Benefits of an integrated booking system
With over eight in ten diners preferring to book online, it's no surprise that many restaurants and pubs now use a booking system to take bookings via a form on their website. In addition to responding to guests’ preferences, a booking form saves time vs taking bookings over the phone and makes it easy to take deposits and help avoid no shows.
But even with such a high proportion of guests making bookings online, most booking systems used by pubs and restaurants aren’t integrated with their EPOS. As bookings are making up a higher proportion of trade, being able to manage them efficiently without jumping from one system to another is increasingly important.
In this article we look at the many benefits that can be obtained from having a booking system that is fully integrated with your hospitality EPOS.
View upcoming bookings directly on the POS
It's a common site in many pubs and restaurants to see a laptop open on the bar showing the current days bookings. With a fully integrated booking system the upcoming bookings can be viewed directly on the EPOS, avoiding the need for an additional device, as well as the need to learn a separate system and remember yet another password.
Duplication of set up & maintenance
A booking system needs a lot of the same information that your POS already has. It needs to know about your tables, covers, areas, and table plan. It probably also needs a lot of the same admin users. Any changes to any of this set up will need to be reflected on your booking system as well as your EPOS. When both are on the same system, everything is set up only once, and any changes also only need to be made once.
Handle deposits
With most venues taking deposits for at least some bookings, it’s important to have a smooth way to record and account for these. With a booking system that is fully integrated with your POS, a tab can be opened for a booking with the deposit applied automatically as credit. This is then accounted for correctly on the Z report at the end of the night and recorded downstream in any integrated accounting systems.
Sales data recorded against a booking
In addition to handling of deposits, opening a tab on the POS that is directly linked to the booking has another significant benefit - the data relating the visit, spend, and even specific items purchased are all recorded against the booking for future reference. This can be reported on the back office to get an understanding of your average booking spend, or the proportion of your total sales that come from bookings.
Our Hospitality EPOS also has a built-in loyalty CRM, meaning this data can also be used to filter your customers by how often they have booked with you, how much they spend, or what they purchase, in order to send targeting marketing communications.
Alerts on the POS when bookings or requests are received
Many venues don’t take bookings from their website for the same day, as they may not have a chance to check their bookings before the guests are due to arrive. When your booking system is part of your EPOS you can accommodate same day bookings by setting up alerts to notify you and your staff through the till. Alerts can be set up to notify of bookings and give the team chance to prepare the table, or a venue may choose to use booking requests that staff can then accept or decline directly on the till based on availability (including any walk ins that are currently occupying a table).
Manage bookings directly on the POS
In addition to accepting or rejecting a booking requests, staff can easily make other changes directly on the POS. If a customer calls to cancel, staff can record with this without having to go and log in to the booking system. Similarly, no shows can be recorded quickly and easily, freeing up the table and retaining that data. If a customer calls up with a particular need, it can be added to the booking as a note.
Benefits from other integrated systems
A booking system that forms part of a fully integrated hospitality suite has further benefits still. For example, guests making a booking can tick a box to automatically become a member of the venue’s loyalty scheme. Then all their visits and purchases will be tracked via the EPOS enabling more effective targeting on your marketing campaigns. Once a guest is a loyalty member you can then send exclusive offers based on their purchase history straight to their phone as a push notification to entice them in for an additional visit.
If you are interested in finding out how our full hospitality management suite with integrated bookings can help transform your business, get in touch with our team of hospitality experts.
