Shift: definition and use in a computer club

A shift is a period of club operation with an open cashier, tied to a specific administrator. All transactions, sessions, and top-ups during that period are combined into a single shift report. Shifts are the operational unit of club accounting in IZI — every financial figure in Analytics traces back to a shift.

What a Shift Does

A shift serves three functions simultaneously:

• Financial accounting — everything that went through the cashier during the period: cash, card, top-ups, refunds, and bonus credits
• Operational control — who worked, how many hours, how many sessions were opened and closed
• Analytics base — shift revenue is the primary data source for calculating AOV, ARPU, and hall utilization

Without an open shift, the cashier cannot process transactions. Without a closed shift, the period’s revenue is not finalized in the reports. This makes opening and closing shifts a non-negotiable operational step rather than an optional procedure.

How Shifts Work in IZI

In IZI, shifts are managed through the Shifts section or the Cashier interface depending on the installation version:

• Opening a shift — the administrator records the starting cashier cash balance. The time is stamped automatically.
• During the shift — all sales, top-ups, refunds, and session openings are automatically linked to the active shift. No manual attribution is needed.
• Closing the shift — the administrator triggers close. The system generates the shift report: revenue by payment type, session count, tariff breakdown, bar sales, bonuses credited, and the closing cash balance. The administrator’s name and total hours are recorded.

The shift report is available in Analytics → Shifts and can be exported for accounting purposes.

What the Shift Report Includes

Section	What it shows
Revenue	Totals by payment type (cash, card, balance deduction)
Top-ups	Total player cash balance top-ups for the shift
Bonuses	Bonus balance credited during the shift
Sessions	Number of sessions opened and completed
Average check	AOV for completed sessions during the shift
Bar sales	Food and beverage revenue separate from gaming time
Staff	Administrator name, shift open and close times

Shift vs Calendar Day

A shift does not have to coincide with a calendar day. A venue open from 12:00 to 06:00 has one shift that technically spans two dates. For day-based analytics — comparing weekdays and weekends, or identifying seasonal patterns — use the session date filter, not the shift filter.

Shift comparison is most useful for performance benchmarking between administrators or between recurring time slots: Friday evening shifts against other Friday evenings, daytime shifts against daytime shifts. Comparing an eight-hour evening shift against a four-hour opening shift produces misleading averages.

Unclosed Sessions at Shift End

Before closing a shift, it is good practice to check the Session Report for any sessions still marked open. An unclosed session means time is still running on a device, the device appears occupied in the system, and no final amount is recorded yet. Closing the shift while sessions are open does not automatically resolve them — they carry over into the next shift’s accounting, which can distort both shifts’ revenue figures.

IZI flags unclosed sessions in the shift close flow. Resolving them before closing keeps the financial records clean and makes the outgoing administrator’s report accurate.

Shift Handover

In clubs with multiple daily shifts, handover between administrators is a critical moment. Best practice:

1. Review open sessions and resolve any anomalies before closing
2. Record the physical cash count in the closing balance field — the system will flag discrepancies against the calculated expected balance
3. Brief the incoming administrator on any active issues (equipment faults, extended sessions, pending refunds)

IZI does not automate the verbal handover, but the shift report gives the incoming administrator a complete financial snapshot of the previous period in seconds.

Related Terms

• AOV — average check per session, calculated from shift data
• ARPU — revenue per active player; shifts aggregate into the monthly ARPU figure
• Session — individual gaming time blocks that accumulate within a shift
• Hall utilization — session count per shift is the base data for utilization calculations
• Roles and permissions in IZI — the administrator who opens the shift