Large Drive-Thru Orders

[Ginger Tea]

Having 3 separate orders in a car, ie one burger, fries and drink per order, uness it is a stretched limo with half a dozen or more peeps inside, sounds like either the trio have not gotten their shit together by the time they order, or they are anal about the bill being split right, but asking for a receipt negates that.

I'm sure there is a mutually beneficial way of ordering 3 burgers with modifiers than doing each separately especially that they should then all be going into the same bag for collection and not a "oops wrong burger slip up." yes they happen when it is two or more orders in a single transaction, but if your first order is #12 in the system and the car behind is #13 your 2nd would be #14 and possibly #16 if a 3rd order is done, so a pre bagged order might be picked up as you entered 3 consecutive orders, so these three in a row must be for your car.

[yankees12100]

But it's misleading. Say 1 car orders 1 order, a cheeseburger (keep it simple), and it takes a total of 75 seconds from start to finish. Then say another car orders 3 separate orders, 3 cheeseburgers, and it takes a total of 210 seconds.

On the surface it appears as though the second car took forever and is hurting the flow of the drive-thru. However, I see it as a plus. 1) The business is actually profiting more *per second* with the 3 orders in 1 car rather than the 1 order in 1 car. The first car took 75 seconds/order the second car took 70 seconds/order (210 total seconds/3 orders). Additionally, 3 people in 1 car creates 2 less cars clogging up the drive-thru since they are together and not in their own cars.

This whole timing thing doesnt make much sense to me lol

[Ginger Tea]

how does saying "3 cheese burgers" seem the worse option, unless you mean start to finish between opening your mouth and getting the cooked food.

I'm taking it to mean ordering the food and pulling away to the collection area, then 3 cheeseburgers no modifiers listed in your example takes just as long to say as "a cheeseburger" without getting into millisecond timing.

[HYHYBT]

However, say 1 car did 3 separate orders and it took 3 minutes to complete from start to finish. I dont understand why the car cannot be treated as separate orders.. meaning the FF place recognizes this as 3 orders at 1 minute each rather than 1 order at 3 minutes.

I do not know whether entering it *as* a multiple order alters the stats from doing them as three cars or not, but if it took three minutes all together, then it would not be three orders of one minute either way. The number that counts by far the most is TTL (Total Time in Line). In practice, it's actually the time from when the first button of entering an order is pressed until the order is served off the DT monitors, meaning that the earliest possible instant is when it's been paid for, and it's not supposed to happen until you've received everything. And obviously neither has happened if you're still back at the speaker box placing other orders.

[HYHYBT]

how does saying "3 cheese burgers" seem the worse option, unless you mean start to finish between opening your mouth and getting the cooked food.

I'm taking it to mean ordering the food and pulling away to the collection area, then 3 cheeseburgers no modifiers listed in your example takes just as long to say as "a cheeseburger" without getting into millisecond timing.

A single order for three cheeseburgers is MUCH faster at every stage, including making the food and bagging it up, than three separate orders for one cheeseburger each. This is somewhat lessened, and eventually negated entirely and even reversed, as the order grows larger and more complicated.

[HYHYBT]

Having 3 separate orders in a car, ie one burger, fries and drink per order, uness it is a stretched limo with half a dozen or more peeps inside, sounds like either the trio have not gotten their shit together by the time they order, or they are anal about the bill being split right, but asking for a receipt negates that.

There are a few reasons. If people are each paying for their own, it's simpler for them to pay separately than to try to divide it up afterwards, especially since it's unlikely the passengers can process card payments from each other. People also often want their orders bagged separately; that greatly simplifies distributing the results in the car. I'd typed out a lecture on how saying "separate bags" after placing an order in which it's not obvious how things would be divided makes a mess of things, but you probably don't need that. More rarely, sometimes one person is paying but wants to split the payment, which isn't possible on that system within a single order (other than draining gift cards).

I'm sure there is a mutually beneficial way of ordering 3 burgers with modifiers than doing each separately especially that they should then all be going into the same bag for collection and not a "oops wrong burger slip up." yes they happen when it is two or more orders in a single transaction, but if your first order is #12 in the system and the car behind is #13 your 2nd would be #14 and possibly #16 if a 3rd order is done, so a pre bagged order might be picked up as you entered 3 consecutive orders, so these three in a row must be for your car.

I'm not sure what you're going for with this, but will add technical detail anyway. Our system numbered DT orders separately from front counter ones. If the "MT" button was used correctly, all orders from the same car would have the same order number (12, in your example.) If not, they would still be in sequence... *unless* either someone placed an order at the window (which, while in between yours numerically, would appear at the front of the line onscreen nonetheless) or at the other order point if there is more than one (in which case it would appear to be between yours even though, since you're still back there placing an order, it should be ahead of your first one.)