How to Automate Supplier Invoices in Your Restaurant

Key takeaways

1. Supplier invoice automation cuts manual processing time from dozens of hours each month to just a few, so your team can focus on guests and revenue.
2. Real-time cost data and price alerts help protect margins, support supplier negotiations, and guide timely menu changes.
3. Integrated systems that connect invoices, accounting, and POS provide clear visibility of dish-level profitability and overall performance.
4. Simple digital workflows, such as email and photo capture, make automation practical even when some suppliers still use paper invoices.
5. Jelly automates invoice capture, cost tracking, and reporting for UK hospitality operators, and you can see it in action by booking a quick chat with the Jelly team.

Why supplier invoice automation matters for UK restaurants

Manual invoice processing consumes significant time in many UK restaurants, pubs, and boutique hotels. Manual invoice processing consumes 16-24 hours per month in many operations, driven by data entry, chasing approvals, and filing paperwork. Those hours increase staff costs and reduce time available for menu planning, training, and guest experience.

The impact goes beyond labour. Manual processing results in inaccurate details, delayed reporting, and weaker supplier control. Without timely visibility of ingredient prices and usage, pricing decisions and menu changes rely on guesswork.

Automated invoice workflows reduce admin, improve data quality, and support better purchasing decisions. Operators that automate typically see faster processing, more accurate payments, and stronger fraud controls through duplicate detection and clear audit trails. This guide focuses on established sites with at least £500,000 in annual revenue that want practical steps to move from paper-heavy processes to digital automation.

Introducing Jelly for automated invoice management

Jelly provides supplier invoice automation designed specifically for UK restaurants, pubs, and boutique hotels. The platform focuses on fast setup, clear controls, and practical reporting, rather than complex enterprise-style projects.

Jelly supports your operation in several key areas:

1. Automated invoice capture: Jelly converts invoices sent by email or photographed on a phone into structured data, including quantities, SKUs, prices, and tax. Manual data entry largely disappears, and every item becomes searchable.
2. Price alerts and cost tracking: A Price Alert system highlights ingredient price increases and decreases by item and by supplier, supporting evidence-based negotiations and prompt margin protection.
3. Real-time dish costing: Ingredient prices from invoices flow into your recipes, so dish costs and gross profit margins stay current rather than relying on old spreadsheets.
4. Accounting integration: Invoice data exports directly into accounting tools such as Xero, which reduces bookkeeping time and improves consistency from purchase through to payment.
5. Insightful dashboards: Clear reports by supplier, category, and time period show where money is going and where cost pressures are rising.

You can see how this works for your site by booking a Jelly walkthrough.

Step-by-step guide to implementing supplier invoice automation with Jelly

Step 1: Set up your process and onboard suppliers

First create a dedicated email address for supplier invoices, and decide how you will handle any remaining paper invoices through photo uploads. Clear communication with suppliers helps them use the new process from day one.

Jelly’s onboarding focuses on quick value. Most teams begin receiving digital invoices into Jelly within days, and the interface is designed for chefs and managers without specialist technical skills.

Expected outcome:

1. All supplier invoices arrive in one digital location inside Jelly, rather than in folders, inboxes, or drawers.

Measurable success:

1. At least 90% of invoices arrive digitally within two weeks of launch.

Step 2: Automate invoice capture and data extraction

Jelly scans each invoice line and records quantities, SKUs, prices, and VAT automatically. Many manual operations spend 10-20 hours per week on invoice entry, and this step largely removes that workload.

Occasional corrections are handled through simple on-screen edits, and Jelly’s AI improves as it learns your products and suppliers.

Expected outcome:

1. Accurate, structured invoice data stored in Jelly and ready for reporting, costing, and export.

Measurable success:

1. Processing time falls by around 75%, from 16-24 hours per month to roughly 4-6 hours.

Step 3: Track costs in real time and act on price alerts

Jelly updates ingredient costs and dish gross profit margins as each invoice is processed. The Price Alert feature flags every price change, along with the supplier and size of the shift.

Suppliers then face structured, data-backed conversations. Operators that manage supplier costs actively often uncover 1-2% reductions in hidden surcharges by challenging patterns of extra fees and unexplained increases.

Expected outcome:

1. Menu pricing, specials, and purchasing decisions reflect current ingredient costs, not last quarter’s estimates.

Measurable success:

1. Teams review and respond to at least 95% of price changes within 24 hours, often supporting a 2 percentage point gross margin improvement within three months.

Step 4: Integrate Jelly with accounting and POS systems

Jelly connects with accounting tools such as Xero and POS systems such as Square and ePOSnow to create a joined-up financial view. Invoice data flows into accounts payable, and sales data flows back for item-level profitability checks.

Real-time visibility into dish profitability then replaces the wait for month-end reports. Careful mapping of accounts and tax codes at setup prevents reconciliation issues.

Expected outcome:

1. A single set of numbers shared across purchasing, kitchen, finance, and management.

Measurable success:

1. Accounting reconciliation time falls by around half, while daily flash reports align closely with true gross profit margins.

Step 5: Use Jelly insights to guide decisions

Regular reviews of Jelly’s Insights Dashboard, Flash Reports, and Menu Engineering tools turn invoice data into practical actions.

1. Insights Dashboard highlights spend trends by supplier and category.
2. Flash Reports show daily gross profit, so managers can react quickly.
3. Menu Engineering ranks dishes by popularity and profitability for targeted changes.

Teams can then focus on high-margin favourites, re-cost or adjust weaker dishes, and decide where to absorb or pass on supplier increases.

Expected outcome:

1. Decisions about menus, pricing, and purchasing rely on current data and clear financial impact.

Measurable success:

1. Food cost reductions of around 3% within three months are realistic for sites that act consistently on the insights.

You can discuss how this might work in your venue by scheduling a chat with Jelly.

Comparing supplier invoice automation: Jelly vs the old way

Conclusion: strengthen margins with invoice automation

Moving from manual invoice handling to automated workflows gives UK hospitality operators better control over costs, time, and data. Reliable invoice data, linked to recipes, suppliers, and sales, helps protect margins in a challenging market.

Jelly provides a focused platform for this work, with automated invoice capture, real-time cost tracking, and integrations that fit typical restaurant tech stacks. The result is a clearer view of profitability and less time spent on routine admin.

Profit keeps the doors open. You can explore how automation might fit your operation by booking a demo with Jelly.

Frequently asked questions

How quickly can I see value from automating supplier invoices with Jelly?

Most sites begin to see value within the first week. Once suppliers send invoices to your dedicated Jelly email, or you upload photos of paper invoices, the system starts generating price alerts, spend reports, and updated dish costs. The interface is designed so chefs and managers can work with it after a short introduction, without a long implementation project.

My chefs are not very tech-savvy. How easy is Jelly for them to use?

Jelly presents a simple layout that focuses on the tasks chefs care about. In the Kitchen section, recipes are built by selecting ingredients that already exist from scanned invoices, and the system handles unit conversions and cost calculations. Tasks that previously took close to half an hour in spreadsheets often drop to just a few minutes, so the team can keep attention on service.

Can Jelly help me negotiate better prices with suppliers?

Jelly supports stronger negotiations by providing a full record of price movements across all ingredients and suppliers. The Price Alert feature surfaces each change so you can bring specific examples to supplier meetings, request credit notes for overcharges, and question new fees. Many operators uncover patterns of small increases or surcharges that were difficult to spot with manual processing.

How does invoice automation affect overall profitability?

Automation improves profitability by reducing admin time, tightening cost control, and guiding menu changes. Jelly users typically see lower food costs, often around 3% within a few months, when they act on price alerts and menu engineering insights. Management time previously spent on data entry can then shift to training, revenue growth, and guest experience.

What if some of my suppliers cannot send invoices digitally?

Jelly still fits operations that receive paper invoices. Staff can photograph invoices with a phone, and Jelly extracts line-level data with the same accuracy as from emailed PDFs. You can then encourage suppliers to move to email over time, without delaying the benefits of automation for the rest of your cost base.