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Staff meal policy

With SmartMy HRMS, employees become staff customers. A staff meal policy decides what the organisation pays: free, a subsidy per meal or a percentage, or nothing. The policy can differ by department, category, designation, grade or location, and the organisation's share is charged to the department's cost centre.
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The problem it solves

  • The factory gives one free lunch per shift, and the canteen cannot tell who already had theirs.
  • Managers get a bigger subsidy than workers, and the cashier works it out by memory.
  • Finance cannot say what each department's staff meals cost the company each month.
  • Staff on leave still claim the free meal.

How it works

  1. With SmartMy HRMS, each employee's work contact becomes a food customer of type Staff, or the Food Customer Type of their staff category.
  2. Open Food Service > Configuration > Customers > Staff Meal Policies and click New. Choose what The Entity Pays: Free, Subsidised (a fixed amount per meal or a percentage) or Staff pays.
  3. Under Entitlement, choose the Sessions, the Meals per Day (1 to start with) and the Outlets. Tick Working Days Only if there is no entitlement on days off.
  4. On Applies To, leave everything empty for the whole Entity, or choose a location, department, staff category, employment type, designation, grade, employee, stage or dates. The most specific policy wins.
  5. At the counter, the employee is scanned like any customer. Within the entitlement the price splits into the staff share and Company pays; a meal above it is paid in full.
  6. Each department's Meals Cost Centre, or its parent's, carries the organisation's share.

Everything it does

What the organisation pays

  • Free: the whole price
  • Subsidised: Fixed amount per meal (never more than the price) or Percentage (above 0, at most 100)
  • Staff pays: nothing
  • Applies to items of the menu; other items are paid in full
  • With a policy, it replaces the customer type's own subsidy for that employee

Entitlement

  • Sessions with the company share: empty means every session
  • Meals per Day with the company share: 1 to start with, 0 means no limit; counted over the day's paid bills
  • Outlets: empty means every outlet
  • Working Days Only: works with the payroll link, from attendance, else the shift, weekly off, holiday and leave
  • Staff Share from Payroll: the staff share may be paid by payroll deduction

Who a policy applies to

  • Scoped like every SmartMy HRMS policy: Entity, Location, Department, Staff Category, Employment Type, Designation, Grade, Employee, Stage, Valid From and Valid To
  • The most specific policy wins; among equals, the lowest sequence

Cost and records

  • Meals Cost Centre on each department (the parent's when empty), charged with the organisation's share
  • The bill shows Company pays; the day's entry books it to Meal Subsidy / Complimentary (Scale accounting)
  • A type set by hand on an employee's contact is kept

Who uses it

HR managerAgrees the policies per department, category or grade.
Food administratorCreates the staff meal policies and sets the cost centres.
CashierScans the employee; the counter applies the share and the meals left.
FinanceReads the meal cost per department's cost centre.
EmployeeEats within the entitlement and pays the staff share.

Where you use it

  • Web: Food Service > Configuration > Customers > Staff Meal Policies; the department form for Meals Cost Centre; the staff category for Food Customer Type
  • Counter app: the split shows as Company pays on the bill
  • Not a monthly allowance: the entitlement is counted per day (meals per day), not per month

What you control

Settings

  • Mode: Free, Subsidised or Staff pays; Subsidy Mode and Subsidy
  • Meals per Day: 1 to start with
  • Sessions and Outlets: empty means all
  • Working Days Only and Staff Share from Payroll: off to start with
  • Meals Cost Centre per department; Food Customer Type per staff category

Works with

SmartMy HRMSNeeded for this page: employees, departments, staff categories and scoped policies. Working Days Only and payroll deduction need HRMS attendance and payroll.

Questions

Can workers get a free lunch and managers a 50 % subsidy?

Yes. Make two policies, one for the workers' staff category and one for the managers' grade. The most specific policy applies to each employee.

What happens with a second lunch?

With Meals per Day at 1, the second lunch that day is paid in full. The bill shows no Company pays for it.

Can the subsidy stop on leave days?

Yes, with Working Days Only, when the payroll link with attendance is installed. Without it the box has no effect.

Which department pays for the meal?

The employee's department, through its Meals Cost Centre. When it has none, the nearest parent department's is used.

Related features

See it with your own menu.

Tell us how many outlets you run and how people pay today. We will show you a day in your mess or canteen on SmartMy Feast.