About This Career

Performs duties such as taking orders and serving food and beverages. Serves customers at counter or from a steam table. May take payment. May prepare food and beverages.

This career is part of the Hospitality and Tourism cluster Restaurants and Food/Beverage Services pathway.

A person in this career:

• Communicates with customers regarding orders, comments, and complaints.
• Scrubs and polishes counters, steam tables, and other equipment, and cleans glasses, dishes, and fountain equipment.
• Accepts payment from customers, and makes change as necessary.
• Performs cleaning duties, such as sweeping, mopping, and washing dishes, to keep equipment and facilities sanitary.
• Requests and records customer orders, and computes bills, using cash registers, multi-counting machines, or pencil and paper.
• Balances receipts and payments in cash registers.
• Serves food, beverages, or desserts to customers in such settings as take-out counters of restaurants or lunchrooms, business or industrial establishments, hotel rooms, and cars.
• Prepares daily food items, and cooks simple foods and beverages, such as sandwiches, salads, soups, pizza, or coffee, using proper safety precautions and sanitary measures.
• Cleans and organizes eating, service, and kitchen areas.
• Monitors and orders supplies or food items, and restocks as necessary to maintain inventory.

Working Conditions and Physical Demands

People who do this job report that:

• You would often handle loads up to 10 lbs., sometimes up to 20 lbs. You might do a lot of walking or standing, or you might sit but use your arms and legs to control machines, equipment or tools.
• Work in this occupation involves use of protective items such as safety shoes, glasses, gloves, hearing protection, a hard hat, or personal flotation devices
• Work in this occupation involves using your hands to hold, control, and feel objects more than one-third of the time
• Work in this occupation requires being inside most of the time
• Work in this occupation involves making repetitive motions more than one-third of the time
• Work in this occupation involves standing more than one-third of the time
• Work in this occupation involves walking or running more than one-third of the time

Working in this career involves (physical activities):

• Seeing clearly up close
• Speaking clearly enough to be able to be understood by others
• Identifying and understanding the speech of another person

Work Hours and Travel

• Rotating shift work
• Weekend work