Offering valet parking services for restaurants just got a lot easier with Summon’s fantastic set of flexible features.
Now you can offer valet parking services that enhance the restaurant experience for guests and restaurant owners while operating most efficiently.
Valet stand location setup is easy and takes just a moment. One of the great features of Summon is the flexibility it provides when setting up a location allowing for any arrangement type you may have with the restaurant.
Set up the parking lot(s).
First, we need to look at your parking area and set up the different parking lots that you may have. In our example, we have the main parking lot where we can park up to 100 vehicles, and then we’ll set up a small lot with seven spots for our VIP guests that want their car parked in front.
Set up the vehicle pickup location (s)
Next, we need to set up an area where restaurant guest can pick up their vehicles when they are ready to leave. Summon allows you to set up multiple pickup locations, but for our example, we will only set up one and call it “Front Door,” which is a perfect descriptor for the physical place and will help guide guests to the place where they can pick up their vehicle.
Set up payments
Summon allows you to take payments through cash and credit card transactions. In addition, you can create multiple rates for a location. For example, you can offer paid “Flat Rate,” “Hourly Rate,” or even “Complementary Rate.” For our example, we will set up two types, one “Regular Flat Rate” ($5.00) and another “Premium Flat Rate” ($15.00) for guests that want their vehicle parked at the front. We will also enable “Complementary Rate” ($0.00) so that you can comp a ticket if need be.
Set up a coupon
Coupons are four-digit numbered codes that allow guests to validate valet parking service. Setting up a discount coupon is easy. Coupons are attached to rates since it’s necessary to know the exact monetary value you will be discounting. For our example, we will only set up a discount code that will validate (discount) -$2.00 from our $5.00 Flat Rate and none for the VIP Flat Rate.
You are pretty much done with the location set up and ready to operate. However, summon has additional functionality that you can set up for a location, such as controlling “required fields” to ensure data input by your team is accurate and consistent for your shift and controls for the user experience (web ticket).
Operating The location
Once the location has been created and set up, you’ll see it on the main Summon page. Once you tap on it, you’ll be able to revisit the “Options” you just set up for the location and “Open a Shift.”
Open a shift.
Once you open a shift, you are ready to operate. Runners can join the shift from their own devices and have access to operational activities such as checking in, parking, retrieving, and checking out tickets.
As a manager, you’ll need to “Pin” your app to the location to receive shift notifications. Once you do that, you’ll start receiving notifications when a guest requests their vehicle, as well as other notifications based on your preferences. Make sure your phone volume is all the way up!
Pinning your phone to a location also “locks the location screen,” so if your phone goes to sleep or is in background mode, you’ll land on the shift operational screen when you turn it on again.
Checking in a vehicle
When a guest arrives at the restaurant, you’ll greet them and get three pieces of information to check in a vehicle.
- Get the rate. As the guest arrives, ask the guest if they’d like to have their vehicle parked up front. Should that be the case, then select the appropriate rate.
- Get their phone number (and name optionally). This information is super important since Summon will send the guest a text message with a link to their web ticket.
- Get the tag of the vehicle. The vehicle tag is super important, and it is used to link all the info together.
With the correct rate selected, the phone number, and the vehicle tag, you are now ready to check-in in the vehicle.
The Guest Experience
Once you check-in a vehicle, an SMS is sent to the guest with a link to their web ticket.
There are two main functions that a guest can do with this ticket. They can “Request” their vehicle and “Pay” for service using a credit card. You have complete control over the guest experience in real-time.
For example, instead of allowing guests to “request” their vehicle via the web ticket, you may want them to visit the stand to do so. In this case, you’d toggle off the functionality, and guests will not be able to request their vehicle from the web ticket.
The same applies to credit card payments; mid-shift, you may decide that you’d want the guests to pay at the stand. Again, you can toggle off the functionality, and it will be removed (real-time) from your guest’s web ticket.
The web ticket offer guests a fantastic experience. Guest can validate service, pay, and request their vehicle at any time. As a result, they feel in control of the experience, and they will be more willing to tip handsomely.
Restaurant Reporting
When you are done with the shift, you can close it and access all the shift reports in the shift section under settings.