Nightclub staff rota: bar, door, glass collectors and cloakroom, built around the night

A nightclub rota isn't a weekly pattern, it's a list of nights. Thursday student night needs a big bar team and a tight door. Friday is quieter until midnight and then isn't. Saturday's headliner sells out, so you need every bartender, extra glass collectors and two on the cloakroom. And the Sunday bank holiday you added three weeks ago needs a whole team that hasn't been asked yet.

Meanwhile your staff are students, people with day jobs and a few full-time supervisors who are carrying more late finishes than they should.

Why club rotas are their own problem

• Every night is different. Capacity, promoter, ticket sales and the weather change what you need. A copy-last-week rota is wrong most weeks.
• Several teams, one night. Bar, bar backs, glass collectors, floor, cloakroom, toilets, door. Each needs the right number, at the right time, with the right lead.
• Staggered starts and finishes. Door on at 10, bar at 10.30, extra bar at midnight, glass collectors through to close, a clean-down team until 4.
• Night work rules. GOV.UK says staff who regularly work at least 3 hours between 11pm and 6am are night workers. They mustn't average more than 8 hours in 24 (normally over 17 weeks), and you must offer a free health assessment before they start night work.
• Rest after late finishes. Adults are normally entitled to 11 hours' rest between working days. A 4am finish followed by a 1pm delivery shift gives 9.
• Young workers. 16 and 17-year-olds cannot work between midnight and 4am, so they can't cover the core of a club night.
• Door licensing. Door supervisors at licensed premises need an SIA licence, in-house or contracted. Your rota should only put licensed people on the door.

How ShiftComplete builds a club rota

Every night as an event

Add each night as an event with the extra cover it needs: "Thursday student night, +3 Bar, +2 Glass", "Saturday headliner, sold out, +4 Bar, +2 Cloakroom, +1 Toilets". When ShiftComplete builds the draft, it staffs each night to match.

Areas for each team

Create your own areas: Bar, Bar back, Glass collecting, Floor, Cloakroom, Door, Clean-down. Each time block on the rota shows the area. If your door team is in-house, rota them alongside everyone else. If it's contracted, add a day note with the numbers you've booked so the duty manager knows what to expect.

Staggered and split shifts

Each person can have up to four time blocks a day, so "10.30pm to 2am Bar, 2am to 3.30am Clean-down" is one person's night on one line.

Availability that fits a student team

Staff mark days as available, partial or off from their phones, weeks ahead, with notes like "exams 12th to 20th" or "can do Thursdays from 11". Record holidays so nobody gets rota'd on their week away.

Fair late finishes

Weight your experienced supervisors and fastest bartenders onto the big nights, and ShiftComplete builds a draft rota in seconds that spreads the rest of the work, and the latest finishes, fairly across the team. Drag shifts to adjust, then publish. Everyone sees their shifts under My rota on their phone, and you can email it too.

Clocking in and out on club nights

The rota says 3.30am; the clean-down finished at 4.15. Switch on time tracking and staff clock in and out on their phone or the shared tablet, so you see hours worked against the rota every night. Download hours as a spreadsheet with a total per person for your payroll. GOV.UK says employers must keep records of night workers' hours for at least 2 years, so keep those downloads somewhere safe. ShiftComplete doesn't run payroll, track location or use facial recognition.

Labour cost against the night

Labour cost shows as you build. A quiet Wednesday with a full bar team is visible before you publish, and you can check a big night's staffing against what you expect to take.

Closing up, incidents and the rest of the night

Clubs live and die on what happens after the doors open. ShiftComplete keeps that on record too:

• Incident logs that are fast enough to use. An ejection, a customer injured on the stairs, a glass injury behind the bar. Log it in seconds with a photo, severity, status and resolution notes, named and timestamped. It's on the dashboard until it's resolved, and the full audit log exports to CSV. Our incident log guide covers what to record.
• Closing checks that respect a 2am close. Checklists can differ by weekday, and a 2am close still counts as "today", so the night's close sits with the night it belongs to. Require a photo for the jobs that matter: the cash office locked, the fire exits clear.
• Maintenance. A broken ice machine or a dead light on the stairs, logged with a photo and tracked until it's fixed.
• Risk assessments created, kept and printed in the app.
• Bar fridge and cellar temperatures logged against their own ranges and flagged on the dashboard if they're out.
• Team announcements for door policy changes, dress code or a new promoter, instead of a group chat nobody reads at 3am.

What it costs

£1.49 per staff member per month, every feature included. No per-site fee, no contract, and you can remove staff at any time, so student staff who leave in June don't cost you over the summer.

Venues with 100+ staff can talk to us. Every venue gets 60 days free, no card needed. Set-up takes about five minutes.

What an operator says

"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's for

• Nightclubs running different event nights through the week.
• Late bars and DJ bars with a dancefloor and a 2am or 3am licence.
• Live music venues staffing gig nights from a casual pool.
• Student union venues with a team that changes every term.

ShiftComplete doesn't replace your licensing advice or your SIA checks; it gives you a fair rota, a clear record of the night, and your Sunday back. Read our working time rules guide, then start your free trial.