Here, kitty kitty kitty
Tuesday, June 2nd, 2009The manager needs to buy plumbs. Or olives. Or wheatgrass. Or band-aids. She doesn’t have any cash. What to do? Why, petty cash to the rescue, of course (what, you were expecting Sham-Wow or something?).
While the amount you keep in the emergency till will vary depending on your sales volume and access to immediate vendor response, every restaurant needs a kitty for these scenarios. Put a couple hundred bucks in it, let’s say. Limit the access to the general manager and a few trusted assistants. Cap the dollar amount spent from it. And most importantly from the accounting angle, reconcile it regularly.
This might require your accounting person to make routine visits to the storefront to tie things out. I have clients who reimburse it by submitting original receipts on a reimbursement form. Helps keep the operations folks honest. I’ve yet to see a sales slip for a condom purchase at Walgreen’s stapled together with the Krogers proofs of purchase for canned ham.
Do your due diligence with your client, though, in reconciling. Count the petty cash till. If it doesn’t balance, suggest to your client that the manager’s bonus be adjusted downward, dollar-for-dollar, perhaps. Either that or make him buy a Snuggie.
