Shortages are a very common problem in catering.
Unfortunately it is not enough to be constantly careful to avoid them, but it is necessary to implement internal procedures and make sure they are respected.
Let’s analyze together the possible causes and remedies.
What is a cash shortage?
Ammanco means lack. About what? Cash from the cash desk.
So a cash shortfall is the finding of a difference between what the cash liquidity should be and what is actually measured.
Finding of a difference between what the cash liquidity should be and what is actually measured.
Clearly, the problem arises if it is negative.
Main causes of shortages
- Theft: yes, in 75 percent of cases this is the reason. Leaving the cash desk in an employee’s hand is always a risk. It happens almost to every restaurateur.
- Bad warehouse management
- Mistakes with the remains
Solutions
Case No. 1
To reduce the risk of theft, just use a management system like Ristomanager, which differentiates the cash functions between owners and waiters.
In fact, our software centralizes operations, so that you will always be in charge of managing orders and cash transactions.
Case No. 2
The weak point of every activity, which undermines its efficiency: the warehouse!
In this case we must act on everything related to the inventory.
Always with Ristomanager, the management software for restaurants, bars, pizzerias, holiday farms, taverns and breweries (and so on and so forth) you can have precise data on its stocks.
Case No. 3
Here the solution that I propose to you is the cash compensation: a compensation given to those who handle the money, since you take responsibility for any cash errors.
But be careful: I recommend it only if you have a large restaurant, otherwise it could prove to be too expensive.
In fact the indemnity represents an additional sum compared to the basic pay.
Shortages and accounting point of view: deductibility
The item cash shortfalls must be entered in the income statement among the different management charges in B14.
According to the financial administration, cash shortfalls are deductible for Ires and Irap purposes if it is shown that they are:
- physiological,
- unavoidable
- inherent to the business activity.
It is also necessary to document the difference through a special report prepared by the person responsible for the company controls and by the cash manager to whom the shortages are attributable.
If all the conditions listed above do not occur, shortages cannot be considered deductible.
Once the shortfall has been documented in this way, the deductibility of the same from business income will derive from the common rules of experience, according to which shortages of modest daily amount can only represent different fiscal-relevant management charges.
In particular
With regard to the determination of the modest amount, the resolution specifies that the evaluation must be related exclusively to the day-to-day management of the fund, taking into account:
- the presence of organizational measures and tools to contain and prevent the causes of cash difference formation;
- the trend of cash differences recorded in the period under review;
- of the emergence of cash differences, for the same tax period, both negative and positive, hypothetically countervailable;
- of the limited significance of cash differences in relation to business volume, the consistency of the daily cash fund or that recorded at the time the checks are carried out, the total number and value of the transactions, the number of operating funds and the number of cash operators.
Finally it must be remembered that the cash differences, the Administration specifies, are subject to the discipline of Article 101 Tuir regarding the deductibility of losses of goods, not goods, in the presence of certain and precise elements that allow to objectively reconstruct the an and the quantum. Upon the occurrence of these conditions, the requirement of relevance may also be considered verified.
Read also: How to choose the best cash register for your restaurant