Smart table reassignment

A floor plan drifts out of shape over the course of a shift. Early bookings land on tables sized for a different party, cancellations leave single tables stranded between two bigger sittings, and by the evening there are gaps too short to sell even though the floor isn’t full. Smart table reassignment tidies that up on its own, using the same solver that plans your whole day at once rather than guessing table by table.

Fills the gaps your floor leaves behind

Once a day (or on demand), Sidedoor re-plans every reservation that isn’t locked, guest-picked, or already seated - fitting each one onto the smallest table or declared combination that works for its party size and time, and closing dead gaps that were too short to sell. Nothing you’ve promised a guest changes: a locked booking, a table a guest chose themselves, a card-held booking, or a party that’s already arrived is planned around, never moved.

Untangles existing clashes

If two bookings end up overlapping on the same table, smart reassignment treats that as a clash to fix, not just a gap to fill: it moves one of the clashing bookings onto the best other table it can find, or sends it to the waitlist if nothing fits, exactly as if you’d put it there yourself. A locked booking sat on a table that’s simply held or blocked isn’t treated as a clash - it counts as seated like any other. A clash it genuinely can’t resolve, such as two locked bookings sharing a table or a locked booking against a block carried over from a neighbouring day, is called out in the preview rather than stopping the rest of the plan; a movable booking caught in a hold is called out too, since reassignment can usually move it clear as part of the same plan. As with the gap-filling above, anything locked, guest-picked, card-held or already seated is otherwise left alone.

Seats below the minimum as a last resort

If re-planning would otherwise leave a booking unseated, smart reassignment can sit it on a table below its minimum party size rather than leave it without a table at all. It still keeps the booking in its own seating area and within its access rule’s table scope, and only considers a free single table or a declared combination (never a one-off combination you’ve made for another booking), choosing the smallest option that fits. Any move like this is flagged below table minimum next to the table in the preview, so you can see exactly where it happened before you confirm the changes.

See the value before you commit to it

Choosing Smart assign opens a confirmation first: Sidedoor explains it’s a dry run (nothing moves until you apply it) and offers Allow over-seating as a last resort, unticked by default and never used by the automatic daily run. Tick it and the plan weighs every table and declared combination up to a little bigger than its listed size, based on how big a party that table has comfortably sat before (never below its listed size). It only reaches for that extra room to seat a booking that would otherwise be left without a table, and that can mean moving a party who’s already seated onto a bigger table so their original table frees up for the one that needed it. Choose Run dry run to see the plan, or Cancel.

The preview runs once with whatever you chose and shows exactly what the moves are worth before anything changes: a headline on how many more standard bookings your floor could take at its two most common party sizes - for example, “frees room for 3 more 2-tops or 2 more 4-tops” - plus a before-and-after of the seat-hours in use. A clashing table being untangled is counted on its own rather than as a table already seated, and any booking seated over its table’s listed size is marked (N seated, over table size) so you can see exactly where that happened. If the numbers aren’t worth it, cancel and the day stays exactly as it was; apply it and Sidedoor carries out exactly what you previewed, including your over-seating choice.

Rescues a waitlisted guest without the maths

When there’s no free table for a waitlisted party, choosing Assign does the same planning for that one guest: it works out which other unlocked, not-yet-arrived bookings it could move to free up a table or combination, shows you those moves, and only seats the guest once you confirm them. Locked, guest-picked and already-arrived bookings are never part of the move. If moving bookings still can’t fit the party, you’re told so and can seat them manually.

Turn smart reassignment on, and preview or apply it on demand, from Settings → Tables. Seat a waitlisted guest this way from the reservations grid.