Ordering system for sandwiches etc..

[john_spencer]

Hello everybody! I could need some advice about the following situation:
Since short, in our company we have the possibility to order sandwiches/dishes from a caterer on friday. there are over 100 employees and this takes up way too much time. I would like to automate this system a bit. Maybe some of you could give me help.
The idea is this:

Every department (average 7-10 pple) has a list with the available sandwiches/dishes/desserts,... With a mouseclick, the items on this list are copied to a separate file (Notepad or something simple). Every department sends this file to the secretary, and she mails the lists to the caterer.
After delivery (packaged separately per department), they can sort out amongst themselves who ordered what.

Any tips are greatly appreciated!!

Thanks, JS

[DaveLembke]

A transactional Database with a web user interface or Access Database with Visual Basic etc for the user interface to shared database is easiest method in which a report can be generated in the end with all sorts of info. You can basically make an internal point of sale system, generate a report that has the order info, fax this to caterer after printing it, and then perform another print out that has everyones orders by department and that then would be broken down into employee names with totals due etc. Also would be beneficial to add a certain percentage to cover the tip to the caterer etc.

Then your only left dealing with making sure everyone paid 

The biggest reason why you need it to be a transactional system is because if everyone is in say an Excel order form document 2 people open at the same time to the shared location by which this single document resides, Bob orders his Sub and saves and closes the worksheet order form, and then Doug edits his copy and then saves his order, Bobs order is now gone as for Dougs information overwrote Bobs changes.

HTML Forms are a good interface for users, but you would need to have a system to handle all the information received, and options to handle this information are ( send to e-mail or send to database ) pretty much. And the send to e-mail wouldnt help you much since thats the issue you have now.

Does your workplace have somone able of creating a transactional database for everyone to access through a neat user interface with drop down menu's etc of what the caterer can create? If you do, your all set. Otherwise I am not sure if anyone here would make one for free or not. Its a pretty involved project to make interface for the menu and then the database.

Its too bad your caterer doesnt make a website with ability to order. If they already have one, then see if they can add a feature for your company to process group ordering.

I use to support a food store chain that had a catering department and supported a product called Cheftec, a program for keeping track of the Catering Department as well as processing orders. Problem is that its not cheap software and requires to be installed on a server with SQL database.

[john_spencer]

Thanks for your reply.  You sound like a pretty smart guy! 

I'm following you (for the most part anyway), but I could not make such a system.   Neither would my boss like it if I hassled up one of the IT guys for this.   A bit more simple would also be sufficient.   What would work is some sort of hyperlink that, when clicked, copies the item into an email/notepad/word document. 
There is a person per department responsible for the financial side.  There will be no problem there.  They will pay when they collect the order for their department, or no food! :-)  By the way, I'm in Europe, Caterers here make A LOT of money without tips :-)

I like your professional approach very much.   Actually you are lightyears ahead of me...   but there is no need for an individual system.  The list could be available on 1 computer per department, everybody takes 2 mins to order, and goes back to their own space. 
Basically speaking, I could open the product list next to an empty email, and everybody could just copy/paste their order to that email.  But It would be nice to have a system that's more automated.

Thanks, JS
 

[DaveLembke]

Glad to be of assistance.

- If ordering per department
- And each department has its own Excel Spreadsheet Order Form Name
- And only one computer is used to process the order per department so that all orders are saved under the same file name and none are lost due to overwriting.

You could then access this Excel Spreadsheet and print out a page per department that also tallies up the amount due as attached. I put some test data in and set the tax to 9% which is our meals tax where I live. You can adjust it any way you want to add/remove features.

I am thinking that if you have say 8 departments ordering and each department has its own spreadsheet file name, you can have 1 shared folder on your network and you can just open each excel spreadsheet after they are done ordering and print a detailed list and it already does the math for you. The departments themselves can break down who owes what money if someone orders 2 or 3 items etc they can break out a calculator and then add tax is necessary. When done you can copy the empty order form back to the shared space and so its empty ready for their next days orders, or if you can teach people to open a custom template for each department and then save the spreadsheet as a different file name than that of the original template copy, each day the follow the same routine and all you have to do is delete the order form that is populated with information.

A Database would be so much cleaner and require less cleanup, and would have rules. Excel is a quick free solution if that works for you.

If you need help adding features to this excel worksheet just ask and I or someone else can assist. Excel is easy 

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[patio]

You guys are making me hungry...