Labor Management. NOW Simple.

Now available! Managing labor at your business just became even more simple.   TimeForge Mobile recently launched, providing managers and staff members the ability to review employee schedules, check timecards, send and receive online messages, and perform other labor management related items on an iPhone, iPod Touch, Blackberry, or other smartphone.

TimeForge Mobile can be accessed by pointing your favorite web browser or RSS reader at the TimeForge website.   To ensure the confidentiality of the information that is available, the RSS reading program must be able to use both SSL (bank-level encryption and security) and authentication (username and password).   Some of our favorite RSS readers include:

• Viigo on the Blackberry
• NetNewswire and Pro RSS on the iPhone
• Others (mostly for the desktop) can be found here

Accessing TimeForge Mobile is very simple!   Just add the website or URL of:

http://www.TimeForge.com/Scheduler/rss.html

to your RSS program of choice – enter your username and password – and your schedule, timecard, availability, and messages will automatically load into your RSS program.

Managers and supervisors have additional capabilities, and multi-unit and multi-store operators can view additional information (such as which staff members are clocked in, the days labor costs, and gross sales for the day).   A full list of RSS URL’s can be found inside “My Settings” page within TimeForge.

TimeForge staff scheduling and labor management software is used by managers, owners, and operators of restaurants, retail stores, bars, clubs, and other service-oriented businesses to increase profitability, reduce turnover, and improve retention.

Related articles or pages

• TimeForge.com Training Webinar – Learn How To Schedule Properly
• Simple Employee Scheduling – Version 1.8.5 (Part 3)
• Our New Employee Scheduling System!
• Off Topic: Inventory Managment for Restaurants
• New Schedule Demo

• Communication between staff members is the key to a good schedule. Shift swaps, staffing minimums, requests for days off, changes in availability, upcoming business requirements (private parties, birthdays, etc…) will all demand more from the staff than any one person will know.   Coordination is key to ensuring a smooth workday.

• Ensure that staff members have any necessary certifications, and that the certifications are current. An employee working without the right certifications can cost your business thousands in fines by various policing authorities, and in some locales, can land the manager on-duty in jail.

• Copying a schedule from the previous week is a quick way to make a schedule for the upcoming week. But this method of employee schedule creation assumes that the previous schedule was “good“. How would you know?   Use various metrics to identify whether the schedule worked for your business – actual vs. theoretical, how many shifts changed, were employees satisfied, how many no-shows occurred, was the actual payroll within an acceptable margin of the actual sales (or customer throughput)?

• Cross training is an excellent management technique to ensure that when the unexpected happens, your business is prepared.   Employees who have been cross trained are able to perform more than one job duty.   When staff members fail to show up to work, or an emergency happens at the business, the workforce is prepared to handle the situation.

• Early clockins and late clockouts can drain the profits from your business. Every employee that clocks in early, or clocks out late is using up precious profits that could be going to fund expansion, provide raises, and pay bills. Watch out for employees who ride the clock by monitoring the employee schedules, and comparing clock in and clock out times to scheduled work times.

• Managers spend hours messing with and creating the work schedule every week. Keep staff members happy and use TimeForge to make the employee schedules.   Employees stay happy because employee’s know what is going on, and managers are content because they can build an employee schedule in seconds.

TimeForge labor management software is used by owners and operators of restaurants, retail stores, bars, grills, and other service-oriented businesses to increase profits, reduce turnover, and improve retention.

Related articles or pages

• TimeForge Attendance Improvements
• Workforce Labor Scheduling Updates (Part 1)
• Use Tools to Keep Managers and Employees Happy
• TimeForge Workforce Scheduling is Now Listed in FindApps.com
• Spend Less Time Scheduling Labor – More Time Managing Your Business

Easy Labor Management – 5 Tips to Build Better Employee Schedules

• Employees who ride the clock are draining business profits. Monitor timesheets and schedules to effectively stop early clock ins. Better yet, use a labor management system that does both attendance and employee scheduling – and can enforce the schedule – such as TimeForge

• Fingerprint scanners are delicate pieces of technology. Use them to clock in/out. Don’t use them to enter PINs.   Restaurant and hospitality staff normally must enter a PIN / id into a Point of Sale system every few minutes, and with greasy hands, fingerprint scanners become defective quickly

• Not sure where your labor dollars are going? Check your fixed / non-variable (manager) salaries and your variable hours (hourly staff). You may be surprised at what you find as many labor dollars are tied up in non-variable staff members.

• Take time to review the schedule and compare sales and customer throughput to your staffing levels. High ratios can be very costly to your business.   A high ratio of labor to sales or customer throughput implies one of three business problems:
  1. Staff members are spending a lot of time with individual customers, and are not adequately serving customers who may be waiting (who then leave).
  2. The business is over-staffed, with more employees on site than are necessary.
  3. Profit per customer / order is too low, and needs to be raised.

  Act quickly to identify which problem is occurring, and solve it.

• Make sure only one manager per department is responsible for approving requests. Otherwise, there can be confusion about time off allotments.   If one manager approves a time off request for one staff member, and another manager approves a request for another staff member – the likelihood of upset staff, higher turnover, and staff shortages is significantly higher than if one manager is responsible for handling requests.   Good communication is key to labor management success.

TimeForge labor management software is used by owners and operators of restaurants, retail stores, bars, grills, and other service-oriented businesses to increase profits, reduce turnover, and improve retention.

Related articles or pages

• TimeForge Dashboard
• Labor Management Software Update Simplifies Employee Scheduling
• Enforce Scheduled Positions and Clock In Times
• Workforce Labor Scheduling Updates (Part 2)
• Workforce Labor Scheduling Updates (Part 1)

Table spacing is important for determining cash flow, occupancy, and customer satisfaction and is especially important in fast casual and fine dining restaurants.

Ever wonder how restaurant table proximity or spacing impacts customer satisfaction and spending?

Read Stephani Robson and Sheryl Kimes report titled Don’t Sit So Close to Me: Restaurant Table Characteristics and Guest Satisfaction.

The findings of their report suggest that not only should customers be seated at right-sized tables for the restaurant, but that when the distance between tables is less than three feet, both satisfaction and spending are decreased.

The full report is available from Cornell’s Center for Hospitality Research web  site.

TimeForge labor management software is used by restaurant owners and operators around the world to increase profits, reduce turnover, and improve retention. TimeForge provides powerful and easy-to-use employee scheduling, attendance, online timecards, and labor management software for restaurant, retail, and other service industries.

Related articles or pages

• Spend Less Time Scheduling Labor – More Time Managing Your Business
• Restaurant Scheduling Software for Fast Casual Restaurants
• Off Topic: Inventory Managment for Restaurants
• Labor Management Software Update Simplifies Employee Scheduling
• In Hard Times, Retail and Restaurant Companies Should Control Costs

Running payroll reports can be a tedious process, and running a report over the wrong payroll period can cause payroll errors at your business.

TimeForge allows you to run any report using an arbitrary date period, or you can use predefined payroll periods, such as bi-weekly, weekly, monthly, or even twice per month (on the 1st and 15th).

Using the built-in payroll periods provides three distinct benefits inside of TimeForge.

• Simple reports. Pick one selection from a drop-down box, and you no longer need to remember the exact payroll dates for that month.
• Payroll Approval Process. TimeForge Payroll Approval provides a simple and easy way to scan all of the attendance data for the period, and identify potential problems, theft, erroneous logins, or other costly mistakes.
• Sick / Vacation / PTO Tracking.   TimeForge PTO can track vacation time, sick time, or other paid or personal time off.   Tracking PTO requires the use of TimeForge payroll periods.

TimeForge is a leading provide of powerful and simple-to-use employee scheduling and online labor management software for the restaurant and retail industries. TimeForge software is used by restaurant owners and operators around the globe to increase profits, reduce turnover, and improve retention.

Related articles or pages

• TimeForge Attendance Improvements
• Workforce Labor Scheduling Updates (Part 2)
• What’s New in Employee Scheduling? (Part 2)
• Use Tools to Keep Managers and Employees Happy
• Scheduling Salaried Staff

As many of you know, we exhibited at the Western Food Expo in California two weeks ago. We had a great time! Our booth was strategically positioned by a Digital Dining Point Of Sale (POS) distributor / reseller and Red Wing Shoes. During the three days in Los Angeles, we spoke to more than 500 restaurant owners, managers, employees, and share holders. A few hotel / motel operators, bar owners, and food inspectors were also interested in the benefits of labor scheduling software. The response for the software was overwhelming, and we appreciated the amazing amount of feedback that many of the customers, and potential customers, provided.

Additionally, we did get to spend some quality time with representatives from Digital Dining, Squirrel Systems, Radiant (Aloha POS), Waiter Pad POS, Micros, and Intura. All of these vendors are interested in integrating the TimeForge employee scheduling and labor management software with their own software packages. Look for integration of our advanced employee scheduling system with your favorite POS system, coming soon!

How long does it take to make an employee schedule? It should take less than 5 minutes! Did you know that labor costs could be as much as 30% of your expenses? TimeForge can help streamline and minimize labor costs through effective employee scheduling at your restaurant, bar, or club.

Related articles or pages

• Accuvia, Labor Scheduling Systems
• Workforce Labor Scheduling Updates (Part 1)
• Restaurant Business Article on Workforce Problems
• Off Topic: Inventory Managment for Restaurants
• Florida Restaurant & Lodging Show is Wrapped Up…