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Quick Service POS Software: 4 Killer Ways to Streamline Restaurant Operations

Quick Service POS Software: 4 Killer Ways to Streamline Restaurant Operations

The key to a successful quick service restaurant is providing a quick, accurate and pleasant experience for customers. While that’s probably not surprising, getting all of these things to happen at the same time can be a challenge if you don’t have the right quick service POS software to help you run the restaurant. 

Be sure you’re using a quick service point of sale system that can streamline your restaurant operations day in and day out. Here are four things to look for in your POS.

1. Increase Drive-thru Profits by Being More Accurate

Your drive-thru can account for 50% – 70% of your total quick service sales. Because drive-thru performance plays a critical role in your restaurant’s profits, it needs to be done right. Give every customer the ability to review their order on a screen to see exactly what they ordered and how much it costs. If there happens to be a mistake it can be corrected before the food is made (reducing food waste) and before payment is made. 

Providing customers with this confirmation screen for their review as a standard part of drive-thru operations can 

  • Save the time employees would normally spend reading orders back to customers.
  • Help customers remember all the items they wanted, reducing the need for multiple orders per customer when an item was forgotten. 
  • Speed up the drive-thru so you can serve more people in less time.
  • Reduce wasted food and wasted time remaking orders.

The result is not only accommodating more customers in a shorter period, the drive-thru confirmation screen in your POS also makes customers happier with their overall experience. These things drive more profits for your business as a result of drive-thru sales. 

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2. Reduce Lines with a Tablet POS

When you utilize a tablet POS as a part of your fast food restaurant point of sale system, the added mobility provides an easy way for customers to place orders quickly and experience shorter wait times, especially at peak times. You can leverage this technology outside your restaurant as a mobile tool to speed up long drive-thru lines. 

Using a tablet POS maximizes employee productivity. While some employees take orders from behind the counter, others can be line-busting—taking orders in-line from customers who haven’t yet reached the counter. This helps to reduce crowds and long lines, especially at peak hours like the lunchtime rush, where customers are pressed for time.

An added benefit of tablet POS is minimized downtime. When internet outages occur, you can continue to process sales and operate as usual, storing data locally until the internet connection is restored. To reap this benefit, look for quick service POS software that can operate in online or offline mode.

Interested in learning more about a tablet POS can improve your quick service restaurant’s operations?

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3. Produce Orders In-Sequence, and On-Time, With an Integrated Kitchen Display System (KDS)

One of the most important systems within quick service restaurants is the kitchen display system (KDS). This system tracks order time, holding employees accountable for slow orders and encouraging faster preparation for greater kitchen efficiency. A KDS also strengthens the communication between your front-of-house (FoH) and back-of-house (BoH) staff.

When an order comes in, the POS sends it directly to the KDS, letting BoH staff know when the order was placed, and how quickly they must prepare it in order to keep customers from waiting too long. It also allows you to set benchmarks for how quickly your average drive-thru orders should take to fulfill. Goals can then be set for your staff as motivation for them to achieve these numbers.

A KDS that integrates with your quick service POS software keeps track of every single order, along with any modifiers, condiments, or preparation instructions, so that nothing is forgotten or prepared incorrectly. This is especially helpful when combining workstation POS and tablet POS orders. The KDS will keep the orders listed in the sequence they were taken, so that you can keep orders coming out in sequence.

4. Allow Online Ordering for Drive-Thru Pickup

For customers that are even more strapped for time, enabling online ordering is a great way to ensure they can get your restaurant’s food as quickly as possible with little or no wait time. Orders placed online are expedited quickly because they’re pushed directly into the KDS so they can be prepared right away.  This makes it easy for customers to pick up their orders at the drive-thru window or even have their food delivered by a third-party, on-demand delivery service like DoorDash. Be sure your quick service POS software has a way to manage all types of deliveries. 

Because fast food purchases are often a decision made while customers are on the go, you can also offer a smartphone mobile app, branded for your restaurant, that makes it easy to place custom orders for pickup at the drive-thru window. A mobile app should always tie into any other account the customer may already have including any online ordering or loyalty program accounts.

With online and mobile ordering integrated into your quick service POS software, you can access critical data that helps create more profitable promotions and entice customers to return. Additionally, upselling prompts can also be leveraged to increase order size, yielding a better bottom line.

When you’re trying to streamline your quick-service restaurant’s operations, it can be daunting to take on all the requirements by yourself. You may not know exactly where to start or which solutions would offer the best return. At HungerRush, we have a dedicated team of industry experts that can help guide through decisions that will put you on the path to quick service success. Speak with us about your individual business needs, and we can pinpoint your biggest challenges and identify the quick service technology solutions that will help you overcome them.

For more information on quick service software and how we can help you maximize efficiency,  New call-to-action .

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