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TheBuzz Erika Engle |
Leap year software glitch
makes restaurateur waryWORRIES over Y2K compliance are a distant memory, except for restaurateur Ed Wary, owner of Auntie Pasto's and Dixie Grill restaurants.
Sunday's leap day was a potential nail-biter. "We happened to discover, accidentally, that the system wasn't computed to include leap year," he said.
The system is the POS, or point-of-sale system used by his restaurants' cash registers to track orders, plan food purchases and the like.
Normally the POS system puts a time and date on every transaction, printed on receipts.
"Obviously that would have thrown everything off, our whole schedule ...(and caused) all kinds of messes," said Wary.
Imagine the expense account woes and court-case alibis that would have been nullified, had a restaurant receipt shown the diner was at the restaurant on March 1 when the day in question was actually Feb. 29.
Canada-based AM/PM Service Ltd., makers of Maitre'd POS software, were contacted, and sent back the needed upgrade.
Reprogramming computers is not really up their alley but reprogram, they did, Wary said. Each of his restaurants has two, three or four registers so there was some down time as each upgrade took place.
Maitre'd is among dozens of popular restaurant POS systems, said Tom Jones, co-owner and president of the two Gyotaku Japanese Restaurants. He is also 2004 chairman of the Hawaii Restaurant Association, for which Wary is the representative to the National Restaurant Association board of directors.
Jones remembers when Wary bought his POS system and was surprised to learn that Y2K compliance efforts had not included the 2004 leap year.
"We use Digital Dining," Jones said.
His two locations encountered no problems with the software, which was purchased in November 2000.
Outback Steakhouse Inc.'s six Hawaii locations encountered no problems, according to official Ed Ennis. Based in Florida, the 825 Outback locations use a proprietary POS system.
The potential POS problem and its timely solution could provide real-world, non-textbook learning for more than just Wary's employees -- he is also an instructor at the University of Hawaii School of Travel Industry Management.
Of the dozens of POS software programs, most are PC-based, Gyotaku's Jones said. "A lot of the new programs feature bells and whistles ... but in reality most restaurants use only 10 to 20 percent of them."
Sort of like humans and their brains.
"Right, the old 80-20 rule," Jones laughed.
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Erika Engle is a reporter with the Star-Bulletin. Call 529-4302, fax 529-4750 or write to Erika Engle, Honolulu Star-Bulletin, 500 Ala Moana Blvd., No. 7-210, Honolulu, HI 96813. She can also be reached at: eengle@starbulletin.com