Quick-service restaurants have an extremely rapid pace. Top-notch food and prompt service are the key criteria for these restaurants to thrive. The customers expect nothing less. So, how can QSRs meet such high standards consistently?
The answer lies in checklists. In restaurants, checklists are the means of streamlining operations and upholding efficiency, consistency, and quality. However, the real game-changer comes when these checklists are integrated into intelligent applications. As a result, digital checklists in smart applications completely changed the game for QSRs. Managing the restaurant becomes streamlined.
With real-time tracking, automated reminders, and valuable insights, digital checklists can completely revolutionize and elevate the QSR. You can boost productivity, scale as per demands, be accountable, and skyrocket your customer satisfaction.
Though there are several checklists that QSRs can implement, here are the top 9 checklists that every quick-service restaurant needs to have.
Checklists and best practices for QSRs
Opening Checklists
Restaurant opening checklists provide staff with a structured approach to preparing the restaurant for customers each morning. Typically, these checklists include unlocking doors, prepping the products, and turning on equipment.
Best practice: Ensure that opening checklists have time goals that track task progress in real-time to validate that everything gets completed promptly and efficiently.
Closing Checklists
A restaurant uses the restaurant-closing checklist at the end of the workday to determine what tasks need to be completed or refreshed before the staff leaves for the night. This checklist covers various zones, such as the dining room and service line, with items such as stocking and storing paper goods properly and verifying whether the nightly cleaning standards are met. The checklists often have a section for the opening managers to review the previous night’s closure, allowing missed items to be tracked.
Best Practice: Managers can prioritize the tasks that affect food safety and customer experience first and reserve the more time-consuming undertakings for weekly or monthly checklists.
Safety Checklists
Safety checklists are a top-most priority for restaurants to ensure the safety of the customers and employees and protect the brand from potential issues. These checklists typically include inspecting each restaurant section for broken floorboards or tiles, ensuring the parking lot is hazard-free, verifying that curbs and speed bumps are properly painted, and confirming that items like personal protective equipment and wet floor signs are adequately stocked.
Best Practice: If required, having alternate safety checklists catering to different seasons is a good practice.
Health Inspection Checklist
Restaurants must always be ready for a random health inspection. Having a restaurant health inspection checklist can be a savior, as it helps keep track of crucial items, ensuring the location is ready for inspection. If required, verify that all employees have current food worker permits and monitor for actions that could be violations, such as improper handwashing or contamination of ready-to-eat foods.
Best Practice: Include items beyond the daily checklists to focus specifically on health inspection requirements. This ensures thorough preparation and compliance with health standards.
Cleaning Checklists
Maintaining a clean restaurant is imperative for maintaining food safety standards and ensuring that the customers feel comfortable. It is necessary to implement cleaning checklists that ensure daily, weekly, and monthly tasks are completed.
Daily cleaning checklists should cover all store aspects that require cleaning every single day. It often overlaps with opening and closing checklists due to their importance for safety and customer perception.
Weekly checklists usually include tasks that are time-consuming and difficult to conduct on a daily basis. It can include deep-cleaning often-used areas or cleaning shelving units. Monthly cleaning checklists include elaborate tasks that may require outside help, such as cleaning ceiling vents, hoods, and more.
Best Practice: For daily cleaning checklists, prioritize the tasks that employees can complete each day and focus on the cleanliness part that impacts food safety and customer experience.
For weekly cleaning checklists, allocate each task to a specific day of the week so that the employees can glance at the checklist and know what task to perform as per the day of the week.
Monthly cleaning tasks are usually disruptive to service, so planning and allocating labor and time toward these tasks during non-peak times is better.
Brand Standards checklists
Brand standards checklists allow supervisors to ensure consistency across locations. They guarantee that the QSR complies with the brand standards during operations. The checklist focuses on the overall customer experience rather than the physical aspects of a store.
Best practice: To evaluate whether the customer experience at the location aligns with the company’s standard operating procedures (SOPs).
Lighting Checklists
A well-lit store is important not only for safety and perceptivity but also for making the store a more welcoming place for customers and employees.
Lighting is a crucial factor in the quick-service restaurant business, and lighting checklists are key to monitoring the lighting status throughout the store.
Best Practice: A lighting checklist should cover all areas of the store, from coolers, freezers, bathrooms, and parking lot lights. It should also check that exterior signage and menu boards are illuminated to indicate that the outlet is open.
Equipment Checklists
Monitoring the status of all the equipment in the quick-service restaurant and addressing any maintenance or cleaning up is essential for the smooth functioning of operations in a QSR. Regular equipment checks guarantee that they function optimally and forestall potential future issues.
Equipment checklists ensure this aspect. From inspecting big or small fryers to thermometer calibration, the checklist can also count the equipment in the QSR.
Best Practice: An application such as the Proceso App can streamline these processes immensely by automating task orders for the maintenance team, enhancing responsiveness and efficiency.
Pre-Rush Checklists
Quick-service restaurants use pre-rush or rush-ready checklists before peak times to verify that the store is all set and ready for an upcoming rush.
These checklists pilot the managers to review the various zones of the store and determine whether everything is well-stocked and ready for efficient customer service.
Best Practice: A checklist that can assess the factors that can affect customer service while maintaining top-notch quality can be a practical pre-rush checklist.
For instance, if the grill station runs out of cartons amid rush hour, it will grind the operation to a halt. In such situations, pre-rush checklists matter.
How can the Proceso App help?
By digitizing these checklists, restaurants can streamline their operations and automate follow-up tasks based on responses.
For instance, if a checklist asks the store manager whether the makeline and cut table were cleaned (with photo proof), and the answer is ‘no,’ the app can notify the district manager. It can automatically assign the store manager a new task to finish this work.
This system holds the store manager accountable and provides the district manager with clear visibility into the situation.
Well-crafted checklists save time by eliminating redundant tasks and ensure that every area of the restaurant is in optimal condition, enabling seamless daily operations.
Quick-service restaurants have a dynamic environment, and digital checklists also allow managers to be dynamic. They can update and change the checklists to meet the store’s evolving needs. Proceso App can streamline the operations of your restaurant with process automation and digital checklists. Moreover, connect your entire workforce through this single no-code platform on Microsoft Teams. It has a 7-day free trial that you can avail of and find out for yourself.