Build Employee Breaks in Toast

In this Article:

• Create a New Break
• Track Missed Breaks and Acknowledge Breaks
  • Customize Your Break Acknowledgement Messages
• Reporting 
• End Breaks Early Permission

 

Create a New Break in Toast Web

1. In Toast Web, navigate to Employees > Timesheet management > Break types.
2. Select the + Add button to create a new break.
3. Add the following information for the new break:
   
   
   • Give the break a Name.
   • Check the box in the Active? column to activate it.
   • Select the break Type (paid breaks will continue to pay wages while the employee is on a break while unpaid breaks will pause wage accumulation until the break is over).
   • Enter the Duration in minutes of the break.
   • For restaurants part of a multi-location group, select the Target and Owner. 
     
     
4. Save and publish your changes.

All breaks default to not being enforced by Toast. If you need to prevent your staff from clocking in before the minimum amount of time has passed, select the name of the break to open up the break settings, and then toggle the Enforce Minimum Time setting to Enabled. Save and publish your changes.

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Track Missed Breaks and Acknowledge Breaks in Toast Web

You can choose to track whether or not an employee has taken a specific break. For example, if you require that an employee take a 30-minute unpaid meal break for every 6 hours of work, and that break must be taken within the first 5 hours of the shift, you can track and report on whether or not that employee has taken that break.
 

1. Navigate to the break in question (Employees > Timesheet management > Break types) and select the break by name to open up additional settings.
2. In the Advanced Properties section, locate Track Missed Breaks and select Yes, missed breaks for the defined time interval are automatically added to the "Break Entries" report. 
3. Now enter the Tracked Break Interval. This is the time span in which a break must be taken. For example, if you enter "5" hours, if an employee doesn't clock out for a break every 5 hours, it'll be noted on the Break Adherence report and the Break Entries report.
4. The Employee Break Acknowledgement setting can be used to require employees who have missed a required break to answer a question. This allows you to track the reason the employee missed the break. For example, this allows you to track if the employee voluntarily chose to skip the break or if the break was not made available to the employee. Learn more in the section below.

• If this is enabled, employees will see a message when they clock back in from a break, depending on if they observed the break as required or missed the break. The default language for the acknowledgment questions is:
  • Observed break: Welcome back! Did your employer ask you to take this break?
  • Missed break: It appears that you did not take a [Break Name] of at least [XX-Break Duration] minutes between [XX:XX AM] and [XX:XX AM]. Did you voluntarily skip your [Break Name] during this time?

For a closer look into tracking missed breaks and break acknowledgement, check out the platform guide.
 

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Customize Your Break Acknowledgement Messages in Toast Web

Our system offers some default language for the break acknowledgment questions as described above, but also offers the ability to customize the language to meet individual customer needs.

To edit the question an employee will see regarding break acknowledgment:
 

1. Navigate to Employees > Timesheet management > Break types
2. Select a break to edit.
3. Scroll to Advanced Properties. First, Track Missed Breaks must be set to Yes and second, Employee Break Acknowledgement must be set to Enabled. Without picking these settings, the break acknowledgment messages cannot be customized.
4. Once these settings are selected, two new settings will appear at the bottom: Override Observed Break Text and Override Missed Break Text.
5. Once you select Yes for either break acknowledgment message, a text box will appear and allow you to customize the message an employee will see in either situation. This message appears to an employee after they are returning from their break.
6. To view either default message that Toast will display, hover over the icon to the right of the No option.
7. Save and publish after any changes are made.

 

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Reporting

Break reporting can be located by navigating to Employees > Related reports > Break entries.

The report can be sorted from all columns. Select the Taken or Audit Response columns to filter whether or not a break was taken and if the employee was asked to go on break. 

Other things of note regarding the Break Entries report:
 

• Audit Responses with a No will have a red triangle icon to visually highlight them. 
• Missed breaks will be grayed out.
• Taken breaks will be in black. 
• For missed breaks, the start time is calculated based on the latest possible time the break could have been taken (according to the time set in the Tracked Break Interval field). 

For a deeper dive into break reporting, check out the platform guide.

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End Breaks Early Permission

All employees automatically have access to take breaks in Toast. The permission related to employee breaks is for overriding breaks that enforce a minimum time. Ensure the 3.15 End Breaks Early permission is enabled for any job/employee who needs to end mandatory breaks before the minimum required time. For more information, check out the Permissions Reference Guide. 

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