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The Buffet Scam

Video Surveillance
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The Series
The Buffet Scam

Suggestive Stealing

and
The Scoundrels

Houston…We Have A Problem
and
Putting Them On Ice

Leftovers

Evil Incorporated

The Recycled Check Maneuver

The Verbal Totals Scam

The Handwritten Checks Scam

The "Playing it off" Scam

Friendly Delivery

The Private Reserve

The Pawn Game

Oops! Wrong Check!
and
Our Man In Amsterdam

Extra! Extra! Read All About It!
and
The Potemkin Voucher

The Package Deal
and
The Finishing Touches

The Wagonwheel

The Wagonwheel
This is the separate check scam in which food is moved from the original check to newly created seats and then checks are reprinted for extra money.

Recommended Aloha system process:

Monitor check reprints and split checks by waiter in the BOH Aloha Audit Report. Use this report to verify functionality is at acceptable operation levels and that no specific employee falls outside normal processes. Generally the establishment will have a consistent ratio from employee to employee. If an employee falls outside that realm they may need to be monitored or spot checked.1

Enterprise.com provides an audit exception report that provides details on how many split checks and split off items of those checks occurred by each employee.

Enterprise.com also shows transfer check counts. All of these can be in a report form or an alert that would be sent to the manager.

The “Required Category / Category Count” setting can be enabled to prevent checks from being closed without appropriate items. If the establishment feels that waiters may be passing checks with common ordered items, such as beverages or salads, and passing them off to multiple guests, the “Category Count” feature in Aloha can be enabled to prevent checks being closed without such items. Category Count or Required Category on a check makes the waiter enter an item such as a beverage or “no beverage” on every check. The waiter would not be able to close a check without the beverage or “no beverage” item.2

Waiter performance measures should be set up on the system. Aloha provides the ability for management to monitor server performance through performance measures. Performance measures allow for tracking of sales targets and comparisons against objectives of each measure. You can define up to 99 performance measures. These measures can be easily viewed on the FOH server sales report or checkout report. It would be recommended to configure a “Sales Category to Guest” or Sales Category to Check” performance measures by waiter job code on the Aloha software. The Sales Categories would contain the most routinely ordered or most popular customer items. This way management can spot check any specific percentage discrepancies that look to be out of range. If a certain waiter has a low sales percentage in this performance measure, then corrective action and monitoring should take place.3

Managers should routinely visually spot check tables and review corresponding waiter checks for accurate items, including order time of items.

1 Reference: Chapter 5 – Aloha Reports Guide for Audit Reporting.
2
Reference: Chapter 3 in the Aloha TableService Manual for Store Settings/Category Counts.
3
Reference: Chapter 4 in the Aloha QuickService & TableService Manuals for Performance Measure Configuration.

Excerpted from "How to Burn Down the House: The Infamous Waiter and Bartender's Scam Bible by Two Bourbon Street Waiters" by Peter Francis & R. Chip Deglinkta. © 2003 Promethian Books

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Aloha Makes it Easy
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Stay In Touch With Us
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    please contact Abacus at
info@abacuspos.com.