3 Technologies That Reduce Restaurant Wait Times

While long wait times can look like a nice public relations play, the reality is, a crowded store and meandering lines can be detrimental to your bottom line. And in an era where convenience is touted above all else, patience when waiting for food is awfully thin. Long wait times are turning away valuable customers and slowing down operational efficiency.

To delight your customers and boost your bottom line with higher table turns – leverage these three technologies to reduce your restaurant wait times.

How can Restaurants Reduce Waiting Times? 

Mobile Order Takers

In the restaurant industry, the point of sale used to be limited to the check-out counter or a hand-delivered check for guests dining at a table. But now, as technology has evolved, so has the point of purchase. With mobile order takers, you can process orders wherever the customer is. 

Here are a few options for taking and processing guest orders with mobile order-taking devices: 

• Table-side 
• Drive thru lane
• In line before guests reach the check-out counter
• At festivals and pop-up events
• From food trucks

You can dramatically expand your reach and order efficiency with these mobile ordering POS solutions. Better still, the processed orders go straight to the kitchen, so your chefs can get a jump start on making the dishes.

Let’s take a closer look at some of the benefits of going mobile:

1. Mobile solutions improve order accuracy and speed up the production process, reducing overall wait times for food. This is especially true for table service environments, relieving your waitstaff from having to memorize orders or decipher notes to send accurate information to the kitchen. 
2. You also add an opportunity to keep lines flowing and reduce the chance of missing a sale due to long wait times. If the queue of customers starts to get out of hand, have a team member grab a mobile POS and intercept guests as they wait, serving as a release valve of sorts for your stationary terminals. 
3. Turn tables faster and provide a better overall customer and employee experience. Having a digital solution for order taking that integrates directly with your kitchen means you’re more likely to get the right details to your line cooks for accurate and efficient food managing. Better still, guests can close out their orders on the spot, reducing the customers’ time spent waiting on a check and servers’ time walking back and forth between a POS and their paying patrons.  

Self-Service Kiosks

According to a consumer survey done by Tillster, more than 65% of customers said they would be more willing to visit a restaurant if self-service kiosks were offered. 

More and more quick-service restaurants and fast-casual restaurants are implementing self-service kiosks in their restaurant operations to drive revenue and cut down on restaurant wait times. By giving customers total control over their customer journey, and letting your staff spend time cooking and not processing orders through a traditional table-service POS, you can drive down wait times and increase back-of-house efficiency.

Also, kiosks can help you increase overall revenue in addition to freeing up staff to focus on other service-oriented tasks. You can better up-sell and cross-promote your offerings leading to higher check sizes with a kiosk through auto prompts and suggested items throughout each order. Unlike a cashier, your kiosk won’t forget to prompt for combos when a-la-carte items are added to the cart. As your kiosk is helping you increase your average check size, it can also help you save money on each order by reducing waste through more accurate, self-reported orders. 

According to Prakash Karamchandani, co-founder of Balance Pan-Asian Grille, average tickets for the brand’s bowls rose from $9.50 to $13 after kiosks were implemented at the restaurant. 

And for restaurants that are concerned that kiosks are hurting the customer experience, many reports indicate otherwise. Self-service is becoming an integral way of providing service, and many diners actually prefer self-service POS systems to traditional face-to-face restaurant ordering options.  

Table Management Tools

With a full suite of table management tools, your restaurant can turn tables even more smoothly. You can digitally replicate your table layout on your POS to easily assign orders to seats to make meal distribution effortless. This will help you keep an eye on where certain tables are at in the dining process and have up-to-second updates on when a table is free, so you can reduce your restaurant wait times.

Looking to seat a walk-in party of ten? To ensure this party doesn’t experience service gaps from the moment they arrive at their table, you can easily identify what stage of service and how many seats are at each table with color-coded timers. This makes managing food for a large party size less overwhelming and gives large parties the best customer service. 

Choose Revel Systems as Your Restaurant POS Service Provider 

Whether you are a full-service restaurant, a fast-casual brand, or a quick-service establishment, maintaining a high volume of customers can be a challenge without the right technologies. 

With Revel Systems, no matter the type of restaurant you operate, you can streamline your front-of-house and back-of-house flow to increase table turns and drive down waitlists for your restaurants, ultimately making your customers happier and boosting your bottom line! Get a free demo today.