Reduce Receiving Runarounds

Secure your back door: Put an alarm on the delivery door. This will alert management to any tampering as well as promote an organized receiving system, since the deliverer must ring a bell from the outside. For security purposes, only one or two managers should have a key to the door, and you should not turn off the alarm and use the door to go in and out.

Restrict delivery hours: Schedule deliveries after lunch. It puts less pressure on the vendors and ensures that the chef is more organized to get things started for the following day. Later deliveries can save on labor costs, too. If you have an early delivery scheduled and the food is not there first thing in the morning, you have employees there who have to find something else to do. If the deliveries are scheduled for the morning but come at night, you wind up paying overtime to daytime workers who are rushing to put things away.

Create a checklist: Record every item and its price on separate purchase orders and use these to check against delivery invoices. That way you will avoid being charged for items you did not order.

Compare prices: Keep records of contracted prices and compare them with delivery invoices. You can save money immediately by watching the price of every item.

Weigh items: Keep a scale by the door to weigh products bought by the pound. A scale is the biggest weapon against being overcharged.

Check the temperature: It's important to take the temperature of perishable foods as soon as they arrive. If an item is not the proper temperature, send it back with the delivery person.

Store perishables immediately: Every hour a product sits out, it is losing shelf life. It is very important that a product get weighed in and put away immediately.

Source: Bread and Butter; National Restaurant Association; Volume 6, Issue 1; January 2002.