Waiting staff

Are you looking to serve up a successful career in Scotland’s hospitality sector? As a waiter, you’ll be the first face a customer sees when they enter a restaurant or café.

You’ll give customers a warm welcome and set the tone for the rest of their meal. Waiters explain the menu, take orders and serve food and drink. You’ll also handle payments at the end of a customer’s meal.

Waiters usually work in a team, managed by a head waiter (sometimes known as the maître d’). Some restaurants will give you a specific area of tables to look after.

In formal settings, your work may include ‘silver service’. This means you’ll serve food directly onto a customer’s plate at their table – you’ll receive special training on the correct way to do this.

Lots of waiting staff work part-time alongside school, college or university. Others dedicate their career to the profession and progress into a more advanced role, such as maître d' or sommelier (wine professional). You could also specialise in fine dining at formal events, become a restaurant manager or move into kitchen management.

Your tasks might include:

• welcoming customers, showing them to their table and presenting them with menus

• taking customers’ food and drink orders and passing these to the kitchen and bar staff

• serving food and drink to customers at their table

• making sure guests are happy with their meals and fixing any issues they have

• handling cash, card and voucher payments – you’ll also give a receipt to each customer

• clearing tables by swiftly removing cutlery, crockery and glassware

• CareerScope – explore the hub of the UK’s hospitality industry

• Country and Town House – check out this day in the life blog from a VIP waiter