13 KDS Load Balancing

KDS load balancing helps the kitchen to better manage orders by automatically routing new orders to KDS Expo Displays and Prep Stations based on their current load of non-bumped items. This feature also allows the kitchen staff to manually:

• Push orders to other Expo Displays and Prep Stations

• Pull orders from other Expo Displays and Prep Stations

Expo Displays and Prep Stations are assigned to distribution groups, and orders route to other Expo Displays or Prep Stations within that same distribution group. Kitchen staff can only pull orders from Expo Displays and Prep Stations from within the distribution group; they can push orders to any display of the same type (Expo/Prep) that is in the same kitchen (uses the same KDS Controller).

Orders are balanced by the number of menu items, not by the number of orders. To achieve the most equal distribution of menu items for Prep Station load balancing, Oracle recommends configuring the KDS to show every item of an order on its own chit.

Setting up KDS load balancing consists of completing the following tasks:

1. Enabling KDS load balancing. Configuring a KDS Controller contains more information on enabling KDS load balancing.

2. Creating KDS Distribution Groups

3. Assigning a Distribution Group to a KDS Order Device

4. Configuring the KDS Toolbar or Configuring the KDS Bump Bar

• Creating KDS Distribution Groups
  
• Assigning a Distribution Group to a KDS Order Device