Manager guide

Getting set up (about an hour)

1. Equipment: add every fridge, freezer and hot hold.
2. Cooked foods: add the dishes you cook or reheat.
3. Probes: add each probe thermometer.
4. Staff: add each person — they get their own username and PIN.
5. Cleaning rota: add your jobs (or tick the suggested ones). Set where and how often. It repeats every week.
6. Allergens: add every dish and answer all 14 allergens.
7. Suppliers & contacts: add suppliers, pest control, engineers and your council’s Environmental Health team.
8. SFBB pack: work through the safe methods (see below).

Safer Food, Better Business

The law requires a food safety management system based on HACCP principles. The SFBB pack is the recognised way for small caterers to have one — KitchCheck has the whole pack on screen.

1. Open SFBB pack. Start with “How to use this pack”.
2. Open each safe method, read it, and answer the How do you do this? questions. Tap Save answers as you go.
3. When your kitchen follows it, tap Save and mark complete. If it does not apply (for example you never hot hold food), tap Not relevant.
4. The Completion record tab shows your progress and prints for an inspector.
5. Update a safe method whenever you change how you work — every save is kept.

Your routine

Every day

• Check the Dashboard — anything red needs you.
• Look at the Daily checklist before closing.
• Sort any Corrective actions and sign off the Diary.

Every week

• Look at Cleaning → Week view. Missed jobs? Find out why and note it in the diary.
• Confirm any training staff have added.

Every month / four weeks

• Make sure every probe has had its monthly check.
• Do the 4-weekly review (the dashboard reminds you).
• Check the allergen matrix is still right and tap I’ve checked it’s all correct.
• Record a Prove it check now and then — for example timing how fast a batch of food chills.

Managing allergens

1. Add dish: name, menu section, and answer all 14 allergens — No, Contains or May contain. “Set the rest to No” saves time.
2. Add the ingredients — the app warns you if an ingredient mentions an allergen you have not ticked.
3. Food you make and pack before the customer orders (grab-and-go)? Switch on Prepacked for direct sale and print labels from More → Print PPDS labels.
4. Print the matrix for customers, and the customer notice for the till.
5. Change a recipe or supplier? Update the dish straight away — staff see it immediately and the change is kept in its history.

Staff, training and sickness

• Staff: add people, reset PINs, or switch off someone who has left. If you run more than one restaurant, you can add the same person to another one.
• Staff training: confirm what staff add, or add training yourself. Keep Level 2 certificate dates up to date.
• Sickness: the dashboard shows anyone off sick. After diarrhoea or vomiting the app will not let you sign them back before 48 hours symptom-free. Do the return-to-work check with them, ticking every point.

Rota, clocking in and pay (optional)

An administrator switches this on for your restaurant. You will then see Team & hours in the menu.

• Rota: pick the week, then add shifts — choose the person (you can rota yourself too), type an area (your own names, like FOH or BOH), tick the days and set the times. Tap + on any day to fill in the person and day for you. Tap a shift’s time to change it, or × to remove it. Copy last week fills an empty week. Each area gets its own tab. Reminders appear for long shifts with no break, short rest between shifts and weeks over 48 hours — nothing is forced.
• Shift swaps: staff can give away or swap their own shifts. By default it goes through when the colleague accepts and you get an alert; switch Manager approval on if you want to approve each one.
• Clock-in screen: switch it on to get a private link and QR code for a shared tablet. Staff tap their name and enter their PIN. Managers set a clock PIN under My account. If the link gets shared, make a new one.
• Timesheets: hours worked next to the rota. Fix a forgotten clock-out or add missed time — every change needs a reason and is logged. Staff can always clock in, but if a time doesn’t match the rota (not on it that day, more than 15 minutes early or late, or 30+ minutes over) you get an alert and it appears under Clock times to check — tap OK if it was agreed, or Fix.
• Hours & pay: view by pay period, week, month or your own dates. Hourly rates are optional: without them you see hours only; with them you also see wages, cost per hour, the rota’s planned cost, and charts by area and day. Set how often you pay (weekly, every 2 weeks or monthly). You can mark people as paid if you like. Download a spreadsheet for your payroll provider. Figures are gross pay only.
• If you manage more than one restaurant, each has its own rota — switch restaurant at the top. Hours & pay has an All my restaurants tab with combined figures.
• Only administrators can set or see other managers’ rates.

Pest control and maintenance

Record every pest control visit, equipment service or repair, and safety check. Add the next due date and the dashboard will remind you. Problems reported by staff appear here — write what was done and tap Mark as sorted.

When the inspector visits

1. Open SFBB pack — show your completed safe methods and the completion record.
2. Open Logs — pick the dates and print or download temperature, cooked food, delivery, cleaning and corrective action records.
3. Show the Diary, the 4-weekly review, the Allergens matrix, Staff training and Pest & maintenance.

Your account and restaurants

• Tap your name at the top right → My account to change your name, sign-in email (needs your password), password, your clock PIN for the shared clock-in screen and Appearance (light, dark or same as your device).
• Staff (under Set up): add people, reset PINs, or switch off someone who has left.
• More than one restaurant? Pick the restaurant at the top of any page — you stay on the same page, so you can flip between sites. The Daily summary shows every restaurant at a glance. Hours & pay has an All my restaurants tab with combined figures.
• Alerts collects everything that needs you.

Questions

Someone typed the wrong temperature.

Managers can use Correct in Logs and give a reason. The original reading and the reason are kept in the activity log.

A member of staff has left.

Open Staff and switch them off. Their records are kept.

We are in Scotland.

The app uses the 82°C reheating rule for restaurants set to Scotland. (In Scotland the equivalent pack is called CookSafe.)

Does it work without internet?

It needs a connection to save records. If the internet is down, write checks on paper and add a diary note when it is back.

Who can see what?

Staff see their restaurant’s records and their own training and sickness. Managers see everything for their restaurants. See the privacy notice.