Hotel staff rota software for reception, housekeeping, kitchen and bar

A hotel rota is several businesses' rotas stacked on top of each other. Reception runs early, late and sometimes night. Housekeeping peaks between check-out and check-in. The kitchen covers breakfast, lunch and dinner. The bar and restaurant follow the guests. Then a wedding lands on a Saturday in June and every department needs more people at once.

When each head of department keeps their own spreadsheet, nobody sees the whole hotel, and the GM finds out on Friday that the same three people have been promised to housekeeping and the wedding breakfast.

What hotel rotas need that others don't

• Departments on one rota. Reception, housekeeping, kitchen, restaurant, bar, maintenance, spa or leisure, night porter.
• Round-the-clock cover. Early, late and night shifts, with the rest rules that come with them.
• Events. Weddings, conferences, Christmas parties, a coach tour checking in at once.
• Staff who work across departments. The breakfast server who helps housekeeping finish rooms, then does a bar shift.
• Live-in and seasonal staff. Common in country and coastal hotels, with availability that changes through the year.
• Cost visibility. Payroll is the biggest controllable cost in most hotels.

How ShiftComplete handles a hotel rota

ShiftComplete is an operations and team-scheduling app for UK hospitality, hotels included. It runs in the browser on any phone, tablet or computer, so nothing needs installing on staff phones or the reception PC.

Departments as staff areas

Set up your own areas (Reception, Housekeeping, Kitchen, Restaurant, Bar, Night Porter, Spa, Maintenance) and tag every shift block with one. Each person can have up to four blocks a day, so a team member's Saturday can show 07:00 to 10:30 Restaurant, 10:30 to 14:00 Housekeeping, and 18:00 to 23:00 Bar, all on one line.

Availability from every department

Staff mark days as available, partial or off from their phones, weeks ahead, with notes. Seasonal staff can block out their dates before they arrive; students can mark exam weeks.

Events that drive extra cover

Add the wedding (+3 Restaurant, +2 Kitchen, +1 Bar from 2pm), the conference day (+1 Reception from 7am, +2 Restaurant at lunch) or the fully booked bank holiday. ShiftComplete builds those requirements into the draft. Day notes keep context on the rota: "Coach tour arrives 4pm, 40 rooms, early housekeeping turnaround".

A fair draft, then your judgement

Weight your strongest people onto the shifts that matter (the wedding coordinator, the senior receptionist for a big check-in day) and ShiftComplete builds a draft rota in seconds, fair across the team. Drag shifts around, then publish. It appears on every staff member's phone under My rota and can be emailed.

Labour cost and holidays

Labour cost is shown while you build, so the GM can see what the wedding weekend costs in staff before it's published. Holidays are recorded, so you won't rota someone who's off.

Multi-site

If you run more than one hotel, or a hotel with a separate pub or café, you can switch between venues, see a group dashboard, give area managers access across sites and add as many managers as you need.

Night shifts and live-in staff: rules to build in

Two areas trip hotels up more than other hospitality businesses.

Night workers. The night period is 11pm to 6am unless you agree a different seven-hour period in writing (it must include midnight to 5am). Anyone who regularly works at least three hours in that period is a night worker. Night workers must not average more than 8 hours in any 24-hour period, usually averaged over 17 weeks, and they can't opt out of that limit. You must offer a health assessment before someone starts night work, and keep records showing you meet the limits for two years. Under-18s can never work between midnight and 4am.

Accommodation and the minimum wage. If staff live in, accommodation you provide affects National Minimum Wage pay. From 1 April 2026 the accommodation offset is £11.10 a day (£77.70 for a full week). The National Living Wage for workers aged 21 and over is £12.71 an hour from the same date. Charges above the offset reduce pay for minimum wage purposes, so check the GOV.UK guidance before setting them.

Our guide to working time rules in hospitality covers breaks, daily rest and the 48-hour week in full.

Example: a 30-bedroom country inn

A 30-bedroom inn with a 70-cover restaurant, a bar and a function room, and 35 staff across reception, housekeeping, kitchen, restaurant and bar, plus a part-time maintenance person and two night porters.

1. Staff set availability; seasonal staff mark the weeks they're with you.
2. The GM adds Saturday's 90-guest wedding and Tuesday's conference day as events with the extra cover each department needs.
3. Department heads weight their key people: head housekeeper Monday to Friday, senior chef on the wedding, the most experienced receptionist for Friday check-ins.
4. ShiftComplete builds the draft. The GM spots a receptionist on a late finish followed by an early start, moves the early to someone else so they get 11 hours' rest, checks the labour cost, and publishes.
5. Everyone sees the whole week on their phone, with the department shown on every block.

The rest of the hotel's paperwork

ShiftComplete also runs temperature logs for kitchen and bar fridges, freezers and hot-hold points; a 14-allergen matrix for restaurant, room service and wedding menus that front-of-house can search; opening, closing and cleaning checklists by weekday; incident and maintenance logs with photos and status; risk assessments you can create, keep and print; and team announcements. It helps you keep the records an EHO asks to see, though meeting the standards remains your responsibility.

Pricing

£1.49 per staff member per month. Every feature included, no per-site fee, no contract, remove staff at any time. The 35-person inn above would pay £52.15 a month. For 100+ staff, talk to us about pricing.

Start with a 60-day free trial, no card needed. Set-up takes about five minutes and you can book a free 15-minute set-up call.

From a hospitality owner

"The rota stopped being a Sunday-night argument the week we switched over. The chef stopped being the only person who knows what's in the kitchen. And the EHO turn up to a screen, not a box file." Graeme Kirkham, Owner, The Lounge Oswestry & Knock & Snitch

Read the Kirkham Hospitality story.

Who it suits

Independent hotels, inns with rooms, boutique hotels, B&Bs with a restaurant, and small hotel groups that want every department on one rota without paying enterprise prices.