee Scheduling – Version 1.8.5 (Part 3)