Every night after close, the brasserie's card and cash tips from the POS are combined with each person's clocked hours and the role points in the tip policy. Shares land in a Google Sheets ledger, and a weekly payroll CSV is produced automatically.
Typical results
Nightly
Tip shares posted to the ledger after close
≈80%
Fewer tip disputes each month
5 min
To send the weekly payroll file
Figures reflect typical results for this kind of automation.
The challenge
Tips at the brasserie are pooled and split by hours and role, so a manager spends 20 to 30 minutes after every service adding up card and cash tips, checking clock-in times and applying the points. Mistakes surface weeks later as awkward conversations with staff, and the weekly payroll file is typed in again by hand.
Before and after
Manager hours per week on tip math
−86%Tip disputes per month
−80%Minutes to prepare the weekly payroll file
−89%The automation
After close, the automation pulls the night's card and cash tips from the POS export and each person's clocked hours from the time-clock app. It applies the role points in the tip policy, such as 1.0 for servers, 0.8 for bartenders and 0.7 for runners, multiplying hours by points to set each share. Results go to a Google Sheets ledger with the calculation shown line by line, and every Monday a CSV is produced in the payroll bureau's import format.
How it works
- 01
Service closes
After the last check is closed, the POS tip export with card and declared cash tips is pulled automatically.
- 02
Hours from the time clock
Each person's clocked hours and role for the night are read from the time-clock app.
- 03
Role points applied
Hours are multiplied by the role points in the tip policy, and the pool is split in proportion.
- 04
Ledger updated
Each share is written to the Google Sheets ledger with the pool, hours, points and result on one line.
- 05
Weekly payroll file
Every Monday a CSV in the payroll bureau's import format is created and emailed to the manager to send.
Starts from
- POS tip export
- Time-clock hours
- Tip policy role points
Delivers
- Google Sheets tip ledger
- Weekly payroll CSV
The impact
Tip shares are in the ledger every night without anyone touching a calculator, removing about 3 hours a week of manager time. Tip disputes fall by about 80%, because every share shows the pool, hours and points behind it, and the weekly payroll file takes 5 minutes to send.
Questions about this automation
How are cash tips included in the split?
At close, the shift manager enters the counted cash tips in the POS as a declared amount, the same way it is recorded today. The automation reads that figure alongside card tips from the nightly export, so both go into one pool and are split with the same hours and role points.
What happens when someone forgets to clock out?
Shifts with a missing clock-out, or longer than 12 hours, are flagged in the ledger instead of being calculated. The manager gets a short email listing them, corrects the time in the time-clock app, and the shares for that night are recalculated on the next run.
Can the tip policy points be changed later?
Yes. The role points live in a settings tab in the same Google Sheets file, so the manager can move bartenders from 0.8 to 0.9 or add a new role without touching the automation. Changes apply from the next night, and earlier entries keep the points used at the time. Simple automations like this are usually live within days.