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HotSchedules

HotSchedules

Overview

What is HotSchedules?

HotSchedules is a cloud-based scheduling, labor and communication management software solution serving the restaurant and hospitality industry.According to the vendor, key benefits include:Build & Communicate SchedulesThe scheduling and labor management software reduces the time it takes managers to create and…

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Recent Reviews

TrustRadius Insights

HotSchedules has become a reliable solution for businesses in various industries, including restaurants, amusement parks, resorts, and …
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HotSchedules

9 out of 10
January 27, 2020
Incentivized
HotSchedules is used across both our stores for scheduling and employee management. Employees are able to update when they want to work …
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HotSchedules review

7 out of 10
February 02, 2018
Incentivized
HotSchedules has given our company a chance to manage labor across the organization and the capability to compare labor strategies with …
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Awards

Products that are considered exceptional by their customers based on a variety of criteria win TrustRadius awards. Learn more about the types of TrustRadius awards to make the best purchase decision. More about TrustRadius Awards

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Pricing

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What is HotSchedules?

HotSchedules is a cloud-based scheduling, labor and communication management software solution serving the restaurant and hospitality industry. According to the vendor, key benefits include: Build & Communicate Schedules The scheduling and labor management…

Entry-level set up fee?

  • No setup fee

Offerings

  • Free Trial
  • Free/Freemium Version
  • Premium Consulting/Integration Services

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Alternatives Pricing

What is 7shifts?

7shifts is a restaurant workforce and scheduling management application, which also features collaboration features, from the Canadian company of the same name.

What is Lightspeed Restaurant?

The Lightspeed Restaurant POS, from Lightspeed in Montreal, is a restaurant POS and management system designed to enable users to sync the user's menu with major food delivery apps, manage all orders and and reach new customers.

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Product Demos

HotSchedules Demo: The Employee Experience

YouTube

HotSchedules Demo: Creating a New Schedule

YouTube

Demo of Red Book Keep

YouTube

HotSchedules Demo: Navigating the Schedule

YouTube

HotSchedules Demo: Employee Shift Release & Pick-Up

YouTube

HotSchedules Demo: Submitting Time-Off Requests

YouTube
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Product Details

What is HotSchedules?

HotSchedules is a cloud-based scheduling, labor and communication management software solution serving the restaurant and hospitality industry.

According to the vendor, key benefits include:

Build & Communicate Schedules

The scheduling and labor management software reduces the time it takes managers to create and communicate schedules. All scheduling and employee information is stored in one central location, so managers have access to time-off requests, availability, skill level, and certification compliance.

Work Schedule App

The HotSchedules mobile app lets employees check their schedule, request time off, swap shifts, manage availability, and send messages. All shift requests require a manager's approval.

Forecasting and Reporting

When integrated with the POS, the tool pulls time and attendance, sales and guest data into the system. The forecasting engine shows past sales trends, which makes it possible to build schedules with the right amount of labor. There are also over 40 reports.

Multi-Unit Store View

The Above Store Console provides reporting and visibility across stores, anywhere and at any time. It can be configured by region, state, country.

Bilingual App & Support

The mobile app is available in English & Spanish. Employees can call into the AVS or Customer Support Center to get their schedule in English or Spanish - 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

HotSchedules Features

  • Supported: Online Scheduler
  • Supported: Time-Off and Availbility
  • Supported: Work Schedule Mobile App
  • Supported: Scheduling Templates
  • Supported: Employee/Staff Communication
  • Supported: Sales and Labor
  • Supported: Forecasting Engine
  • Supported: Reporting
  • Supported: Point-of-Sale Integration
  • Supported: Centralized Communication
  • Supported: SMS Messaging

HotSchedules Screenshots

Screenshot of Time-Off, Availability, Employee Hours, Sales Volume are all available in the scheduler.Screenshot of Employees are able to swap and pick-up shifts from the HotSchedules Mobile App. All shift changes or requests require a manager's approval.Screenshot of Managers and employees can communicate with each other from the mobile and web apps - from anywhere and at anytime.Screenshot of Employees can submit a time-off, request - paid, or unpaid - and can request to work or request off right from the mobile app.Screenshot of Managers can view sales and labor data from their phone.

HotSchedules Video

HotSchedules Competitors

HotSchedules Technical Details

Deployment TypesSoftware as a Service (SaaS), Cloud, or Web-Based
Operating SystemsUnspecified
Mobile ApplicationApple iOS, Android, Windows Phone, Blackberry, Mobile Web
Supported LanguagesEnglish, Spanish

Frequently Asked Questions

When I Work and ScheduleFly are common alternatives for HotSchedules.

Reviewers rate Usability and Support Rating highest, with a score of 8.9.

The most common users of HotSchedules are from Mid-sized Companies (51-1,000 employees).
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Comparisons

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Reviews and Ratings

(232)

Community Insights

TrustRadius Insights are summaries of user sentiment data from TrustRadius reviews and, when necessary, 3rd-party data sources. Have feedback on this content? Let us know!

HotSchedules has become a reliable solution for businesses in various industries, including restaurants, amusement parks, resorts, and retail establishments. Users have reported significant time savings and improved efficiency in scheduling processes. For example, a restaurant manager praises HotSchedules for reducing their scheduling time from over 3 hours to just 30 minutes per week. This software enables employees to cover their own shifts with approval, allowing for better shift management and flexibility. It facilitates communication among team members, ensuring constant checking and trading of shifts in an amusement park setting. Multiple departments at a resort rely on the platform to handle last-minute schedule changes, call-offs, and requests for added shifts.

HotSchedules assists food and beverage departments by providing easy access to availability, time off requests, and labor forecasting. This improves communication between staff and management. The software's user-friendly interface allows for generating and posting weekly schedules effortlessly. It also serves as a means of communication with staff members across multiple locations within a restaurant group.

Moreover, HotSchedules Train formerly Schoox is utilized for employee orientation and training purposes. The software not only helps with controlling labor costs but also offers features like sales forecasting and labor cost analysis. Across organizations, HotSchedules proves valuable by assisting in proper staffing needs and managing labor expenses effectively. In retail settings, the product streamlines employee scheduling while enabling them to view their schedules easily and make shift swaps when necessary.

In conclusion, HotSchedules is highly regarded for its ability to save time, improve communication, increase flexibility in scheduling processes, and provide various features that benefit different departments within organizations. Its broad range of applications makes it suitable for businesses of all sizes across multiple industries.

Users highly recommend signing up for HotSchedules and getting familiar with the application. They also suggest using the convenient mobile app and setting up email notifications for easy access to schedules and efficient shift swapping. Additionally, users highly recommend HotSchedules as a reliable solution for scheduling needs in various work environments. Overall, they find HotSchedules to be a valuable tool for controlling expenses, allocating labor, improving communication, and making positive changes within the service industry.

Attribute Ratings

Reviews

(1-25 of 79)
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Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
It was across the board. It was nice for the staff - they could pick up and give up their shifts on their phones so that they did not have to come into work. They also knew when there were shifts to be picked up for big parties. It stopped them from clocking in before their shift started.
  • Online/cell phone shift changes.
  • Automatic updates.
  • Linking schedule with POS system.
  • Printouts for daily schedules, older managers had difficulty reading who picked up for who, if the shifts were all picked up.
  • Could have more ease of use for the older generation.
It is well suited for the restaurant where schedules are always changing. It would not be useful with a business with mainly set schedules. It would also work well with people in different locations so that everyone could easily access it.
January 27, 2020

HotSchedules

Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
HotSchedules is used across both our stores for scheduling and employee management. Employees are able to update when they want to work and hours etc. Management can then approve or deny those requests and schedule as needed. HotSchedules puts the employees in charge of their schedule and shifts so that management can focus on other things.
  • Scheduling.
  • Time off.
  • Labor management.
  • Pick-up shifts AI management.
HotSchedules is great for managing hours, shifts, employee schedules, time off, etc. Leaders at our stores have had options of moving to other tools, but have continued to stay with HotSchedules at it works the best it seems. It is hard sometimes with shift pick-up as leadership has to approve every drop and pick-up. I wish drops were automatically approved, and then there was an algorithm when picking up shifts was approved based on duration of employment and age (so minors can't).
Nathan Miller | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
It is being utilized in my organization for scheduling and forecasting. It addresses any holes in scheduling and cost analysis.
  • Makes everything paperless.
  • Very user-friendly for back office and staff.
  • Can really dive deep into data and sales and what you are spending.
  • The schedule view was much better before it changed.
Well suited for any staff especially restaurants or larger than 20 staff members. Makes all digital- Notes, messages and goes right to their email or phone which ever they have set up.
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Each of our full-service locations utilizes HotSchedules as a tool to minimize labor expense and a communication tool with our team.
  • Communication with team members
  • Enforce time and attendance with POS to control labor expense
  • Communication among managers
  • Tracking staff performance issues
  • Keeping up permits
  • Does not tie labor/schedule postings to budget; too easy for managers to override
  • Messages are not easily accessible
  • Above store reporting tools are outdated; should be able to schedule reports
For small to medium-sized companies HotSchedules works great when business is very static. If you are simply using HotSchedules for a schedule writing tool, it is phenomenal. However, it does miss the mark as a labor control software. Needs more controls to keep managers aware of spending versus historical sales data.
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
HotSchedules is used by our operations team department, including all of our part-time staff. Some of our business leaders have an account to simply utilize the messaging tools that HotSchedules offers, though it is not used for scheduling purposes or finance purposes seeing as they have a more gridline schedule. HotSchedules has helped our team remain connected through the messaging tool, updates, and changes to their schedules, and keeping track of their attendance. It has also streamlined the time keeping process as we utilize the time and attendance module of HotSchedules and utilize their time clock feature for our team to clock in and out. Given it's a webpage it gives the freedom to move the clock to where our team meetings to start the work day are.
  • Communication is so simple on HotSchedules. Whether it is communicating a new schedule release, or a quick note about tonight's shift we as managers are able to easily communicate and know that it will reach our team through text notifications, or email notifications.
  • The Meal Break planning tool is very useful in being able to help our floor leaders clearly understand and plan for what breaks are needed throughout the shift. This allows them to come up with a strategic game plan quickly and spend more time with our guests.
  • Shift Swaps and Releases are so seamless. This is our favorite tool as it makes helping our team cover shifts extremely easy and painless. On the flip side it also makes staff who want more hours be able to find what is available in real time.
  • Breaks and Meals: On the time clock we are limited with meals and breaks. If someone has a 4-7.99 hour shift we give them a 20 minute paid rest break. If the employee reaches an 8-hour shift they are given 2 15 minute rest breaks and a 30-minute meal. Meal and Break set up cannot understand changing the breaks. We had it set up to add a 10-minute break to equal 30 minutes when you reach the 8th hour, however, the time clock when they click "Start Break" still gives them 20 minutes on both breaks leaving confusion.
  • The Availability module has a few issues we have noticed. When a new employee is set to start a new availability it does not change in the scheduler. The Scheduler still holds the old staff members availability making it challenging for the scheduler to schedule appropriately.
  • We believe a late or missed schedule report should be available to print easier reports for time and attendance tracking. Currently having to go through each staff's punch is not as smooth as it could be. This seems to be a simple addition to a great arsenal of reports.
HotSchedules can be implemented in any organization that has to staff a store with varying hours. I have recommended this to my colleague who has 8 employees, yet he has seen great results with the shift swaps and availability tracking/time off requests. I do wish we could see some more attention to general staffing and training VS. the heavy emphasis on restaurant businesses. It feels HotSchedules has grown into many more areas and should work away from marketing so directly to restaurant businesses. Some training programs for other business would be a welcome sight.
Score 7 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
HotSchedules is currently being using across our whole organization. We use HotSchedules for our employee scheduling as well as our time cards. Before Hotschedules we were using Excel spreadsheets to schedule employees, this is by far a better system. It allows for employees to take the responsibility into their own hands. It allows for the employee to set their availability on their own without a drawn-out process of contacting a manager and sitting down with them. It allows the employee to find coverage for their shift, again without intervention from a manager beyond approving the shift change through HotSchedules. The employee can also use it to request time off before we were using a Google Form that the manager would have to check for new submissions and move the information over to their Excel spreadsheet schedule.
  • All the information needed for your employees can all be found in one place. From the availability of an employee to their pay rate to their phone number. It's all just a click away. Before HotSchedules all of this information was kept in different places and the managers would need to open several documents and contact lists to find what they were looking for about a single employee.
  • Control over how indepth you use the product. The possibilities of this service are seemingly endless. However if you are solely looking for a specific feature HotSchedules offers you have the ability to soley use that feature. HotSchedules can simply schedule, or it can automatically schedule, or you can assign a specific job to a specific person on a specific day. For us, we have employees who are doing a specific job/task one week and then they are needed for a different job/task the next week. HotSchedules allowed us to narrow down our options starting with department, moving to location, moving down to the job they would be preforming for that scheduled day.
  • The ease of changing/releasing shifts. If an employee wants more hours they can go in and select shifts that are up for grabs or request to work on a specific day at a specific time. The opposite is also true. If an employee is worried they will have too many hours that week, they can release their shift and put it up for grabs by a different employee. And of course, all of this is fairly customizable to what you want your employees to have the ability to do, with or without your intervention and approval. In our case, if a shift lead releases a shift we only want other shift leads to be able to pick up the shift. HotSchedules allows us to do just that.
  • Clocking In and out can be a little slow. It takes longer to clock in then our previous method. Before we just had a card you swiped and it would clock you in. Took 2 seconds. Now with the Hotschdules method we use it take 30 seconds or so. Not a huge issue but it can add up if you have one computer and a line of employees waiting to clock in.
  • Time Cards. It does not allow you to view someones current time until the "punch" has ended. If the manager would like to check what time the employee clocked in/out from lunch they have to wait until the employee has clocked out for the day before the record is generated. As a shift lead you may send and employee to lunch but forget to note what time you sent them. Awhile passes and you feel like they should be back by now, so you want to go in and see what time they left for lunch but it does not show you that punch record because the employee is still "clocked in" they are just on their "Meal Break"
  • The ability to customize the restrictions for Clocking in and out. You can set it up so that employees can only clock in from a specific location, however if you have a manager who is allowed to work from home they would not be able to clock in without being at the same location as set in the software. It would be nice to see it able to be customized per user.
It is very well suited for the restaurant industry, sometimes I think almost too much. If you are not in the restaurant industry it seems there are some features that you won't be able to/won't have a need to utilize. If HotSchedules can integrate into your point of sale it becomes even more useful and you can use it to analyze sales, etc.
Shannon Carpenter | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We previously used HotSchedules when implementing 4 shifts across our production and packaging groups. We went from 1 shift M-Th, to 2 shifts M-Th, then added 2 additional 30 hour F-Su shifts. We also used it for our warehousing and sanitation crews. We had a change in our business and started to fall away from its use. Now that we are growing again, we are reimplementing its use and will also use it for clocking in and out, as well as tracking employee training and certifications. Having the ability to print hours reports to do daily labor analysis by project as well as tracking training are both incredibly valuable and help us stay on top of costs by being able to do daily labor analysis.
  • HotSchedules tracks our labor hours and dollars. Being able to do quick labor analysis helps us make sure our pricing is in line with our estimates for clients.
  • HotSchedules tracks our employee trainings. Because we are a third party audited food manufacturing facility, we have both formal certifications (CA Food Handler Cards) and monthly trainings on subjects such as Food Safety, GMP's, Pest Control, Allergen Control, HACCP and Sanitation. Being able to have a record easily accessible for each employee to prove to our auditors and keep those employees up to date with training is invaluable as an organizational tool.
  • I find that the system of assigning jobs and rates is a little tedious, but understand the need for it.
  • I'm not familiar enough with the copy and setting the next week's schedule, but it's not necessarily hard to use.
  • The whole assigning welcome letter and with log in and password is difficult with the Spanish speakers even though you have a Spanish version.
  • Many of our employees do not have email or smart phones, so I find that HotSchedules is not as useful to them or us.
Absolutely appropriate for restaurant workers. Less so for manufacturing, but it does gather the labor data effectively when everyone logs in properly.
January 26, 2018

Great Program!

Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We use HotScedules for employee schedules and maintaining time off throughout the business.
  • Well Organized
  • Easy Setup
  • A better layout for the employees to view their schedule
HotSchedules is perfect for contacting every employee through the inbox rather than searching their emails on a different site.
January 25, 2018

HotSchedules Review

Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
HotSchedules is used by our whole organization. The primary reason we use it is to provide employees a reliable and effective way to see when they are scheduled to work. It also is useful in that it allows employees to add their availability as well as request days off. This is extremely useful when it comes to scheduling employees to suit there wants/needs.
  • Provides employees with an effective mobile application to view their schedule whenever they need to.
  • Allows employees to add availability and request days off.
  • Allows other employees to see other co-workers schedules so they know who they work with.
  • Allow companies to set up different departments within hotschedules, without constantly having to give employees different hotschedule logins.
Hotschedules is well suited when it comes to providing employees a reliable way to get their schedules. It also helps with holding employees accountable for coming to work.
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
The entire organization uses the product to manage ski area employees. I used it in my department. It addresses the employees ability to know their schedule as well as trade shifts and communicate with the manager. it did help keep folks accountable to their schedule and lets me deal with other issues that before we used the app, had to be addressed by me to find replacements for shifts.
  • It helps with schedule shift trades and publishes the entire schedule for each day so folks can tell who is on shift and when. It enables a staff of mostly teenagers to be able to contact me and help them with any issue regarding scheduling and HR issues they needed to approach me with from time to time.
  • It enables the manager to force the employee to be responsible for their attendance.
  • Saves time in dealing with shift exchanges and various requests dealing with time off and so on.
  • It is extremely difficult to use for my weekly set up. because our shift times differed from the other two resorts that used it, the time slots for when shifts started were different due to different operating hours. Because I had to put in different availability times I had to drag and drop each employee (73 of them) on to the shifts. Because they were not seen as available the program would not show them in the drop down to easily select them as being available for the highlighted shift box
  • If I was able to set up my own shift start times for a.m. and p.m and those parameters for myself versus having to have our rep be contacted to see if the change was possible. On our end, the call never was made and I had to spend a lot of time dragging and dropping each week. I did re-use schedules but with so many folks needing different days each week it ended up being less of a shift change and hey you forgot ..... fight that I dragged and dropped each week.
  • I think simplifying the system for availibilties and letting the user set them up themselves (like campground master reservation system) would have been great. the time I spent each week would have come from the initial set up phase and would have saved time down the road.
It seems well suited for the employee user end, so they can work with their manager and be accountable for their schedule. I think you can better adapt it to non-restaurant settings by increasing the ease of use for the scheduler with lots of employees. The difficulty is for the person making the schedule if it has been adapted to a different setting. Universal shift parameters which can be set up by each scheduler on their own, without having to have the app provider make the changes on their end to meet each need is what would make it really great to use. I did like it, it really helped me save time and put shift trades back on the person who was working the shift.
January 25, 2018

HotSchedules Review

Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
My company uses HotSchedules for scheduling all of our staff at all of our locations. As well as tracking our revenue and labor percentages via integration with the micros system that we use in our stores.
  • Makes scheduling easy and simple
  • Integrates well with other systems
  • Can easily be used to set up sales forecasts based on previous weeks and or years
  • Deleting old employees is more complicated then it needs to be.
  • Often times it won't allow employees to log on, saying it has an error
It's great for scheduling large amounts of staff.
January 24, 2018

Amazing HotSchedules

Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We use HotSchedules to schedule employees; follow up with changes in schedules and SMS employees, and for payroll budget accordingly with sales forecasts.
  • Payroll Budget
  • Sales Forcast
  • Cash handling
  • Sales target
  • HotSchedules App
  • Missed punch alert to employees
  • Blocking employees for a full 30-min break
  • When employees clock in late the manager should be notified via SMS
Caleb Cochrun | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
It is being used by our home office employees that are mobile and in the field for the WebClock. They aren't able to clock in at any restaurant of ours so we needed a mobile app that could track hours and compile data for us.
  • Very user-friendly
  • Customer service is very nice, patient, and willing to help right away
  • Hotschedules is a very slick looking site/application
  • I don't like that even as the admin in the above store console that I don't have access to turn on/off all features. Even for users below me. I need to contact customer service and they have to do it which just creates a lag.
  • I don't know the features that are available sometimes because they aren't activated right away for some reason, and to my point above, I have to reach out to someone else to see what they are/activate them.
  • The automated reporting isn't very robust, I really need to be able to have an automated report that can give me individual employees' hours for a week not just by job code.
Hotschedules is accessible by anyone, anywhere which is great. The lag between adding features as I stated before is a set back though and the inability to modify automated reports [is as well]. A, so the format in which most reports export to Excel is very messy and cannot be changed which is a pain to deal with sometimes.
January 22, 2018

Hot Schedules

Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Hot schedules is used company wide within our organizations. It is used to create a one-stop shop for all team members needing to check their schedules, trade shifts, request days off, change availability, etc. It has an additional function allowing team members to clock in but we do not currently use this function.
  • Easy to read schedule any time you need it
  • Can change availability for schedule writer whenever I want
  • Ability to swap shifts or pick up days with other team members
  • We do not use the clock in function
  • Sends a lot of notifications
  • No way to limit how much team members can swap around
Hot Schedules is good for a medium-sized business looking for an easy way for team members to access their schedules. The app is also very easy to use and is available on nearly any smartphone. There are many functions featured own the app and the user can pick and choose what they want to use.
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We use it for hourly and management employee scheduling. We also use it for a lot of our intercompany communications - especially broad announcements that we need to get out to many people very quickly. HotSchedules is also great for keeping track of employee certifications. HotSchedules allows us to maintain a healthy sense of accountability, since all communications are easily referred to.
  • Group communication
  • Certification tracking
  • Employee accountability
  • Schedule layouts can be difficult to read
  • Slow response when editing schedule blocks
  • Messaging center could be more elegantly designed and user-friendly
Great for scheduling across various departments. The ease with which you can build discrete employee blocks is particularly useful. Also, HotSchedules provides easy to use group messaging features that correspond to specific employee blocks. HotSchedules' history features also make it easy to track employee performance - attendance, punctuality, certifications, etc.
Score 2 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We are using it to schedule employees for a coffee shop and to time punch.
  • The app works well for employees
  • It is easy to copy and use schedules
  • Hot Schedules is too complicated for a 1-3 shop environment
  • It defaults to not having an ending time on a shift....who does that??
  • It is not easy enough to delete some of the layers---i.e. we have a manager who is scheduled on the floor and we want others to be able to see her hours and when she is working, so we can't use multiple schedules or else the supervisors would not be able to see her
  • In my "day" job, we operate over 50 franchise restaurants and I always wanted to use Hot Schedules which is why I tried it for this consulting gig I have.....unfortunately, it seems they have not stayed up with the technology currently being offered in this category
Well suited for a full-service restaurant environment with multiple locations. Less suited for fast casual or fast food or a single store owner.
Score 6 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We use HotSchedules for shift scheduling and timecards, initially for our tasting room but now for the whole business. We had previously used paper timecards, so this is a big step forward for the company. We have a mix of salaried and hourly employees, and to my knowledge all hourly employees track their time through HotSchedules.
  • Ability for field employees to clock in and out on their phones
  • Easy management of staff and timecards by managers
  • Easily altered options for various levels of staff
  • Robust reporting options
  • Reliance on internet connections can sometimes be an issue with HotSchedules, given our rural location, this is an issue with all SAAS suites however.
  • We have only one account for our many departments, which means we occasionally run into issues using some features, as each department operates differently but our options in HotSchedules must be the same.
  • A minor pet peeve, but I would love it if, when I was altering employee's punch in/out times, that the date/time would not reset until I hit the "submit" button. Sometimes a man just wants to make changes in his own order.
  • Support for a card-based timecard solution.
  • Ability to host a local instance on our own servers
HotSchedules is ideal for our hospitality team, but can be a bit of a hurdle for our production department at times, particularly when we have a lot of people trying to clock in at once - when the system is down or moving slowly, it can bleed us of up to 10 minutes of productivity in the morning, which can have a big impact on our days.
December 20, 2017

Hot Schedules...Worth It

Score 7 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We currently utilize HotSchedules for all of our scheduling needs at a location level. This allows the management team and the associates to interact with the schedule outside of the location. As an administrator I am able to see requests off and schedule updates without needing to be at the location.
  • The app is very user friendly.
  • Once you create your schedule templates, scheduling becomes increasingly easier.
  • The chat feature is very valuable.
  • We have 30+ locations. We sometimes “borrow” associates from location to location to cover shifts. As of now the borrowed associates do not always show up on the schedule. This has caused associates to miss shifts.
  • We do not utilize it yet, but not being able to clock in unless you are on the schedule seems like an issue waiting to happen.
The app absolutely sells this product. It’s well made and easy to use. When actually creating a schedule more needs to be done for allowing a company less rigid options for transferring associates.
December 20, 2017

Hotschedules is great!

Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We use it for our employees work schedule and any messages that need to be sent out. Our employees are also able to track their hours worked and we are able to use check lists to keep up with weekly/daily duties. This allows us to be accountable within management and for our staff to be accountable. We have been much more organized since using hotschedules.
  • Hotschedules is very easy to navigate making it usable by everyone!
  • Hotschedules makes staying organized easy!
  • We can reach every single employee at any given moment with important information through hotschedules!
  • We just had an update to our time clock and we don’t like it. It takes longer for our management and team to clock in and out and has added steps that could be more simplified, though we do like seeing hours worked so far.
Hotschedules is well suited for our team to stay connected and organized. We also can stay on the same page with any information that we need to keep current in our ever-changing schedule. I think for our use it is appropriate and not sure how it would ever be less appropriate.
December 13, 2017

Hot, Hot, HotSchedules!

Score 7 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
HotSchedules is used across our entire company to make scheduling at each individual location more personalized. It helps keep the location up to date with the most recent schedule changes and since we are in an industry working with primarily first time job holders and high school students, it helps bridge the gap of having to contact each employee whenever a schedule change occurs or if they need to swap shifts or take an unexpected day off. I think some of the best features are how interactive both the application for mobile devices and the browser version are and that they update in real time as soon as a change is made with a push notification to everyone assigned at my location.
  • The template system for shifts that occur every day at our location and that I can drag and drop them to ensure that I am meeting our company’s staffing guidelines are a huge plus for me.
  • The ability for employees to handle shift change on their own with my approval so I am kept in the loop but not having to constantly log on every time an associate calls me with an unexpected need to change their schedule is a nice feature.
  • The mobile application is ten times greater than the previous program we were using to generate a schedule. It is very interactive and allows me to do almost everything from the convenience of my smartphone or tablet.
  • My biggest complaints are just bug fixes that were supposed to be pros of the product. Right now there is a bug that has gone on since we rolled out the product at our company that does not allow us to share employees between locations for employees needing to cover a shift or transfer to another location for an extended period of time.
  • I would really like to see them add the actual schedule creation into the mobile application or at least be able to create the schedule on a mobile browser to eliminate the need to use my home computer. If I could generate a schedule from my phone or tablet, I would be able to make any necessary changes on the fly and it would not necessarily interrupt my time off or when I am not at the location.
I think it is very appropriate in our industry. Being that we work in a retail industry it is perfect for employees to see when they are scheduled and be able to control their schedule on their own if needed. I think it will strive for businesses with multiple outlets or locations, such as ours, that have hundreds of employees spread out throughout many locations. I think it could still be useful for even smaller companies that may hire fewer employees on a regular basis, I just don’t know if the trade-off for the cost of the product would outweigh the fact that not all of the perks that HotSchedules is capable of doing for someone that may not need to keep track of only a few employees.
Nora Leuck | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Hotschedules was initially more widely used by the company to manage scheduling and hourly employees. I kept track of my staff and their hours and set and managed scheduled time. We used the clock in feature, which I liked because we could sign on remotely to clock in. Now we have to clock in at a store location, no more remote access to the clock in feature. I am now a salaried employee and do not clock-in any longer. I found the program easy to navigate and enjoyed using it.
  • Ease of setting a schedule.
  • If the schedule is repeated week after week, it is easy to copy it with out rewriting the whole thing.
  • Fast, easy reference to who is clocked in. Easy to check my weekly hours for my team and keep it under control.
  • Messaging feature was very handy.
  • Ability to delete old employees and reuse the assigned sign in number at the end of a fiscal year.
  • Really had few complaints.
The writing of schedules for a sizable staff for a retail of restaurant setting - well suited. It has the ability to send out the schedule to staff and communicate with staff. I really liked that. It gives good oversight of daily/weekly hours to watch your salary dollars.
Easy to contact staff about a change in hours or availability of extra shifts.
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized

It is used in a multiple departments as a way to efficiently schedule about 180 employees. It helps address the accessibility of the schedule to our employees and allows for quick response to covering shifts and broadcasting essential information to our employees. It has reduced the amount of time needed to complete schedules as well as in finding coverage for shifts.

The logbook is also a very important aspect of HotSchedules that we use on a daily basis to convey messages between Managers and record the days events.

  • The release/swap function is really a well thought out idea that allows employees the freedom to adapt their schedule if necessary and managers the control to see what is going on with the shifts and where things can be improved.
  • The Logbook is one of the strongest attributes of HotSchedules because it allows all the information of day-to-day operations to be in one spot and can be accessed by all management.
  • The not allowing of shifts to be picked up if there are overlapping hours is very problematic and should be at the discretion of the manager to watch for these things, not the system.
  • The app should have the ability for managers to see and edit schedules. It would improve the versatility of the app and allow for better access outside of the office.
  • If a manager could add jobs, locations, and schedules to an employee while in the scheduler instead of moving out the scheduler and to the staff list to edit the availability it would make for a more flawless application of the scheduler and the jobs.

HotSchedules is well suited for a business that has more than 15 employees and wants to improve their staffing. It gives the employee ready access to their schedule on their phone instead of having to call in to work or find a printed schedule.

It would not be as well suited for a smaller business that sees the majority of its employees on a daily basis and can convey major topics with them in person.

Jose Lopez | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 4 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We use HotSchedules to schedule FOH and BOH employees - the entire restaurant's work force.
  • Schedule posting and organization, obviously
  • Integrates with Micros so I can lock the schedule and avoid punching in early by employees
  • HotSchedules interface could stand to be more pliable. I run a twenty four hour business. My business day starts at 8am one day and ends at 8am the next day. It is virtually impossible to schedule overnight employees because the system recognizes the shift as the next day. Before the recent upgrade, it was much easier to schedule. When I inquired about going back to the old software, I was just told no. Now I'm looking for alternative programs
  • The budgeting tool is a mystery and is very rigid. It's based on a single type of schedule based on days of the week and business levels.
  • Any requests for training gets routed back to the online videos which neither provide any real training and there's no ability to ask questions in real time.
  • No up-to-the-minute information. You have to wait until the next day to see who is approaching overtime. I would love to get a text whenever an employee is approaching overtime, not based on a report.
  • No on-boarding software. No tip integration. No payroll intergration.
I would like real time reports based on the schedule and sales.
Score 7 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We use the application to schedule all team members in our retail sites. [It] Gives everyone a platform to use on their devices to stay update with schedules and make any modifications when needed.
  • Shift swapping
  • Picking up house shifts
  • Able to access schedule from just about anywhere that has internet access
  • I don't work with the scheduling anymore so I have not used it since that last couple of updates. I now just manage accounts.
HotSchedules is great for the restaurants because there are so many moving pieces and generally there are very few that have "set" schedules. It is easy to adjust by using the forecasting tools. If a company had a large employee base but all schedules are basically set or the same HotSchedules would not be as useful a tool.
Score 6 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
It is currently only being used by the front of house staff and management. The kitchen is reluctant to use it. It does provide the FOH staff with easy access to their schedule from their mobile device. Management does not like the way a schedule prints out and finds it a bit hard to read, but overall, it is worthwhile.
  • Mobile access to schedules is key for the FOH employees.
  • As an owner who does not do the scheduling, I do appreciate being able to bring up my phone and look at the roster to know who is working and when.
  • Tracking availability schedules and food handler certs are certainly very helpful.
  • HotSchedules should move away from being connected to companies that promote stealing other employees. Jobsabi was not appreciated by this employer whatsoever.
  • Reporting - especially the posted schedule - is hard to read and doesn't have many options for different layouts
  • Give us the ability to hide past employees in the employee listing. It's ridiculous to have to see terminated or inactive employees.
Well suited for changing schedules and flexibility required by the front of house restaurant staff. Well suited for keeping track of certificates and availability. Definitely not necessary where schedules are more set and don't change much - a spreadsheet works great and the cost of HotSchedules is not necessary.
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