A periodic internal audit for restaurants and hotels: standards, stock, cost control, service and compliance.
Daily checklists keep a venue running; an audit checks whether the controls behind them work: are recipes followed, does stock match sales, are comps recorded?
Use it to compare outlets fairly and to find where margin is lost.
14 items. Keep it on a tablet, or print a copy for the clipboard.
An audit at a hotel bar finds a 6% variance between expected and actual spirit usage and unrecorded comps on weekends. Actions: comp approvals by a manager in the POS and a weekly spirit count. The next audit shows variance under 2%.
Food, beverage and labor are the largest controllable costs in most restaurants and hotel outlets, and an audit ties sales records to what actually happened on the floor. It also tests that food safety logs are being kept, which health inspectors may ask to see.
| Outlet | Harbor View Hotel lobby restaurant, Portland ME |
|---|---|
| Audit date and auditor | Sept 18, Elena (F and B controller) |
| Recipes | Lobster roll portion 5 oz spec, 6 oz observed |
| Stock variance | Food 1.8%, wine 4.5% |
| Comps and voids | 3 comps without manager approval, Sunday brunch |
| Food safety logs | Cooler temp logs complete |
| Labor | Brunch hours 12% over plan; overtime for 2 cooks |
The extra ounce on the lobster roll is small per plate but adds up on a high-cost item, which is why portion checks sit beside variance. Wine variance is higher than food, so the next step is a bottle count by bin.
Quarterly for most outlets.
Someone independent of the outlet.
The gap between expected and actual usage.
Yes, it is a major cost.
Compare theoretical usage, which is what the POS sales say should have been poured using recipe specs, with actual usage from the opening count plus purchases minus the closing count. The gap, expressed as a percentage of theoretical, is the variance. Large gaps point to over-pouring, unrecorded comps, waste or theft.
Pull the POS comp and void report and check that each one has a reason and a manager approval, that voids are not clustered on one server or late in shifts, and that totals match policy. Compare comp totals by shift and day. Unexplained patterns are the starting point for follow-up, not proof of wrongdoing.
More for the same job
EZTime tasks can repeat on a schedule, ask for a photo when they are done and warn a manager when one is overdue. A 14-day trial needs no credit card.