- About Advance Ordering (AO)
- Step 1: Core System - Assign Advance Order Service Type to Residents/Patients
- Step 2: Core System - Set Up Advance Ordering for Dining Area or Residence Area Enabled as a Dining Area
- Step 3a: Core System - Set Up Meal Delivery to Rooms (if In-Room Service is Required)
- Step 3b: Core System - Set Up Tracking of In-Room Deliveries (if Meal Delivery to Rooms is Set Up)
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Step 4: Configuring AO Settings in Touch Admin
- Step 5: Refusal Reasons (for a AO Skipped/Refused Meal)
- What About the Production Reports and Forecasting?
About Advance Ordering (AO)
With advance ordering (AO) set up in your MealSuite account, a resident can place an order (or have an order placed for them) seven days in advance using the Touch application.
This article summarizes the steps required to set up AO.
Step 1: Core System - Assign Advance Order Service Type to Resident/Patients
For a resident/patient who is to use AO for a meal period (breakfast, lunch, dinner), assign the Advance Ordering to their profile, as per screenshot below. (See Selecting Service Types for Persons for instructions to do so.)
Step 2: Core System - Set Up Advance Ordering in Dining Area or Residence Area Enabled as a Dining Area
- The dining area in which the person dines, which includes a residence area enabled as a dining area for in-room service, must be enabled with the AO service type. See Adding and Configuring Dining Areas > Enabling Service Types for a Dining Area for instructions to do so.
- Once the dining area/residence area enabled as a dining area is enabled for AO, you can configure the service interval increment (i.e., wave) for each meal period (breakfast, lunch, dinner) and the number of meals that can be served in the wave. For example, assume that a wave is set for 15 minutes for lunch, with 2 meals served per wave. See Adding and Configuring Dining Areas > Entering Wave Length and Meals per Wave for instructions to do so. On the Touch app side, when a wave is full, the wave will not be shown to the user.
Step 3a: Core System - Set Up Meal Delivery to Rooms (if In-Room Service is Required)
If meals are to be delivered to a person's room (i.e., in-room service), then the residence area of the room must be set up to allow room delivery.
By default, a residence area is automatically enabled as a dining area so that the system knows that meals and snacks can be delivered to rooms in that residence area. However, a residence area enabled as a dining area will require the additional configuration steps below to allow room delivery service to that residential area:
Step 3b: Core System - Set Up Tracking of In-Room Deliveries (if Meal Delivery to Rooms is Set Up)
If you set up meal delivery to rooms via Step 3a, there is also the option of tracking the in-room deliveries. By tracking in-room meal deliveries, your facility will develop a better understanding of the time taken between food preparation and room delivery. To set up tracking of in-room deliveries, see Tracking In-Room Deliveries.
Step 4: Configuring AO Settings in Touch Admin
A dining area (including a residence area that allows meal delivery to rooms) that exists in the MealSuite core system is represented as a meal delivery area in Touch Admin. In Touch Admin, you can configure AO settings for the meal delivery area, including selecting the KMS Location that advanced orders are sent to. To open the meal delivery area in Touch Admin to configure AO settings:
- In Touch Admin, select Ordering Settings, and then click the Meal Delivery Area Configuration tab. The Meal Delivery Area Configuration screen appears, listing the dining areas/residence areas enabled as dining areas that have been ported over from the MealSuite core system.
- Click the Edit button of the meal delivery area you want to configure. The Edit Meal Delivery Area screen appears.
- Refer to the topics below to configure AO settings:
Selecting the KMS Location that Advanced Orders are Sent To
In the Meal Assembly Location for all Advanced Orders drop-down, select the KMS Location that will produce the advance orders.
Managing AO Orders if Person's Diet Order Changes
If a person's diet order is changed after they have placed an advance order, and the new diet order results in non-compliant menu items for that person, select how the the system is to behave via the Diet Order Change Logic field:
- Cancel Order - the advance order is cancelled.
- Drop Non-Compliant - any non-compliant items for the person are dropped from the order.
- Drop Non-Compliant & Autofill - removes ordered items associated with a person’s previous diet order that are not on the new diet order, and then for each menu category that does not have an item to serve, the system will select an item by using the non-select logic of serving a first choice item before other choices. For example, assume the resident originally orders a burger and fries, and then their diet type changes to low sodium. In such a scenario, the fries are removed, and the system checks the menu category for fries (which is "starch"), and sees the low-sodium tater tots are available, which it then adds to the order.
Entering Preparation Times for AO Orders
Scroll to the Advanced Ordering - Prep Timings section. For each meal period (breakfast, lunch, dinner), enter the required preparation time that determines when an advance order will appear onscreen at a KMS food preparation station. For example, if a breakfast order is to be sent out at 8:00 AM, and 20 minutes of prep time is required, the order appears onscreen at 7:40 AM.
Note that prep timings also work in conjunction with pick up and delivery orders for POS dining rooms and POS quick service locations. With a prep time, the order will be sent to the KMS ahead of the time that is selected in the Time field when the pick up or delivery order is placed. For example, if a lunch order is to be picked up/sent for delivery at 12:20 PM (entered in the Time field), and 20 minutes of prep time is set for lunch, the order appears onscreen at 12:00 PM.
Setting Up Cutoff Times for AO Orders
Scroll to the Advanced Ordering - Order Cutoff section. For each meal period (breakfast, lunch, dinner), enter the cutoff time that determines when an advance order can no longer can be placed.
When an order cutoff time is reached, then on the Touch app when the user attempts to take the advanced order, the following message appears "This meal is overdue", and the order cannot be placed.
If cutoff times are not set up, then an order can be placed anytime prior to the the start time for the meal service (breakfast, lunch, dinner). Note that start and end times for meal services are entered for a dining area/residence area enabled as a dining area in the core system; see Viewing the Start and End Times for Meal Services (Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner).
Auto-Generating Tickets if no AO Order is Placed
If a person with the AO service type does not place an order, then you can have the system automatically generate a ticket (screen and/or printer) for that person using the item selection logic for the advanced order service type. To do so:
- Scroll to the Advanced Ordering - Auto Generate Tickets section.
- Select the Auto generate tickets check box.
- In each meal period (Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner), select the time that an auto-generated ticket will appear onscreen or be printed. Note: If you are adding/editing times within three hours of the actual time being entered, the changes will not take effect until the following day.
Save Changes
At the bottom of the screen, click the Update Meal Delivery Area button to apply your changes.
Step 5: Refusal Reasons (for an AO Skipped/Refused Meal)
What is a Refusal Reason?
When a resident or patient with the advanced ordering service type skips a meal, the Touch app user will be required to enter a reason for the refusal, as per screenshot below.
Creating Refusal Reasons
To create the refusal reasons for the Touch app user to select from, complete the following steps:
- In Touch Admin, select Ordering Settings, and then click the Refusal Reason tab. The Refusal Reasons screen appears.
- Click the Add Reason button. The screen refreshes accordingly.
- In the Reason field, enter the reason.
- Click the Create Refusal Reason button to apply your changes.
- The newly-created reason is listed in the Refusal Reasons screen.
Editing a Refusal Reason
- In Touch Admin, select Ordering Settings, and then click the Refusal Reason tab. The Refusal Reasons screen appears with the list of existing reasons.
- For the refusal reason you want to edit, click its Edit button. The screen refreshes accordingly.
- Edit the reason as needed.
- Click the Update Refusal Reason to apply your changes.
- The newly-edited reason is listed in the Refusal Reasons screen.
Deleting a Refusal Reason
- In Touch Admin, select Ordering Settings, and then click the Refusal Reason tab. The Refusal Reasons screen appears with the list of existing reasons.
- For the refusal reason you want to delete, click its Delete button.
Note: If the reason does not disappear from the screen, refresh the screen.
What About the Production Reports and Forecasting?
With advance orders, your production reports will 100% match your tickets without the need to forecast. If needed, however, you can set up your account to include the number of people assigned the advance order service type (i.e., the advance ordering census) in the percentages forecasting method. This is useful for purchase orders or quantified grocery lists created from productions amounts multiple days in advance, in which case you do not know what the advanced orders will be.
To do so see Including Advance Ordering Census in Forecasting.