Check every food distributor invoice for price increases and short shipments
Snap or forward each distributor invoice. The agent checks every line against your agreed prices, flags increases and shorts, and enters the bill.
- Reach it by
- Text
- Who can use it
- The owner, the kitchen manager and whoever does the books
- Works in
- Text and email · Your agreed price list or order guide · Your food cost sheet or inventory tool · QuickBooks or Xero
The problem
Chicken goes up 40 cents a pound. Fryer oil goes up two dollars a case. Nobody tells you. It's on line 23 of an invoice that got signed at the back door and stuffed in a folder.
Short shipments get signed for too. A case of lemons is on the invoice but not in the walk-in, and you pay for it anyway.
By the time you see it in your food cost at the end of the month, you've paid it four times.
What your agent does
- A cook photographs the invoiceAt the back door, by text
- Or the distributor emails it
- Your agent reads every lineCompares it to your agreed price and what you paid last time
- Price increases flaggedItem, old price, new price, cost per week
- Shorts and subs flaggedChecked against what the receiver counted
- Food cost updatedYour costing sheet or inventory tool
- Bill entered once approvedAs a draft in Xero; after the OK in QuickBooks
What you get
- Every invoice line checked, not just the total
- Price increases caught the first week, with the dollar impact
- Credit requests ready for every short and wrong price
- Bills in QuickBooks or Xero without anyone typing them
Who approves what
The owner or bookkeeper approves each bill. In Xero the agent enters it as a draft for approval; in QuickBooks, which has no draft bills, it waits for the OK and then enters it. It never contacts a distributor on its own; it drafts the credit request for a short or a price above the agreed one, and the kitchen manager sends it or tells it to.
Common questions
- Can it read a crumpled invoice photographed in bad light?
- Usually, yes. When a line is hard to read, the agent says which one and asks for a better photo or a copy from the distributor's portal. It doesn't guess at prices.
- We don't have a signed price agreement. Does it still help?
- Yes. It compares each line to what you paid last time and flags anything that went up. You can add agreed prices for your key items later.
More for restaurants
One menu change, every channel
Call or text one change. The agent updates Square, and Square syncs it to DoorDash, Uber Eats and Grubhub.
Cover a sick call-out
A cook texts at 5am that they're out. The agent finds who's free and won't hit overtime, texts them in order, and updates the schedule.
Catering inquiry to booked event
A catering inquiry comes in by call, email or form. The agent asks the questions, quotes from your menu, sends the deposit invoice and books it.
What job would you hand to an agent?
Book a free 15-minute call. Tell us the job that eats your week and we'll tell you how an agent would handle it and what it would cost.