Why should I add or require documents?

A benefit of The Food Corridor platform is the document tracking system. You can add Expiration Dates to any Client Document and let the platform send you and your clients notifications before they expire. 

The built in notifications are sent to both the Kitchen Admin and the client 45 days, 14 days, and 3 days before the document is set to expire (or renew, for auto-renew FLIP policies). You will also receive a notification when a client uploads or updates a required document.

You can set as many required documents, and upload as many private or shared documents, as you'd like - there is no limit!

Required documents are documents that you require of your food business clients in order to work out of your kitchen. These requirements typically include business license, insurance, and a food handlers card, though you may also wish to require a signed contract or additional items. You can set your document requirements in Kitchen Settings > Documents.

You can also enforce document compliance by preventing your clients from booking in your kitchen until their required documents are added and current. In order to do so, switch 'Disallow booking until client's required documents are current' from "OFF" to "ON" above your list of document requirements.

If a client doesn't have a required document uploaded or if one is past expiration, and they try to create a booking, they will be prevented from doing so and will receive this message:

You can also integrate FLIP with your existing insurance requirement, making it easy for your clients to apply for liability insurance directly through The Food Corridor. This automatically syncs your clients’ FLIP policy and expiration date with the document requirement, so you can feel confident that your clients are compliant. If a client's policy is set to auto-renew, their new policy will be automatically renewed and uploaded to their insurance requirement. To switch this on, toggle “Integrate with FLIP?” to “OFFERED”.

For more information, check out What is FLIP and How Does it Work?

It's great practice to enforce this setting (many kitchens' favorite setting!), but if you need to make an exception - say a client's document is stalled but you know it's covered - you can override this setting at the client level. Simply go to your Clients tab > Client name > click Edit next to Settings > toggle ‘Required Documents’ to off.

Kitchen documents are uploaded by the Kitchen Administrator and are often associated with kitchen policies and procedures. The Kitchen Administrator has the option of setting the visibility of a document to private or visible to all your clients and prospects.

Kitchen Documents that you may want all of your clients to have access to could include logos, price sheets, contact lists, cleaning schedules and procedures, kitchen maps, equipment usage instructions, blank contracts, policy and procedure manuals, etc. 

Both the Client and the Kitchen Administrator are able to upload a prospect's or client's documents. While we recommend having your prospects and clients upload their documents themselves, this is up to you. 

If you choose to upload them, go to your Clients tab > Client name > Documents > Edit icon (or Add Document at the bottom) > Upload the document > Enter the expiration date > Save. 

To delete an uploaded file, go to your Clients tab > Client name > Documents > Click the trashcan icon.