New Year's Eve service, planned in October

In the middle of December, a restaurant manager realises that New Year's Eve has not been planned. The diary is half full of bookings taken at the normal menu prices, nobody has decided whether there will be one sitting or two, the kitchen has not seen a menu and half the team has asked for the night off. The next two weeks are spent fixing decisions that should have been made in October, and the night itself is busy, stressful and less profitable than it should have been.

New Year's Eve service is the one night of the year when almost everything can be decided in advance. Guests book weeks ahead, the menu is fixed, the times are known and the demand is certain. That makes it the night that rewards planning most: a venue that makes its decisions in October and works through them week by week arrives at the night with a full room, a prepared kitchen and a team that knows exactly what to do.

This guide sets out the plan, from the decisions to make in October to the night itself: the format, the package, event pricing, prepaid bookings and festive deposits, the terms, the rota, the menu, the prep and the pacing. Every venue and figure in it is an example.

October is late enough to know the year's trading and early enough to be ahead of the guests. Many guests start looking for New Year's Eve plans in the autumn, and the venues with a clear offer, a price and a way to book are the ones that fill first.

It is also the last comfortable moment for the decisions that take time: agreeing the menu with the kitchen, booking entertainment, arranging extra staff and setting up the booking and payment process. A venue that decides in October has two months to execute; one that decides in December has two weeks to improvise.

The first decision is the shape of the night. One long sitting through midnight suits venues whose guests want to celebrate in one place, often with entertainment and a view. Two sittings, an early dinner and a late celebration, suit venues with guests who want to eat and move on, and families who want to be home before midnight.

Choose the format that fits the venue and its guests, and keep it simple. A format with three sittings and different menus for each multiplies the work in every part of the plan.

The second decision is the package: what each guest receives for the price. A set menu of several courses is usual, often with a drink on arrival or a glass of sparkling wine at midnight, and sometimes a full drinks package for the late sitting.

Agree the package with the kitchen, using the same test as any festive menu: can the kitchen serve it well to a full room, in the time the sitting allows? Our guide to a Christmas menu the kitchen can repeat nightly covers how to design a set menu for volume.

The third decision is the price. New Year's Eve calls for event pricing: a price for the whole evening, not for a dinner. It covers the menu, the drinks included, the entertainment, the decoration and the experience of being there at midnight, and guests expect it to be higher than an ordinary night.

Build the price from the costs first: the food, the drinks at expected consumption, the extra team and their pay for the night, the entertainment and the decoration. Then set it for what the evening is worth to guests, and check it against what similar venues nearby charge.

New Year's Eve is a natural night for peak pricing: demand is higher than on any other night, and a higher price earns more from a room that would fill anyway. Peak pricing is accepted by guests when it is clear, consistent and honest about what is included.

Publish one price per package and sitting, the same for every guest who books it. Say what is included and what is not. Avoid charges added on the night that were not in the price; a guest who feels the bill was a surprise remembers that, not the celebration.

The fourth decision is how guests commit. On New Year's Eve, a table left empty cannot be resold at ten o'clock, so most venues take payment in advance: prepaid bookings for the full price, or festive deposits for part of it, with the balance due by a set date.

A deposit is easier to accept early in the season; full prepayment protects the venue completely. Many venues take a deposit at booking and the balance in early December. Our guide to reservation deposits: when they help, when they hurt covers the trade-offs.

The fifth decision is the terms, and they must be settled before the first booking. They cover the package and price, the deposit and when the balance is due, the sitting times and when tables must be left, the deadline for menu choices and allergies, the cancellation and refund rules, whether a booking can be passed to someone else, children's prices and what happens if guests arrive late.

Write them in plain words and publish them where guests see them before booking: on the booking page, in the confirmation and on the payment request. Our guide to a no-show policy guests read once and remember covers how to word a policy guests understand.

Once the five decisions are made, open the diary. Announce the night to the venue's regulars first, through the email list for guests who agreed to hear from you, then on the website, the booking page and social media.

Regulars who hear first and book early fill the room with the guests the venue most wants on its best night. Our guide to festive bookings: open the diary in September covers the wider festive timetable.

Some guests will have booked New Year's Eve before the plan was ready, at the ordinary menu and without a deposit. Contact them as soon as the package is decided, explain the evening and its price, and ask them to confirm under the new terms.

Most guests understand, as long as the venue explains early and politely. Leaving them until December, or honouring the old terms for a few and not for others, causes far more trouble than a clear message in October.

November is for filling the room and preparing the people. Follow the bookings week by week against the plan, and remind regulars who have not booked. Confirm the entertainment, the extra suppliers and any equipment hired for the night.

Build the rota for the night in November, not December. Tell the team which shifts are needed, ask for preferences and agree who will work. Our guide to a staff rota that survives first contact covers how to build one that holds.

The team is asked to work when everyone else is celebrating, often late into the night. Pay them fairly for it, according to their contracts and the law where you trade, and think about the journey home, when public transport is busy and taxis are scarce.

A venue that arranges transport, a late meal for the team and a word of thanks after midnight keeps a team that will work the night again next year.

In early December, collect the balances due under the terms, and chase any that are late. A booking whose balance is not paid by the deadline should be released under the terms, after a reminder, so the table can go to someone on the waitlist.

Ask for the menu choices and allergies by the deadline too. With the choices in, the kitchen knows how many of each dish to prepare, and the floor team can plan the seating with every guest's needs in hand.

New Year's Eve fills, and many guests who could not book will be glad to take a cancellation. Keep a waitlist from the moment the room is full, with each guest's party size and how to contact them.

When a table becomes free, call the waitlist at once. Plans change quickly in late December, and a table offered the same day is usually taken within minutes.

In mid-December, write the kitchen plan for the night. Work out the prep for each dish from the menu choices, the order quantities and delivery dates for every ingredient, and the timing of each course for each sitting.

Order early. Suppliers are busy in late December, some close for days around the holidays, and some products run short. Confirm every delivery date in writing, and check that the cold room will hold it.

Before the night, cook the menu for the team at the pace of the real service. A practice shows which dish takes too long to plate, where the pass will wait and how many hands each course needs.

Adjust the menu or the timings after the practice. A change made a week before is easy; a problem discovered at nine o'clock on the night is not.

In the week before the night, reconfirm every booking: the time, the number of guests, the terms, the arrival window and any allergies. Reconfirmation finds the late changes while the waitlist can still fill them.

Reconfirm the suppliers, the entertainment and the team too. A short list of everything that must happen, with a name beside each item, makes sure nothing is assumed.

On the day, set the room early: the tables to the plan, the decoration, the place cards for groups with pre-orders, the bar stocked for the drinks package and the terrace or windows ready for midnight.

Brief the whole team before service: the sittings and their times, the menu and its allergens, the large groups, the guests with special requests, the plan for midnight and what to do if something goes wrong.

Pacing decides whether the night feels relaxed or rushed. Ask guests to arrive within a window, serve the first course at a set time and keep each course on schedule. For two sittings, plan the turn between them with a clear margin, so a late first sitting does not delay the second.

The end of the first sitting needs a gentle plan: dessert and coffee served on time, the bill presented before the end and a polite reminder that the table is needed for the next guests.

At midnight, as on New Year's Eve almost everywhere, service stops while guests celebrate. Plan the menu around it: the main course well before, dessert or a celebratory glass just before the countdown and nothing sent in the minutes before twelve.

Plan where guests will stand, especially if they will move to a terrace or windows. Keep exits clear and the number of guests in each space safe.

After the countdown, some guests leave at once and others stay. Decide in advance how late the night runs, and say so in the terms. Keep a light service going: coffee, late drinks and something small to eat.

Close the night with the same care as it opened: the last guests thanked, the team fed and sent home safely, and the room left ready for the morning.

New Year's Day follows, and many venues open for a late breakfast, brunch or lunch. Plan its rota and prep alongside the night, so the team that closed at two is not the team opening at nine.

A short, simple menu for the day after, prepared partly on the day before, makes it far easier to run.

After the night, record what happened: the covers at each sitting, the deposits and balances collected, the cancellations and how many were filled from the waitlist, the timings of each course, the drinks consumed and the team's comments.

Those notes are next October's starting point. A venue that records its New Year's Eve service each year starts the next plan with real figures instead of memory.

Many families want to celebrate New Year's Eve together, often early in the evening. An early sitting with a children's menu at a lower price suits them, and it fills tables at a time the celebration crowd does not want.

Say in the terms whether children are welcome at the late sitting, and at what price. A late celebration with loud music and a family with young children at the next table is a difficult evening for both.

Entertainment changes the night: a band, a DJ or a musician makes the evening feel like an event, and it raises the price guests will pay. It also brings its own planning: a contract agreed in October, the space for equipment, the power, the volume and the time it must stop.

Agree everything in writing, including the timings around midnight and the end of the night. A performer who starts late, or plays past the time the terms promised, can spoil a night that went perfectly until then.

A full room on New Year's Eve, with guests moving to a terrace or windows at midnight, needs a safety plan. Keep the number of guests within the venue's permitted capacity, keep exits and routes clear and check any outdoor space is safe for a crowd standing at once.

Brief the team on what to do if something goes wrong: a guest who is unwell, a guest who has had too much to drink, an emergency. A plan that everyone knows is far calmer to follow than one invented in the moment.

Many venues include drinks in the late sitting's package, often a glass of sparkling wine at midnight. A drinks package needs costing against what guests actually drink on a celebratory night, which is usually more than on an ordinary one.

Order the drinks early, chill them in good time and plan how the midnight glasses will reach every guest at once. Where alcohol is served, the usual rules on responsible service apply on this night as on any other.

An invented bistro decides in early October: two sittings, an early dinner at one price and a late celebration with a drinks package at another, a deposit of half the price at booking and the balance by 1 December, with a full refund until then and transfers allowed after. It announces the night to its email list in late October and is full by mid-November.

Three guests who had booked earlier at the ordinary menu are contacted in October and confirm under the new terms. The rota is set in November, the practice service in mid-December shows the main course needs a second person at the pass, and the week-before reconfirmation fills two late cancellations from the waitlist. On the night, both sittings run to time, and the whole evening's sales were secured before December began.

servearound does not take deposits or prepayment yet: prepaid bookings are coming. Until then, take the deposit through your own payment provider, and with "Confirm online bookings yourself" switched on, online bookings arrive pending until the team confirms them. The night's package can be offered on the booking page as an add-on, with a price per guest, what is included and the fields guests fill in, and as a set menu on the till, available only that night.

Reminder emails go a set number of hours before each booking, a guest who finds a time full can join the waitlist for it, and the campaign announcing the night can be written in October and scheduled up to 90 days ahead. See Reservations.

In October: the format, the package, the price, the deposits and the terms.

One long sitting suits a celebration venue; two suit venues with early diners and families.

As an event: cost it first, then price it for what the evening is worth, clearly and the same for every guest.

Yes, or full prepayment. A table left empty on New Year's Eve cannot be resold.

Contact them in October and ask them to confirm under the new terms.

In November, with the team's preferences asked first.

Keep a waitlist, and allow guests to pass their booking to someone else.

The covers, deposits, cancellations, timings and the team's comments, for next October.

New Year's Eve service is the night that can be decided in advance, so decide it in October: the format, the package, event pricing that is clear and fair, prepaid bookings or festive deposits, and plain terms published before the first booking. Use peak pricing honestly, with one price per package for every guest.

Open the diary to regulars first, move earlier bookings onto the new terms, set the rota in November, collect balances and choices in early December and plan the kitchen in mid-December. Practise, reconfirm everything the week before, pace the sittings around midnight and record the night for next year.