A photo in a group chat
- Write the rota
- Photograph it
- Argue about it
Two versions circulate. A double-booked server is found on the night. Hours are reconstructed from memory at month end, and nobody can say what labour actually cost last week.
Workforce · UAE & GCC
Staff Scheduling & Time Clock for UAE Restaurants
Build next week on a 7-day grid, publish it so the team can see it, and watch who actually turns up. Clock-ins happen at a kiosk by PIN or face, and the hours become cost per person without anyone adding up a timesheet.
- Draft the week privately, publish when it is ready
- Clock in by PIN or face — the kiosk runs on a spare tablet
- Hours and estimated cost per person for any date range
The week schedule, as it ships.
More than a WhatsApp group
The rota stops living in a photo of a whiteboard
Most restaurants here plan the week in a notebook and send a photo to a group chat. It works until someone swaps a shift, and then nobody knows which photo is current.
Tahlib Workforce
- Draft the week
- Overlaps flagged
- Publish
- Clock in
- Hours captured
- Cost per person
One rota everyone reads from the moment you publish it. The system warns you before you double-book someone, and the hours people actually worked come from the clock rather than from recollection.
You still decide who works when. You stop being the only person who knows what was decided.
How it works
From planning the week to knowing what it cost
Set-up is entering your team once. After that it is a few minutes a week.
Plan on a 7-day grid
Click a cell to add a shift: who, start, end, and the role they are working that day. The grid totals hours as you go.
Get warned about clashes
Assigning someone who is already on shift at that time flags an overlap before you save it, not on the night.
Publish when it is ready
Shifts start as drafts only you can see. Publishing the week shares it with the team, so there is one current version.
Staff clock in at the kiosk
A spare tablet paired to your restaurant. They tap their name and enter a PIN, or look at the camera if you have enrolled faces.
The board shows who is on
A live list of everyone currently clocked in and how long they have been on, plus the recent clock-outs.
Fix the honest mistakes
Someone forgets to clock out. Correct the entry from the dashboard — a reason is required, and the edit is recorded.
Read the hours back
Hours per person for any date range, with the roles they worked and the number of shifts closed.
Turn hours into cost
Give a staff member an hourly rate and the report estimates their cost for the period, and the total for the team.
Manual time-entry edits always carry a reason and land in the audit log with the name of whoever made them.
At a glance
What the week actually looks like
Two screens do most of the work: the labour report at the end of the week, and the clock-in check that decides whether an entry can be trusted.
What you get
The parts a manager actually uses
Grouped by the job, not by which screen they live on.
Planning the week
The rota, in one place, with one current version.
- 7-day grid — click a cell to assign a shift
- Start, end, role and a note per shift
- Overlap warning when someone is already scheduled at that time
- Draft shifts stay private until you publish the week
- Hours totalled per day and across the week as you build it
- Move between weeks without losing your place
The time clock
What actually happened, rather than what was scheduled.
- Live board of who is on the clock and since when
- Recent clock-outs alongside, so a short shift is visible
- Clock a staff member in or out from the dashboard when the kiosk is not to hand
- Correct a forgotten clock-out, with a mandatory reason
- Every manual edit written to the audit log with the editor’s name
The attendance kiosk
A spare tablet by the staff door, paired to your restaurant.
- Register a kiosk from the dashboard and pair it with a one-time token
- Staff tap their name and enter a 4–8 digit PIN
- Or clock in by face, if you have enrolled them
- Regenerate a token instantly if a device goes missing
- Deactivate a kiosk without deleting its history
Face clock-in, done carefully
Optional, consented, and honest about how sure it is.
- Three angles captured at enrolment — centre, slight left, slight right
- Explicit staff consent recorded before anything is stored
- A quality gate that rejects a poor capture rather than storing it
- A liveness challenge, so a photograph is not enough
- Every entry stores its method and an assurance level of high, medium or low
- Face data removable per staff member, permanently, at any time
Hours and cost
The number you need before payroll, not after it.
- Hours per staff member for any date range
- Shifts closed and the roles each person worked
- An hourly rate per staff member drives an estimated cost
- Team total for the period, and a per-person breakdown
- Only closed entries count, so someone still on shift never skews it
Clocking in
An attendance record you can actually defend
The point of a time clock is not that it records a time. It is that you can say how that time was recorded when someone disputes it.
Quality is checked before identity
A capture that is too far away, too dark or partly out of frame is rejected at the device. Nothing blurry ever reaches the matcher, so a bad photo cannot become a bad match.
A photo will not clock someone in
The kiosk issues a challenge and requires evidence that the action actually happened. Holding up a picture of a colleague fails it.
Every entry says how it was made
Face, PIN, manager or code — recorded on the entry along with an assurance level. A medium-assurance clock-in is visible as such rather than looking identical to a strong one.
Corrections are visible, not silent
Editing a time entry needs a reason and is written to the audit log with the manager’s name. The record shows it was edited rather than quietly replacing the original.
Connected operations
Where the hours come from and go
Workforce is useful alone. It gets sharper when the rest of the restaurant is on the same system.
- Schedule
- Kiosk
- Time clock
- Labor report
- P&L
Staff & roles
The same team records the rest of Tahlib uses, with the role-based access that decides who can edit a rota or correct a clock-out.
Expenses & P&L
Estimated labour cost sits next to your other costs in a monthly P&L with a labour percentage.
Task Board
Opening and closing checklists for the shift you just rostered, with acknowledgement per person.
Analytics
Order volume by hour tells you when the floor is actually busy — the input you want before writing next week.
Point of Sale
Who was on the till, and when, from the same staff records the clock uses.
Chain Dashboard
Each branch keeps its own rota and its own kiosks, while the group compares hours and cost across locations.
Products are switched on individually — see the full catalogue and prices on the products page.
Where it fits
What changes, by type of restaurant
The rota is the same shape everywhere. The problem it solves is not.
- Cafés
- Small team, early starts, a lot of part-time cover. The published week ends the "was I on today?" message at 06:40, and the clock settles what hours were actually worked.
- Casual dining
- Split shifts and weekend doubles. The overlap warning is the difference between finding a double-booking on Tuesday and finding it on Friday night.
- Quick service
- High turnover and a lot of new starters. PIN clock-in needs no enrolment, so someone hired on Monday can clock in on Monday.
- Multi-site operators
- Staff who cover more than one branch. Each site keeps its own rota and kiosks, and the hours land against the branch where they were worked.
- Owner-managed restaurants
- Where the rota lives in one person’s head. Publishing it means the floor can run a shift without ringing the owner to ask who is on.
Built here
The details that matter for a UAE team
Written around how restaurant teams here are actually staffed.
Mixed teams, mixed languages
The dashboard runs in English and Arabic with proper right-to-left layout, so whoever writes the rota does it in the language they think in.
Costs in AED, per person
An hourly rate per staff member turns hours into an estimated cost for the period — the figure you want before payroll, in the currency you pay in.
Long service, split shifts
Shifts carry their own start and end rather than fitting a fixed pattern, so a lunch-and-dinner double is one rota entry and one set of hours.
Biometrics with consent and an exit
Face clock-in is optional. Consent is recorded before a template is stored, and a staff member’s face data can be permanently removed at any time.
Getting started
How to get Workforce
Two ways to get it, and you are not forced into either. Add it to the paid plan you already have, or move to the plan that bundles it.
Start with a Tahlib plan, then add the products you need — or move to a plan that already includes them.
Questions, answered
What managers ask before moving the rota
How do staff see their shifts?
You build the week as drafts that only you can see, then publish it. Publishing shares those shifts with the team, so there is one current version rather than several photos of a whiteboard.
Will it stop me double-booking someone?
It warns you. Assigning a person to a shift that overlaps one they already have flags it while you are still editing, so the clash is caught before the rota goes out rather than on the night.
What do staff clock in on?
A kiosk — any spare tablet, paired to your restaurant from the dashboard with a one-time token. Staff tap their name and enter a 4–8 digit PIN, or look at the camera if you have enrolled their face.
Do we have to use facial recognition?
No. PIN clock-in works on its own and needs no enrolment, which is usually the right choice for a new starter. Face is optional, per staff member, and consent is recorded before anything is stored.
Can someone clock in a colleague with a photo?
The kiosk issues a liveness challenge and requires evidence the action actually happened, so a held-up photo fails. There is also a quality gate before that which rejects a capture that is too far, too dark or partly out of frame.
What if someone forgets to clock out?
Correct the entry from the dashboard. A reason is required, the record shows it was edited, and the change is written to the audit log with the name of whoever made it.
Can I remove a staff member’s face data?
Yes, permanently, at any time — per staff member from the attendance screen. The template is stored for attendance only.
Does it calculate what my labour actually cost?
It estimates it. Give a staff member an hourly rate and the labour report multiplies it by the hours from their closed time entries, per person and as a team total for any date range.
Does it compare labour cost to my revenue?
Not today. The report gives you hours and estimated cost; putting that against revenue is something the Expenses & P&L product does at a monthly level. If a live labour-to-revenue ratio matters to you, say so before you commit.
Can it split the tip pool?
No. Tip pooling is not part of Workforce today — it schedules, tracks time and reports hours and cost. Worth knowing now rather than discovering it on payday.
Can I export the hours for payroll?
You can read the report on screen for any date range, broken down per person. There is no CSV export yet, so today it is a screen you work from rather than a file you hand over.
Does it work in Arabic?
Yes. The schedule, time clock, labour report and attendance screens all run in English and Arabic with proper right-to-left layout.
What does it cost?
Two ways, and you choose. Add it to the paid plan you are already on at its own monthly price per branch, with a 14-day free trial — no upgrade required. Or move to the plan that bundles it with several other products. The pricing section above shows both with current figures.
Get the rota out of the group chat
Build next week on a grid, publish it once, and let the clock tell you what actually happened.
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