Under what circumstances will PAR notify a Dq Treat Participating Location about problems?

According to Dq Treat's 2025 Franchise Disclosure Document, PAR (the service provider) will notify a participating location about problems under two specific circumstances. First, if PAR becomes aware of a system-wide outage, PAR and/or Dairy Queen may notify participating locations of the outage. In this case, the participating location is not required to notify PAR to obtain a credit for the outage. Second, if PAR personnel determine that a problem reported by a participating location is due to defects in the location's user environment, PAR will notify the participating location. Examples of such defects include electrical disturbances, software failures from third-party installations, viruses, or natural disasters.

For a Dq Treat franchisee, this means that PAR takes responsibility for informing them about widespread system issues that could impact their operations, ensuring they are aware of the problem and can potentially receive credit for any losses incurred. Additionally, PAR will inform the franchisee if the issues are originating from the franchisee's own systems or environment, which places the onus on the franchisee to rectify those problems. This is a fairly standard practice in franchising, where the franchisor or their service providers handle system-wide issues, while franchisees are responsible for maintaining their own equipment and environment.

It is important for a prospective Dq Treat franchisee to understand the distinction between system-wide issues and user environment issues, as the responsibility for resolving these problems falls on different parties. Franchisees should also be aware that they must report any outages to PAR to be eligible for credits, unless it is a system-wide outage that PAR is already aware of. Maintaining a robust and stable user environment is crucial for franchisees to avoid being held responsible for issues that disrupt their operations.