Food Service Management Software

Overview

Food Service Management software from Vision is comprised of a series of applications that stand alone or integrate seamlessly to provide reliable, timely reporting to the leadership of your food service operation. Discover integrated information tracking, cost reporting, and precision control of your food production and kitchen operations. Strategic implementation of information technology for the food service department contributes to supporting the financial bottom-line through dynamic quality and budget control.

The Vision Software tools support just-in-time inventory and purchasing with versatile production forecasting and precise recipe scaling—leading to lower inventory carrying costs, reduced inventory shrinkage, reduced food waste, and considerable cost curtailment. Portable bar-code scanning technology for inventory tracking is an option. Back-of-the-house interfaces with front-end point-of-sale (POS) systems available through Vision Software business alliances help sustain vital retail revenues.

Cost planning and reporting features built into every management module lead to informed, proactive decision-making in food service operations through every step of the management process, from menu planning and purchasing through all service areas—including cafeterias, food courts, patient meal systems, and catering or special functions.

Food Production Scheduling Software

Vision Software’s Production Scheduling application uses historical data on actual usage of items served and projects future production needs. You can review and manually modify projections, and print production sheets. The software has built-in multi-site support, so you can project usage for all locations and consolidate this data into a single production sheet. As needed, you can add in production sheets for unscheduled or special functions to generate a consolidated, comprehensive food production plan.

The Food Production Control Application

The Food Production Control Application operates in conjunction with the Production Scheduling to automatically expand the ingredients in each recipe to the amount needed for production of the forecasted number of portions. If desired, the system can round ingredient amounts to preparation units (e.g., the number of portions in a specific cooking pan, major ingredient pack size, or batch cooking size). The system accounts for multiple portion sizes for a single production item.

These features and reports streamline production control:

• Labeling
• Picklists or Pull Lists
• Ingredient Control Room Processing Sheets
• Calendarized Thaw Schedules
• Freezer Pull Labels

Inventory & Purchasing

Vision Software provides a manufacturing-oriented inventory control system that includes raw materials, work-in-process, and finished goods inventory items as separate inventory in the system—with needed transfer between systems for full accountability and costing.

The Inventory Control system accommodates both conventional and cook-to-inventory production methods. Bar-coded inventory tracking methods are available, as are interfaces to computerized materials handling equipment. You can use bar code readers to reduce the time required to track inventory items.

If your aim is to increase productivity, improve accuracy in accounting for inventory, and feed reliable data to your purchasing and cost-charging systems, the portable Inventory Control Assistant (ICA) provides the ultimate intelligent solution for inventory management.

To replace the manual processes for the tabulation of inventory status, purchase order receipts, bulk nourishments, and floor stock items, you use a mobile bar code scanner. The Vision Software “Inventory Control Assistant” (ICA) lets you:

• Receive items into inventory via Purchase Orders (POs)
• Take physical inventory: by storage location, by cost/budget area, or by line item
• Track and account for floor stock and nourishment item distribution
• Associate an unlimited number of SCC and UPC codes with inventory items
• Print your own bar code labels
• Track PO discrepancies

Food Purchasing Software

Based on your menus and production scheduling, the purchasing system automatically determines the amount of each food item to purchase. It creates bid sheets, maintains vendor and contract information, and generates purchase orders and requisitions.

You can choose to have the system select items to be purchased through a par-level methodology, or simply select items based on cycle menu requirements. Use the system to verify orders received and update the inventory system.

You may integrate with vendor systems to obtain electronic price updates, and transfer purchase orders to the vendor’s order entry system.

Wondering about the difference between UPCs and SCCs?

UPCs, or Universal Product Code bar codes, are commonly found on almost every item manufactured. Typically, a UPC relates to an issue unit, for example, a #10 can of green beans.

SCCs, or Shipping Container Code bar codes, are found on the case that units of an item are shipped in.

Upon receipt of an item, it is imperative for the system to differentiate a SCC from a UPC. For example, scan one case (SCC) and two cans (UPC) of green beans, and the tabulated result will be 8 cans posted in the Vision system.

Cost Analysis Software

The Cost Analysis Tool provides cost information on menus, recipes, special functions, etc., using current ingredient prices. Reports can be generated on the food cost of a cycle day menu, separating the total production costs between patient and non-patient areas.

The system will calculate the suggested selling price of Retail Service items based on actual food cost (in conjunction with user-selected formulas and variables), compare projected costs with anticipated revenue, and show expected gross profit and the ratio of profit to sales. The system can be used like an electronic spreadsheet to determine the best menu item mix and pricing methodology to obtain desired profit objectives in the retail areas of the operation.

Cost Charging

The Cost Charging application allows you to monitor and control the cost of food items used by various departments and the cost of bulk nourishments used by individual nursing units. Nursing unit floor stock sheets can be input into the system, and the amount of each item sent to the unit can be tracked, costed, and charged to the unit and be relieved from inventory.

Use Vision Software’s Cost Charging System to generate custom reports to obtain information by cost center on weekly, monthly, and yearly costs. You can relate these costs to previous year’s costs, and compare these costs with pre-established budgets. You can also evaluate costs in conjunction with census and tray count for each nursing unit.

Catering Software

For your special functions or outside services (called “catering” in the US), the Vision Software Catering application allows you to enter administrative details about an event into the system (e.g., name of event, date, location, etc.), along with the menu to be served at the function. The system will cost the menu, account for food cost, labor cost, overhead, and profit, and will print an invoice for the event. Common events (such as Monthly Continental Breakfast Service) can be used over and over again, simply by updating the service date and/or Cost Center requesting the function. You can transfer costs to a cost center, or accumulate and report them on a weekly, monthly, and/or year-to-date basis. If desired, you can flow food production requirements into standard daily production schedules.

Nutrition facts at your guest’s fingertips!

A new partnership introduces cutting-edge wellness opportunities for your hospital food and nutrition team. Vision Software gives you seamless access to on-demand nutrition facts labels for any recipe in your Vision recipe or inventory database that has a NutriBase® Food ID assignment.

Now you can:

• Offer nutrition facts for anything you serve and support your wellness education outreach program.
• Print nutrition facts labels for anything you serve in your retail operations—great for grab’n’go or Home Meal Replacements (HMRs).
• Apply nutrition facts labels to patient snacks, nourishments, or meal items.
• Use nutrition facts labels on patient trays as an educational tool that clinical RDNs can use for diet
  education. Enhance transfer of learning and help prevent hospital readmissions.