Bookkeeping for Hospitality

Hospitality carries the most complex payroll of any small business sector in Australia, and it carries it with the thinnest margins. A single venue may be running full time, part time and casual staff across multiple classifications, with junior rates, casual loading, evening and weekend penalties, public holiday rates, split shift allowances and overtime all applying at different times to different people. The relevant award sets out these entitlements in detail, and none of it is optional. Underpayment in hospitality is rarely deliberate. It is almost always the result of a roster processed quickly at the end of a long week.

Single Touch Payroll reporting means each pay run is now visible to the ATO as it happens rather than at year end, and superannuation obligations under the payday super arrangements are tied far more closely to your pay cycle than they once were. This is a positive change for compliance but it removes the buffer that venues used to rely on. Super now needs to be funded in step with wages rather than caught up at the end of a quarter, which changes how a venue has to manage cash across a slow month.

The reconciliation side is equally particular. Your point of sale reports a figure for the day. Your card terminal settles a different figure, sometimes net of merchant fees and sometimes on a delay. Cash takings may be banked in a lump covering several days. Delivery platforms settle on their own cycle, net of commission. Until all of those are matched back to the bank, you do not know your real trading position, and the difference is rarely trivial across a month.

Food and beverage GST adds a further layer. Some items you buy are GST free and some are taxable, and the treatment of what you sell depends on what it is and how it is supplied. A venue that codes all purchases the same way is either overclaiming or underclaiming, and both are corrected eventually.

We reconcile every revenue stream back to your bank, keep your payroll accurate against the applicable award, manage superannuation in line with your pay cycle, code GST correctly across purchases and sales, and prepare your BAS. Monthly reporting shows food cost, labour cost and margin as percentages you can act on rather than figures you have to interpret.