Matakuliah
Tahun
: V0254 - Operational Tata Hidang II
: 2010
Maintaining and Improving the Revenue
Control System
Pertemuan 11
Revenue Security
• Errors in revenue collection can come from simple
employee mistakes or, in some cases, outright theft by
either guests or employees.
Bina Nusantara University
3
Revenue Security
• In its simplest form, revenue control and security is a
matter of matching products sold with funds received.
Thus, an effective revenue security system ensures that
the following formula reflects what really happens in
your foodservice operation.
Product Issues = Guest Charges = Sales Receipts = Sales Deposits =Accounts
Payable
• The potential for guest, employee, or supplier theft or
fraud exists in all of these areas.
Bina Nusantara University
4
External Threats to Revenue Security
• A guest said to have walked, or skipped a check when
he or she has consumed a product but has left the
foodservice operation without paying the bill. (See Steps
to Reduce Guest Walks or Skips)
Bina Nusantara University
5
External Threats to Revenue Security
• Another form of guest theft is that of fraudulent
payment. This includes passing counterfeit money, bad
checks, or most commonly, the use of invalid credit or
debit cards.
• A credit card, is simply a system by which banks loan
money to consumer as the consumer makes a purchase.
• Travel and entertainment cards are a payment
system by which the card issuer collects full payment
from the card users on a monthly basis.
• A debit card is a form of guest payment in which the
funds needed to cover the user’s purchase are
automatically transferred from the user’s bank account
to the entity issuing the debit card.
Bina Nusantara University
6
External Threats to Revenue Security
• If restaurant managers are to ensure that they collect all
of the money that are due from payment card
companies, they must effectively manage the interface
(electronic connection) between the various payment
card issuers and their restaurant.
• The merchant service provider (MSP) plays an
important role as the restaurant’s coordinator/manager
of payment card acceptance and funds collection.
Bina Nusantara University
7
External Threats to Revenue Security
• A restaurant accepting payment cards does not actually
receive immediate cash from its card sales, but rather it
will be credited via electronic funds transfer (EFT)
the money it is due after all fees have been paid.
• All businesses that accept cards – credit or debit - are
charged fees for every transaction. Theses fees are
called interchange rates, and are a percentage of the
value of the transaction.
Bina Nusantara University
8
External Threats to Revenue Security
• If you agree to accept checks, you will experience some
loss.
• Another method of guest theft you must be aware of is
that used by the quick-change artist. A quick-change
artist is a guest who, having practiced the routine many
times, attempts to confuse the cashier. In his or her
confusion, the cashier gives the guest too much change.
Bina Nusantara University
9
Internal Threats to Revenue Security
• Service personnel can use a variety of techniques to
cheat an operation of small amounts of money at a time.
• Complete revenue control is a matter of developing the
checks and balances necessary to ensure that the value
of products sold and the amount of revenue received do
indeed equal each other.
Bina Nusantara University
10
Internal Threats to Revenue Security
• Servers can misrepresent the amount they charge
guests.
• Food operations should require a written guest check
recording each sale. A guest check is simply a written
record of what the guest purchases and how much the
guest was charged for the item(s).
• Hard copy guest checks should be recorded by number
and then safely stored or destroyed, as management
policy dictates.
Bina Nusantara University
11
Internal Threats to Revenue Security
• A method of service personnel fraud is one in which the
server gives the proper guest check to the guest, collects
payment, and destroys the guest check but keeps the
money.
• For this reason, many operators implement a
precheck/postcheck system for guest checks.
Bina Nusantara University
12
Internal Threats to Revenue Security
• A user workstation, that is, a terminal primarily being
used only to ring orders, may be utilized. The guest
check will then be taken to a cashier terminal for
settlement.
• There are a variety of components available to you as
you seek to design a good guest check control system.
These can include the use of management issued guest
checks, multi-copy guest checks (carbonless paper), and
guest checks generated by computerized POS systems.
Bina Nusantara University
13
Internal Threats to Revenue Security
• Service personnel may charge the guest for a higher
priced item while serving a lower priced one, and then
keep the difference in selling price.
• In some operations, even sales that were originally
properly recorded can become a source of theft. This is
so because these operations allow changes to be made
to previous rounds. A previous round is a service
round that occurred before the most recent service total.
Bina Nusantara University
14
Internal Threats to Revenue Security
• Not all service personnel are dishonest, of course, and
sometimes honest mistakes can be made. This usually
occurs when service personnel are required to total their
guest checks by hand.
• It is important to remember, that even sophisticated
computerized systems hold the potential for employee
fraud.
Bina Nusantara University
15
Internal Threats to Revenue Security
• If a cashier is responsible for the collection of money,
several areas of potential fraud can exists. The cashier
may collect payment from a guest but proceed to
destroy the guest check that recorded the sales. Another
method of cashier theft involves failing to ring up the
sale indicated by the guest check while pocketing the
money.
Bina Nusantara University
16
Internal Threats to Revenue Security
• In addition to theft of your own business financial
assets, the hospitality industry affords some employees
the opportunity to defraud guests as well. Some
techniques include:
• Charging guests for items not purchased, then keeping the
•
overcharge.
Charging the totals on credit card charges after the guest has
left, or adding credit card charges and pocketing the cash
difference.
Bina Nusantara University
17
Internal Threats to Revenue Security
• Misadding legitimate charges to create a higher than appropriate
•
•
total, with the intent of keeping the overcharge.
Purposely shortchanging guests when giving back change, with
the intent of keeping the extra change.
Charging higher than authorized prices for products or services,
recording the proper price, then keeping the overcharge.
Bina Nusantara University
18
Internal Threats to Revenue Security
• Cashiers rarely steal sums directly from the cash drawer
because such theft is easily detected.
• Management can compare the sales recorded by the
cash register with the money actually contained in the
cash register. If it contains less than sales recorded, it is
said to be short, if it contains more than sales recorded,
it is said to be over.
• Consistent cash shortages may be an indication of
employee theft or carelessness.
Bina Nusantara University
19
Internal Threats to Revenue Security
• If the cash register has a void key, a dishonest cashier
could enter a sales amount, collect for it, and then void,
or erase, the sale after the guest has departed.
• Another method of cashier theft involves the
manipulation of complimentary meals or meal coupons.
• It is important to remember that even good revenue
control systems present the opportunity for theft if
management is not vigilant of if two or more employees
conspire to defraud the operation.
Bina Nusantara University
20
Internal Threats to Revenue Security
• Bonding is simply a matter of purchasing an insurance
policy against the possibility that an employee will steal.
• If an employee has been bonded and an operation can
determine that he or she was indeed involved in a theft
of a specific amount of money, the operation will be
reimbursed for the loss by the bonding company.
Bina Nusantara University
21
Developing the Revenue Security System
• An effective revenue security system will help you
accomplish the following important tasks:
–
–
–
–
–
Verification
Verification
Verification
Verification
Verification
Bina Nusantara University
of
of
of
of
of
product issues
guest charges
sales receipts
sales deposits
accounts payable
22
Developing the Revenue Security System
• Verification of product issues
• The key to verification of product issues in the revenue
security system is to follow one basic rule:
• No product should be issued from the kitchen or bar
unless a permanent record of issue is made.
Documented Product Requests = Product Issues
Bina Nusantara University
23
Developing the Revenue Security System
• Verification of guest charges
• When the production staff is required to distribute
products only in response to a documented request, it is
critical that those documented request result in charges
to the guest.
• Product issues must equal guest charges.
• Each guest check must be accounted for, and employees
must know that they will be held responsible for each
check they are issued.
Product Issues = Guest Charges
Bina Nusantara University
24
Developing the Revenue Security System
• Verification of sales receipts
• Sales receipts refer to actual revenue received by the
cashier or other designated personnel, in payment for
products served.
• Both cashier and a supervisor must verify sales receipts.
Guest Charges = Sales Receipts
• Sales receipts refer to all forms of revenue, such as
cash, checks (if accepted), or bank cards.
Bina Nusantara University
25
Developing the Revenue Security System
• In general, there are four basic payment arrangements
in use in the typical foodservice operation. They are as
follows:
–
–
–
–
Guest
Guest
Guest
Guest
pays cashier.
pays service personnel, who pay cashier.
pays service personnel, who have already paid cashier.
is directly billed.
• Accounts receivable is the term used to refer to guest
charges that have been billed to the guest but not yet
collected.
Bina Nusantara University
26
Developing the Revenue Security System
• Verification of sales deposits
• The deposit slip may be completed by a cashier or other
clerical assistant, but management alone should bear the
responsibility for monitoring the actual deposit of sales.
• Management must personally verify all bank deposits.
• This involves the actual verification of the contents of
the deposit and the process of matching bank deposits
with actual sales.
Bina Nusantara University
27
Developing the Revenue Security System
• Embezzlement is the term used to describe theft of a
type where the money, although legally possessed by
the embezzler, is diverted to the embezzler by his or her
fraudulent action.
• Falsification of bank deposits is a common method of
embezzlement. To prevent this activity, you should take
the following steps to protect your deposits:
– Make bank deposits daily if possible.
– Ensure that the individual making the daily deposits is bonded.
Bina Nusantara University
28
Developing the Revenue Security System
3. Establish written polices for completing bank reconciliations
(comparison of monthly bank statements vs. daily deposits).
4. Review and approve bank statement reconciliations each month.
5. Employ an outside auditor to examine the accuracy of deposits
on an annual basis.
• If verification of sales deposits is done correctly and no
embezzlement is occurring, the following formula should
hold true:
Sales Receipts = Sales Deposits
Bina Nusantara University
29
Developing the Revenue Security System
• Verification of accounts payable
• Accounts payable refers to the legitimate amount
owed to a vendor for products or services rendered.
• The authorized purchaser must verify the legitimacy of
accounts payable to be paid out of sales deposits.
• In a revenue system that is working properly, the
following formula should be in effect:
Sales Deposits = Accounts Payable for Legitimate Expenses
Bina Nusantara University
30
Developing the Revenue Security System
• Supplier Fraud
• The typical supplier scam involves goods or services that
you would routinely order.
• These dishonest suppliers take advantage of weaknesses
in an organization's purchasing procedures or of
unsuspecting employees who may not be aware of their
fraudulent practices.
• Scams initiated by vendors can take several forms such
as phony-invoice scams, unauthorized buyer scams, and
the gift-horse scam.
Bina Nusantara University
31
Developing the Revenue Security System
• Phony-invoice schemers know that restaurants
sometimes make mistakes or can be careless in
accounting, so they prey on these weaknesses. The
invoice may be a solicitation in disguise and in very fine
print contain the following disclaimer: “This is a
solicitation. You are under no obligation to pay unless
you accept this offer.”
Bina Nusantara University
32
Developing the Revenue Security System
• With unauthorized buyer scams, the supplier secures
the name of an employee before products are shipped
and the restaurant is billed for unordered goods or
services. The invoice, which includes an identified
employee’s name as the “authorized” buyer, arrives
several weeks (or more) later, for three reasons.
– The inflated price, as much as 10 times what should be paid to a
legitimate supplier, is less obvious if the invoice arrives well after
the merchandise has been received.
– The chances are good that the restaurant has used the
merchandise before the invoice arrives.
– The supplier will claim that the time which it could have
accepted returned goods has long passed.
Bina Nusantara University
33
Developing the Revenue Security System
• The gift-horse scam starts when a caller tricks an
employee (or manager) into accepting a modest gift or a
free promotional item, with a passing reference to
merchandise or services. The restaurant then receives
overpriced, unordered merchandise, followed weeks
later by an invoice that includes the employee's name as
the authorized buyer.
Bina Nusantara University
34
Developing the Revenue Security System
• When an alert foodservice manager protests that he or
she did not authorize the purchase and delivery of the
overpriced merchandise and thus should not have to pay
for it, the supplier will respond in fairly predictable ways.
These include:
• Bullying: The seller argues that the products were
ordered.
• Negotiating: Here the seller expresses sympathy for the
“misunderstanding” that has occurred and offers to settle
the bill at a reduced (but still inflated!) price if payment is
made immediately.
• Charge for Returning: In this case, the seller offers to
allow the restaurant to return the merchandise but only if
they pay a significant restocking or shipping fee.
Bina Nusantara University
35
Developing the Revenue Security System
• You can protect your revenue from vendors who would
attempt to defraud you. Here are steps you can take:
–
–
–
–
Know your rights
Assign designated buyers and utilize purchase orders at all times
Check the documentation before paying bills
Train your staff
Bina Nusantara University
36
The Complete Revenue Security System
• The five key principles of a revenue security system are
as follows:
– No product shall be issued from the kitchen or bar unless a
permanent record of the issue is made.
– Product issues must equal guest charges.
– Both the cashier and a member of management must verify
sales receipts.
– Management must personally verify all bank deposits
– The authorized purchaser must verify the legitimacy of accounts
payable to be paid out of sales deposits.
Bina Nusantara University
37
The Complete Revenue Security System
• It is possible to develop and maintain a completely
manual revenue control system.
• However, when properly selected and understood,
technology enhanced systems can be a powerful ally in
the cost control/revenue security system.
Bina Nusantara University
38
Technology Tools
• Protecting sales revenue from external and internal
threats of theft requires diligence and attention to detail.
• Software and specialized hardware now on the market
that can help in this area included those that:
1. Maintain daily cash balances from all sources, including those
of multi-unit and international operations.
2. Reconcile inventory reductions with product issues from
kitchen.
Bina Nusantara University
39
Technology Tools
3. Reconcile product issues from kitchen with guest check totals.
4. Reconcile guest check totals with revenue totals.
5. Create over and short computations by server, shift, and day.
6. Balance daily bank deposits with daily sales revenue and identify
variances.
7. Maintain database of returned checks.
8. Maintain accounts receivable records.
9. Maintain accounts payable records.
Bina Nusantara University
Bina Nusantara University
40
40
Technology Tools
10.Interface back office accounting systems with data compiled by
the operation's POS system.
11.Interface budgeting software with revenue generation software.
12.Create income statements, statements of cash flows, and
balance sheets.
Bina Nusantara University
41
Bina Nusantara University
42