Quick-service restaurants see 60% or more of their business at the drive-thru, making headsets essential.

In July, an employee at a Sonic restaurant in Salem, Va., received a shock after lightning likely struck a transmitter box near where she was standing outside and wearing a headset. The employee was not injured, although the shock blew off one of her shoes.

And although headsets don’t “attract” lightning, because metal conducts electricity easily, contact with metal objects such as headset components, a golf club or a metal-handled umbrella during a lightning strike can make an electrical shock more intense—and thus, more dangerous. Sonic noted in a statement following the incident that other crew members had heard a “pop” in their headsets when the strike occurred.

Limiting employees’ headset use—especially outside—during periods of unstable weather can help ensure crew members’ safety and, in turn, minimize operators’ exposure to possible legal ramifications of an on-the-job injury suffered during a storm.

Additionally, Washington, D.C.-based OSHA mandates that employees exposed to noise at or above an 8-hour time-weighted average of 85 decibels (about the level of city traffic) institute an annual training program that provides instruction on preventing hearing loss. Teen workers in particular, OSHA notes, should be advised about adequate volume levels and cautioned against exposing other headset-wearing crew members to excess background noise.

Positioning headset microphones closer to the user’s mouth than to the chin can help cut down on background noise heard by the person on the listening end.

With adequate health and safety precautions in place, today’s digital headsets can offer the benefits not only of helping to decrease order errors but also of lessening communication-related frustration for customers and crew members. For customers whose first language is not English, the greater intelligibility provided by digital headsets means that order takers are more likely to accurately record orders the first time and not have to ask customers to repeat their order.

Quick-service restaurants often see 50% to 60% of the business roll through the drive-thru window, so providing as smooth an ordering experience as current technology will allow is a top operator priority. Irvine, Calif.-based In-N-Out Burger has been using headsets for around 20 years—the chain’s cultlike status means that customers craving any of the never-frozen burgers from In-N-Out’s regular or Not-So-Secret secret menus will sit in drive-thru lines that snake around corners and sometimes off of units’ property.

During especially busy times, an In-N-Out employee will head out to the drive-thru lane to take customers’ orders and answer any questions in an effort to speed the ordering process. “It’s absolutely fair to say that headsets improve drive-thru efficiency,” says Carl Van Fleet, In-N-Out’s vice president of planning and development. “Better order accuracy cuts down on mistakes, and fewer mistakes definitely improves wait times.”