A good roster keeps customers served and wages under control. A bad one leaves you short on your busiest day and overstaffed on your quietest. Whether you run a café, a shop, a restaurant, a market stall or an events business, the same simple method works for rostering casual staff. Here it is, step by step.
1. Start with your busy times, not your people
Write down when you are open and when the rush hits. A café might peak at breakfast and lunch. A shop might peak on Saturday afternoons. An event might be flat out from the gates opening until close. Build the roster around those peaks, and allow time for opening and closing on either end. Many owners forget that the business costs money before the first sale and after the last.
2. Decide the roles each shift needs
List the roles you need for a quiet shift, a normal shift and a peak shift. It might be front of house, kitchen, bar, cashier, floor or a runner. Once the roles are written down, rostering becomes filling slots, not guessing.
3. Ask for availability before you build the roster
Casual staff have other jobs, study and plans. Collect availability for the week or the event before you assign shifts, and set a clear cutoff time. Chasing people by text on the morning of a shift is the main reason rosters fall apart.
4. Keep a short bench
Always have one or two people you can call when someone cancels. A good bench is a small list of reliable casuals who have already worked with you and know how you operate. It is the cheapest insurance you can buy.
5. Confirm every shift in writing
A verbal "see you Saturday" is not a confirmed shift. Send each person their shift with the start time, the location, who to ask for, and what to wear or bring. Ask for a reply. Written confirmation also means there is a record if there is a disagreement about hours later.
6. Track actual hours, not planned hours
Shifts run long and short. Record when each person actually started and finished, and what breaks they took. Accurate timesheets protect you and your staff. They also make pay day faster, because you are not reconstructing the week from memory. Check the Fair Work Ombudsman website for current pay, award and break rules that apply to your business, because these change and depend on the type of work.
7. Review after every busy period
Look at how the roster held up. Did you run out of hands at the peak? Was anyone standing around? Small adjustments each time add up to a much tighter roster over a season.
Where a rostering app helps
Everything above can be done on paper or in a spreadsheet, and many businesses start that way. An app takes away the repeat work:
- Rostering in one place. Build the roster once and staff see their shifts on their phone, instead of scrolling a group chat.
- Clock-in that is hard to forget. Crewbase uses NFC clock-in, so start and finish times are recorded as people arrive and leave.
- Timesheets built as you go. Hours are recorded as shifts happen, ready to review at the end of the week.
- Compliance in the same place. Induction quizzes and required forms can be completed in the app, so new casuals are ready before their first shift.
- Free for staff. Your casual team uses Crewbase at no cost.
Crewbase was built in Australia for businesses with shift workers. You can see how it works on the how it works page, browse the features, or check the pricing.
Quick roster checklist
- Busy and quiet times written down
- Roles needed for quiet, normal and peak shifts
- Availability collected, with a cutoff
- Two reliable casuals on the bench
- Every shift confirmed in writing
- Actual start, finish and break times recorded
- A five-minute review after each busy period