Article Contents
Introduction
To monitor costs, you can set alerts for when POS Items go above a set cost percentage.
After setting your cost alert levels, you’ll receive email notifications any time those POS Items exceed the alert threshold.
This could be due to:
A change in the menu price in the POS
Changing the ingredients in a POS Item
An invoice where the cost of an ingredient has increased
Make sure you've set users to receive the POS Item Cost Alert email under Email Report Permissions.
Note: You can also set cost alerts for individual items. To learn more, see:
Adding a POS Item Cost Alert
Individual POS Item
To set a cost alert for a POS Item:
From the POS Items page, place your cursor over a POS Item and click the edit button
Click into the “Cost Alert” field and enter the cost percentage you want the alert to trigger at (it will accept up to 2 decimal places)
The Cost Alert for the POS Item has now been set. When the cost percentage meets or exceeds the alert level, designated users in the venue receive an email notification
Multiple POS Items
To add cost alerts to multiple POS Items at a time:
Click the checkbox beside each POS Item
On the menu that appears, there are two options
Cost Alert - Use this to add a set cost percentage for each selected item. For example, if you put in "25", each item would have a cost alert of 25%
Relative Cost Alert - Use this to add a percentage on top of each POS Item's current cost percentage. For example, entering "5" would set a cost alert for each item that is 5% higher than its current cost percentage
Enter a value based on your chosen cost alert method then click outside the field
Click "OK" on the confirmation window
The cost alerts apply to the selected items. In this example we used the Relative Cost Alert and entered a value of 5. The cost alert for each selected item is set to 5% above the current cost percentage
Removing a POS Item Cost Alert
To remove a POS Item Cost Alert from one or more items:
Click the checkbox beside each POS Item
Click "Clear Cost Alert" on the menu that appears
Click "OK"
The cost alert is removed from the POS Item(s)
Note: You can also go into individual POS Items and set the cost alert as 0 to remove it
POS Item Cost Alert Notifications
In the email notification you’ll see all affected POS Items along with the:
Alert level %
The cost percentage before the change
The cost percentage after the change
The current menu price and updated cost
Note: As a reminder, this email only goes to designated recipients. You can manage which users receive the notification under Email Report Permissions.
The PLU Number column includes a link to each POS Item. You can also click the link below the table to go to the POS Items page.
By going to the POS Items page we can learn more about what caused the increase.
We see that the cost percentage has increased for the Cheeseburger POS Item, and by clicking on the edit button we can see more details.
In this example, we added an invoice with Ground Beef at $7.99/lb, which increased the cost of the Cheeseburger POS Item by 2.5%. When viewing the POS Item, you can also set a new cost alert level.
Above Cost Alert Filter
To help spot POS Items that are above their cost alert level, toggle on the "Above cost alert" predefined filter.
All POS Items where the current cost percentage is greater than the cost alert display.
View Alert History
To see the history of cost alerts sent for a POS Item, click the "History" tab.
This shows every time the cost percentage went above the alert level and an email was sent.
Cost Percentage Above 100%
Even if you haven't set any alerts, if the cost percentage of a POS Item goes above 100%, a banner displays at the top of the POS Items page.
This typically indicates an issue with either the:
Mapping, where the cost of the ingredients exceeds the menu price of the POS Item. For example if an ingredient is added as 1 unit instead of 1oz.
Item cost. This may be from a recently added invoice where the cost of the item was added incorrectly. For example, if the cost of a case was input as the cost of an individual unit.
Clicking the banner applies the "Cost % higher than 100%" predefined filter.
By viewing the POS Items you can determine the reason and fix as needed.
To learn more, see: