Guide › Manage the business

The assistant and today at a glance

This chapter covers Back office › Assistant: a conversation about your restaurant that answers from Sofrito's own figures, and Today at a glance, a short list of what deserves your attention now. It explains what you can ask, how changes are approved, what the assistant can't do, and what it costs. Owners and managers use it; anyone with the back office can.

Before you start

• The conversation runs on Sofrito Cloud with AI set up. On a Sofrito Hub, open your back office on Sofrito Cloud to talk to the assistant; Today at a glance works on both.
• The assistant sees only what your role sees. Someone without View reports gets no sales figures from it, and someone without Edit the menu can't change prices through it: see Your team, roles and PINs.

#Today at a glance

On the right of the Assistant screen (folded at the top on a phone), Sofrito lists what matters today, most urgent first:

• kitchen tickets waiting longer than your late time;
• stock at or below its reorder level;
• how sales are pacing against the same time last week;
• labour, or discounts and voids, out of line with sales so far;
• today's best seller, and today's bookings;
• dishes guests see without a description.

These come from fixed rules, not from AI, so they cost nothing and everyone sees the same. Select Ask about this under one to ask the assistant about it.

#Ask a question

1. In the back office, select Assistant.
2. Type your question and press Enter, or pick one of the suggested questions. Write in any of Sofrito's languages: it answers in the language you write in.

Good questions name a period or a comparison: "How did we do this week compared with last week?", "What were our best and worst sellers in September?", "When are we busiest on Saturdays?", "Which dishes have no photo?".

Under each answer, a line such as Looked at sales · 12–18 Oct shows what the assistant read to answer. Select it to see those figures, as a chart or a table. Every figure in an answer comes from them: if Sofrito doesn't have it, the assistant says so rather than guessing.

While a Sofrito Hub serves your restaurant, Sofrito Cloud has your figures as of the hub's last sync, and the assistant says so when today's figures matter.

#Changes you approve

The assistant can mark a dish sold out or back on sale, change a dish's price, name, description, allergens or tags, add a dish, and recommend a dish on your guest menu. It never changes anything by itself:

1. Ask, for example "Mark the bacalhau sold out" or "Raise the burger to 14.50".
2. A card shows exactly what would change, such as Price 13.50 € → 14.50 €, with a warning when something looks unusual (a price more than doubled, a dish already on the menu, a recommended dish without a photo).
3. Select Approve to make the change, or Don't change to leave everything as it is.

An approved change is made as you, with your permissions, exactly as if you had made it on the Menu screen, and it runs once however many times the connection drops. The audit log shows it, marked as made through the assistant: see Security, the audit log and your data.

#What it can't do

The assistant doesn't take payments, refund, void, issue or change invoices, or change your team, taxes or settings. Ask it where something is done and it tells you where in the back office to find it.

Text in your own data, such as a dish description or a guest note, is only ever read as data: if it reads like an instruction to the assistant, the assistant doesn't follow it, and any change still needs your approval.

#Conversations and privacy

Each person has their own conversation at each location; nobody else can open it. Select New conversation to start afresh. Your conversation is deleted with your restaurant's account.

#What it costs

Each answer uses AI, counted against your restaurant's monthly AI allowance (20 US dollars unless your Sofrito Cloud operator set another). The Assistant screen shows how much this month has used. When the allowance is used up, the assistant stops until the first of the next month; Today at a glance carries on.