Restaurants, bars, and hotels turn over about two in three roles a year, and every replacement is a W-4, a direct deposit, and a first paycheck that has to be right.
These aren’t bad-operator problems. They’re the standing condition of running a restaurant, bar, or hotel on hourly crews, and each one is either a manager’s unpaid second job or a liability quietly compounding.
Turn over two of three roles a year (faster in QSR) and every year is a hiring year. Each replacement is a W-4, a direct-deposit form, an I-9, and a tip-credit notice where it applies, keyed in by a manager between rushes, for a hire who might be gone by the holidays.
Tipped overtime has to be computed on the full minimum wage, not the $2.13 cash wage. Seven states ban the tip credit outright, and most of the rest set their own, higher floors. Get it wrong and the back-pay clock runs up to three years when the violation is willful. Food service is one of the DOL’s most-investigated industries for a reason.
Punches sit in Toast, Square, Clover, Aloha, or MICROS; schedules sit in 7shifts, HotSchedules, or Homebase. Every cycle someone exports, reformats, and re-keys, and every handoff is another chance to short a paycheck.
A cook quits after Saturday service. Now it’s a hand-cut check with guessed withholding, or “it’ll be on the next run.” Either answer costs you, in tax cleanup or in the ex-employee telling the whole group chat.
Paystub texts on payday, PTO-balance questions mid-shift, and every January, W-2 requests from people who left two jobs ago. The GM didn’t sign up to run a records department.
The tavern, the fast-casual spot, and the inn each sit in their own LLC with its own EIN and filings. Generic payroll answers with three separate accounts and a consolidation spreadsheet the bookkeeper maintains by hand.
WageTime runs tipped payroll as configuration, not clipboard math: tips carry into the run, pools split the way your house runs, and tipped overtime rides the same engine, matched to overtime owed on the full minimum wage, never 1.5 × $2.13.
Replaces the tip spreadsheet with the formula nobody remembers writing, and the quiet hope that no one ever checks the overtime rate.
Work two or more rates in one week and WageTime computes overtime on the weighted-average regular rate automatically: the blended-rate method federal rules describe for mixed weeks, whether that’s the dining room, the bar, or a banquet pickup.
Replaces the OT column someone “fixes” by hand every other Friday.
Hires self-onboard from their own phones before the first shift, and leavers get a final check that doesn’t wait: WageTime runs are unlimited, so the Saturday walk-out is paid off-cycle Monday, every tax filed.
| New hire | First shift | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Tessa M. · ServerW-4 & I-9 done · e-signed | Fri Mar 13 | Ready |
| Jonah T. · Line cookW-4 & I-9 done · e-signed | Fri Mar 13 | Ready |
| Marcus J. · BartenderW-4 & I-9 done · e-signed | Sat Mar 14 | Ready |
| Priya S. · Front deskW-4 & I-9 done · e-signed | Sat Mar 14 | Ready |
| Sam W. · DishwasherW-4/I-9 done · e-sign pending | Mon Mar 16 | In progress |
| Nora B. · ServerW-4/I-9 started · no e-sign | Mon Mar 16 | Awaiting docs |
Replaces the clipboard packet, the manager’s data-entry hour, and the first paycheck that bounces because a routing number was read off a voided check.
The week’s punches post to a single review tied to the pay period, grouped the way you run the building, nothing re-keyed. WageTime also builds and publishes schedules with conflict safeguards; bring your POS and scheduler to the demo.
| Department | Reg hrs | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Front of house18 people · 22.5 OT · 24.0 PTO | 1,214.0 | Ready |
| Kitchen14 people · 31.0 OT · 16.0 PTO | 1,062.5 | Ready |
| Bar6 people · 8.0 OT · 0.0 PTO | 401.5 | Ready |
| Housekeeping4 people · 0.0 OT · 8.0 PTO | 296.0 | 2 awaiting |
Replaces the export-reformat-upload ritual, and the payroll journal the bookkeeper keys into QuickBooks by hand every cycle.
Hospitality groups hold each concept in its own LLC and EIN, and WageTime treats that as the default: every company files under its own EIN, federal, state, and local taxes handled automatically, deposits included, all from one login.
| Company | People paid | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Harbor House Tavern LLCEIN ••-•••2419 · fed+st filed | 34 | Complete |
| HH Cantina LLCEIN ••-•••8065 · fed+st filed | 27 | Complete |
| Anchor Inn Hospitality LLCEIN ••-•••3347 · fed+st filed | 21 | Complete |
Replaces a payroll account per LLC, three sets of year-end chaos, and the consolidation spreadsheet nobody trusts.
Full-service payroll is $10 a month per person paid that month, plus $50 a month per company, with unlimited runs. No long-term contracts, no per-run charges.
Off-cycle runs and bonuses cost nothing extra. No long-term contracts; cancel anytime.
Example: 50 people paid × $10 + $50 company = $550 for the month
HR & hiring, onboarding, PTO, time tracking, benefits, and workers’ comp are optional add-ons, priced separately when you’re ready.
See a demoYes. Reported tips enter the run through tip earning codes, tip-pooling structures are supported, and top-ups are computed by state when cash wage plus tips fall under the minimum. Tipped overtime rides the same overtime engine, matching the math owed on the full minimum wage: federally $10.88 minus the $5.12 credit is $5.76 per overtime hour. Bring one real pay period to the demo.
We import clock hours so there’s no double entry; time lands in an approval screen and flows into the run. Tell us your POS and scheduler on the demo and we’ll confirm the exact flow for your setup. Finished payroll posts to QuickBooks mapped by department.
Under the federal rule it depends on the tip credit: pools including cooks and dishwashers are allowed only when everyone gets full minimum wage in cash and no tip credit is taken; credit-taking pools stay among customarily tipped roles, and managers and supervisors can’t take from the pool or keep other employees’ tips. In WageTime your pool is configuration; bring your split to the demo.
Starting with 2026 W-2s, employers separately report qualified tips plus a Treasury tipped-occupation code, and employees can deduct up to $25,000 of qualified tips on their returns (tax years 2025-2028), while Social Security and Medicare taxes still apply. Year-end W-2s are included with WageTime; bring your reporting questions to the demo.
One login, three companies. Each runs under its own EIN with its own federal, state, and local filings, deposits included, and reporting comes per company or combined. Adding the next concept means adding a company, not adding a vendor.
$50 per month per company, plus $10 per month per person paid that month. No long-term contracts, cancel anytime. The three-company group in the screens above, 82 people paid, comes to $970 for the month: $150 in company bases plus $820 in per-person fees. Runs are unlimited, and off-cycle checks and bonuses come at no extra cost. Switching is full-service and paid; we’ll scope it on the demo.
Last month’s new-hire packets, your tip structure, the two people who quit last week. Twenty minutes with a payroll specialist on a live demo restaurant: you’ll watch a hire self-onboard, a tipped week compute, and a final check run off-cycle.
Book a 20-minute demo