In short
What this page covers
- Staff the night, not the day
- Templates for a Tuesday and templates for a Saturday
- Swaps without the group chat
- Open shifts for a Saturday drop out
For pubs
Rota software for pubs, built around Friday night
Cover the weekend properly, fill a late drop out before the room gets going, and let the hours count themselves, close down included. Free, for as many staff and houses as you have.
Where the time goes
What actually goes wrong on a pub rota
These are the everyday situations that turn a rota into a source of mistakes, phone calls and needless cost.
01
Friday at nine is a different business from Tuesday at three
Two behind the bar carries a wet Tuesday afternoon. The same two on a Friday at nine means a bar three deep, no glasses coming back, and people walking out without buying. Staff the week flat and you lose the takings on the two nights that pay for the other five.
02
Last orders is not the end of the shift
The bell goes at eleven and the work carries on. Drinking up, glasses through the wash, bottling up, the till cashed off. The rota says 23:00 and the bar staff walk out at half twelve. Nobody wrote those hours down, so they surface later as an argument instead of a number.
03
A bar back drops out at six on a Saturday
Doors are already open and the room fills at eight. So you stand in the office ringing down your contacts, and the people who would have said yes are the ones who did not pick up.
04
The rota is a photo pinned behind the bar
You put it up on Sunday and post it in the group chat. By Thursday two people have swapped in replies nobody scrolled back to read, the door was booked separately by text, and the team is working from three different versions.
05
The match nobody put on the rota
You wrote the week three weeks ago. It does not know that the derby kicks off at 12:30, or that the first warm Saturday of the year has just doubled the garden. It was built for an ordinary Saturday and this is not one.
06
One person actually knows the cellar
Lines, gas, barrels, the cooler. When the one person who can do all of it is away you find out at eleven on a Saturday morning that the guest ale has gone and nobody on shift can change it.
How InShift fixes it
A rota built for a trade with a mountain in the middle of the week, not for a calendar. Everything below is in the free account, with no cap on people or houses.
Solution 1
Staff the night, not the day
Build shifts around the hours the room is actually full. One on at three, four on from eight, a glass collector for the five hours it matters. You can see the weekend covered before you publish it, rather than when the bar is three deep.
Solution 2
Templates for a Tuesday and templates for a Saturday
An open, a close, a Friday late, a match day, a summer Sunday with the garden on. Set the hours once, say how many are behind the bar and give the Friday its own later finish, then drop them onto the week. A month of rota takes minutes.
Solution 3
Swaps without the group chat
A member of bar staff offers a shift in the app, a colleague picks it up, you tap approve. The rota updates itself and everyone sees the same version, because there is only one.
Solution 4
Open shifts for a Saturday drop out
Post the uncovered shift and everyone who could work it gets it on their phone at the same moment. The first one free takes it. No ringing round from the office while the room fills.
Solution 5
Bar, floor, kitchen and door on one rota
People have roles, so you rota a bar back, a glass collector, a chef and a door supervisor without ever mixing them up. Mark who can run the cellar and you can see at a glance whether a Saturday has one of them on it.
Solution 6
Hours ready for payroll, close down included
Hours add up as the rota is worked, at each person's own hourly rate. Bottling up counts because it is on the shift. Export the lot to Excel for whoever does your payroll.
A Saturday on the rota in a pub
A pub trading 12:00 to 00:30, quiet until five and full from eight. Note how the people stack up towards the night instead of sitting flat across the day, and that the shifts run past last orders because the work does.
| Time | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| 10:30-18:30 | Duty manager | Cellar and lines before doors, takes the dray in, runs the afternoon |
| 12:00-20:00 | Bar staff | Opens the bar, carries the quiet afternoon alone |
| 17:00-01:00 | Bar staff | On the taps from teatime, stays for bottling up |
| 18:00-01:00 | Duty manager | Takes the night, calls last orders, cashes up |
| 19:00-00:30 | Glass collector | Five hours that keep the bar and the garden clear |
| 20:00-01:00 | Door supervisor | Weekends only, on the door until the room is empty |
Try it without an account
Three free tools that need no sign-up and no email. Build a rota or add up hours right now, and move to an account when the team has to see it.
Frequently asked questions
How many bar staff do I need on a Friday night?▾
Start from the hours, not the people. Say you trade 12:00 to 23:00 in the week and 12:00 to 00:30 on a Friday and Saturday, with one on the bar through a weekday afternoon, two from six, and four once it fills at eight. Add the cellar work before doors and the close down after and you land at roughly 140 staffed hours a week behind the bar alone. That is about three full timers plus three or four who mainly do the weekend. Put your own trading hours and your own peaks into the rota and you will see your number rather than mine.
Can I run more than one pub on one account?▾
Yes, and there is no limit on how many. Each house is a location with its own staff, templates and trading hours. You see all of them, a house manager sees only their own, and someone who covers two pubs has one rota with both on it.
How does the team see the rota?▾
They install the InShift app on their phone from the App Store or Google Play and enter a six digit code you give them. That is the whole setup, no email address and no password to forget. When you change the rota they get a push notification, so nobody turns up on the strength of a photo from last week.
What happens when someone drops out at six on a Saturday?▾
Publish the shift as an open shift. Everyone who could work it gets a notification at the same moment, and the first one to take it has it. You approve with one tap. That is one action instead of fourteen phone calls from the office while the bar fills up.
Does it work out hours and pay?▾
It adds the hours up as the rota is worked, close down included, multiplies them by each person's hourly rate, and exports a timesheet to Excel for any period you like. The hour and a half after the bell is in the total because it is on the shift, which is the bit that used to become an argument. Rates are per person, so somebody who works both your houses is counted once.
Is it actually free, or free until it is not?▾
Free. Every feature, as many staff and as many houses as you like, no card and no trial clock running down. There is no billing in the product at all, which sounds like a strange thing to boast about until you have been moved onto a paid tier the week you took on your fifth glass collector.