Getting started
Invite your team
Add hosts, servers, managers and bussers to a venue, and understand what each role can do.
Updated Aug 15, 2026
TableStack is built for a full front-of-house team, and each person gets an account scoped to the venue and role they work. This guide covers inviting staff and choosing the right role.
Three ways to add someone
Which one you want depends on whether the person needs to open the app at all.
1. Send an invitation (the usual way)
From your team settings, invite a teammate by email address and pick the role they will have at this venue. TableStack emails them a join link; they set their name and password from that link and land straight in the venue. The invitation is a pending invite — not yet an account — until they accept, and it expires after seven days (you can always send a fresh one).
A couple of guardrails keep things sane: you can't invite an email that already belongs to a teammate at your venue (change their role instead), and only an Owner can invite another Owner.
If the person already has a TableStack account — because they work for another restaurant group — accepting simply adds your group to their existing login. They keep one password, and their venue switcher lists both.
2. Add someone without a login
Most servers and bussers never open TableStack; the host assigns them to sections and visits. Add them with just a name and a role — no email, no invitation, no password. They show up in the section server picker straight away.
You can store an email on the record as a contact detail, but it does not let them sign in. If they need the app later, an Owner can switch on login for that same record and everything already assigned to them carries across.
3. Create an account directly (Owners only)
Sometimes you need to hand someone working credentials on the spot — a new manager standing next to you, or a venue that doesn't do email. Enter their email and role and TableStack creates the account immediately, shows you a one-time password, and sends no email at all.
Copy that password before you leave the page — it is shown once and never again. The first time they sign in they must replace it with one of their own before they can do anything else. If they lose it before then, delete the account and create it again.
Roles are per venue
A role is granted at a specific venue, not across your whole group. Someone can be a Manager at your downtown location and have no access to the uptown one — or hold different roles at each. This keeps access tight when you run more than one venue under a single organization. See team and roles for the full picture.
The roles
TableStack has five roles, from most to least access:
| Role | Made for |
|---|---|
| Owner | Full control, including billing, staff and every venue setting. |
| Manager | Runs the venue — settings, floors, reports, guests, reservations and service — but not organization-level billing. |
| Host | The host stand — floors, guests, reservations and seating parties through service. |
| Server | Service work — viewing the floor, guests and bookings, and advancing their tables through the meal. |
| Busser | Clearing tables — viewing the floor and marking tables clean. |
Every role sees the floor; what changes is how much they can manage above it. You can change anyone's role later, with one rule: a venue must always keep at least one Owner, so the last owner can't be demoted.
What this affects
- What each teammate can do — roles gate seating, editing settings, designing floors, viewing reports and more.
- Real-time sync — everyone on the venue sees the same live floor as it changes.
What affects this
- Your role — managing staff is itself a permission.
- The venue a teammate is invited to — access never spills to your other venues.
Related: team and roles.