A rota app for pubs that does the Sunday-night rota for you

Every pub rota has the same moving parts: a handful of full-timers who hold the place together, a rotating cast of students and part-timers, a kitchen that works different hours from the bar, and a calendar full of things that change how busy you'll be. Quiz night. The darts league. A home match. A wake booked for Thursday afternoon.

Most pubs still run this on a spreadsheet, a whiteboard in the back office and a WhatsApp group. It works until it doesn't: someone didn't see the update, two people think they're off on Saturday, and the GM spends Sunday night rebuilding the week from scratch.

What a pub rota app actually needs to do

Plenty of rota software is built for shops, warehouses or care homes and then sold to pubs. Pubs need a few specific things:

• Availability from the staff, not from memory. Your bar team should tell you when they can work, on their phone, weeks ahead, without you chasing.
• Busy nights planned in. Friday from 7pm is not Tuesday afternoon. Match days and functions need extra hands without you redrawing the whole week.
• Split shifts. Lunch, a gap, then back for the evening is normal in a food pub. The rota has to show it clearly.
• Areas. Who is on the bar, who is in the kitchen, who is floor or glass collecting.
• Labour cost while you build it. Not a report on Monday that tells you last week was too expensive.
• One place to see the final version. On everyone's phone, the moment you publish.

How ShiftComplete builds a pub rota

ShiftComplete is an operations and rota app built for UK pubs, restaurants, cafés, bars and hotels. It runs in the browser, so there's nothing to install for you or your team.

1. Staff set their availability

Each person marks days as available, partial or off from their own phone, weeks in advance, and can add a note ("can't do after 9 on Wednesdays, college"). You stop collecting it by text message and stop forgetting what someone told you at the bar.

2. You add the events

Put the week's events on the days they happen: a Friday match that needs two extra on the bar, a 30-person christening on Sunday lunch, a quiet Monday where you can run lighter. Day notes sit on the rota so everyone sees the context ("Brewery delivery 8am, cellar access needed").

3. You weight the people you want on

Some shifts need your strongest bar staff, your duty manager or the chef who knows the Sunday roast. Weight them and ShiftComplete takes it into account.

4. It builds a draft rota in seconds

ShiftComplete builds a draft rota from availability, events and your weightings, spread fairly across the team so the same two people don't get every Friday and Saturday close. It is a draft: you look over it, drag shifts around and fix anything that doesn't feel right.

5. You publish it

Hit publish and the rota appears on every staff member's phone under My rota. You can email it too, for anyone who prefers it in their inbox.

Split shifts, areas and holidays

Pub days rarely fit into one neat block. ShiftComplete lets you give one person up to four time blocks in a day, and each block can be tagged with an area you set up yourself: Bar, Kitchen, Floor, Cellar, Garden Bar, whatever your building needs. So a team member's Saturday might read 11:00 to 15:00 Kitchen, then 18:00 to 23:00 Bar, and they can see exactly where they're meant to be.

Holidays are recorded in the app, so you don't rota someone who's booked off. And because split days and late closes are where rest rules get missed, it's worth keeping the basics in mind: adults working more than six hours are entitled to a 20-minute break, and 11 hours' rest between working days, while under-18s get a 30-minute break once they work more than four and a half hours. Our guide to working time rules in hospitality covers the detail.

Labour cost as you build, not after

Wages are usually a pub's biggest controllable cost after stock. ShiftComplete shows labour cost while you're building the rota, so when you add a fourth person to a Tuesday night you can see what it costs before you commit. If you want to set a target, our guide to labour cost percentage explains how to work it out.

A week at a 40-cover gastropub

Picture a village gastropub with 40 covers, a bar that gets busy for sport, and 18 staff: a GM, an assistant manager, a head chef, two cooks, a kitchen porter, and a mix of full and part-time bar and floor staff.

• By Wednesday, staff have marked availability for the week after next. Two students are off for exams; one bar person can only do days.
• The GM adds events: Saturday is a rugby international, so +2 on the bar from 2pm. Sunday lunch is fully booked, so +1 on the floor.
• She weights the head chef onto Friday to Sunday and the assistant manager onto the Saturday close.
• ShiftComplete builds the draft. She swaps two shifts so a new starter is paired with an experienced hand, checks the labour cost line, and publishes.
• Everyone sees it on their phone that evening. No "I didn't see the group chat."

More than a rota

The same app runs the rest of the pub's day: temperature logs for every fridge and freezer, a 14-allergen matrix front-of-house staff can search on the floor, opening and closing checklists that change by weekday, incident and maintenance logs with photos, and team announcements. It helps you keep the records an EHO asks to see, in one place rather than a box file. If you only want the rota, that's fine too.

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, which matters when your summer team goes back to university. An 18-person pub pays £26.82 a month. If you have more than 100 staff, talk to us.

The first 60 days are free and you don't need a card to start. Set-up takes about five minutes, and there's a free 15-minute set-up call if you'd like a hand. See pricing for the full detail.

What one pub group says

Kirkham Hospitality runs The Lounge in Oswestry and Knock & Snitch. Owner Graeme Kirkham:

"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 full Kirkham story.

Who it's for

• Freehouses and tenanted or leased pubs where the licensee writes the rota themselves.
• Food-led pubs that need kitchen and front-of-house on one rota with split shifts.
• Small pub groups that want one login across sites, a group dashboard and area-manager roles.
• Any GM who is tired of rebuilding the week on a Sunday night.

If you'd rather start on paper, our free staff rota template and step-by-step guide on how to write a pub rota will get you going.