General manager guide, part 4: menus, rates, stock and your team

This is part 4 of 4 of the Xenia general manager guide: 1. Your overview and your role · 2. Approvals and keeping control · 3. Running the day · 4. Menus, rates, stock and your team.

These are the things you change less often than you read, so Xenia asks for a reason and keeps a record of each one.

Menu prices

Open Outlets and menu and choose an outlet. Beside each dish or drink are Change price, Recipe, Change and Take off, and the 86 button to mark it sold out. Choose Change price.

• Type the New price and Why is it changing? (for example "Supplier raised the price").

• Orders already taken keep the price they were taken at.

• The dialog lists Earlier prices, so you can see how a price has moved.

• Add a category and Add an item build the menu. Recipe says what stock one portion uses, so a sale takes the right amount out of the store.

Price rules holds happy hour and other time-based prices. They apply to an item as it is added to an order, and where two run together, the bigger discount applies.

Room rates and rate plans

Open Rooms. Choose Change rate on a room, type the New rate per night and, if you like, a Reason ("low season"). Existing bookings keep their price, and every change is recorded in the audit trail. Out of service takes a room off sale for repairs.

For prices that move on a pattern, open Rates. A rate plan changes the room rate by a percentage for weekends, a season, a long stay or a promo code. Each shows whether it is On, and has Edit, Switch off and Remove. The Rate calendar shows what each room costs on each day.

Stock

Open Store. The buttons across the top are the stock jobs the bar and the restaurant cannot do for themselves:

• Receive stock when a delivery arrives, and New order to buy from a supplier.

• Transfer between stores, and Request stock, which your team uses to ask the store for more.

• Count stock to check the shelves against the system, and Log wastage for breakage and spoilage, with the reason.

• Stores and suppliers to add a store or a supplier.

The tabs show Stock on hand, Stock value, Slow moving, Wastage, Losses, Purchase orders, Supplier accounts, Requests, Receipts and transfers, Counts, Missing stock and the Ledger. Every movement has a document and a name against it, and what is on hand is always the sum of the ledger. Look at Missing stock and Losses after each count.

Your team

Open Staff to see who can sign in, what each person does, and who has been invited but has not joined.

• Activity beside a name opens everything that person has done. It is the quickest way to answer "who did this?".

• The role beside a name can be changed from the list, and Remove takes someone off the hotel at once.

• Invite someone sends an email with a link that works once and expires after a week.

Hotel settings and the recycle bin

Hotel settings holds the details printed on receipts and the rules the hotel's days and money run by: the time zone, VAT, check-in and check-out times and the night audit time. The owner setup guide explains each one. Changes are recorded, and the owner is alerted to ones that affect charges.

Recycle bin holds rooms, buildings, floors and areas that were removed. Nothing is deleted: choose one to bring it back if it was removed by mistake.

A weekly checklist

• Read the week's daily reports and the outlet reports. Compare voids with sales.

• Check Outstanding balances and chase what is owed.

• Open Missing stock and Losses, and make sure the counts were done.

• Read Alerts and mark each one looked at, with a note to the owner for anything you could not explain.

• Review Staff: has anyone left, or changed jobs?

If you get stuck at any point, ask the owner first, and the Xenia support team after that.