Printing receipt/ticket from POS to printer upstairs?

[Dirky]

Hi,

I will quickly explain our setup/scenario:

Outside in beer garden.

• 2 or 3 staff in a beer garden each with square retail iPad and card reader. They will walk round tables and take orders.
• Customer also have the QR code on their table so they can do self-serve if they wish.

Upstairs, the bar and prep area.

Here I have ordered a Star mCprint3.

When staff take an order on the POS, we want the receipt and or ticket to print upstairs in the bar, so the orders can be prepped.

Question 1

I was hoping that the iPad upstairs in the bar would pass the orders through to the printer but I think it seems that the iPads outside will need a bluetooth connection (or lan/wifi) in order to print? Is that correct? (If so I think they will be out of range for Bluetooth).

Question 2.

Will the orders coming in via selfe-serve print out on the printer too? I was informed they would, if so, is that via bluetooth connection from the upstairs iPad.

Problem 1.

We cant use restaurant version as it does not allow cost prices to be set in the products.

Otherwise this may have been a better option.

Thanks for any help or advice!

[Sam_400º]

@Dirky - you make this very easy to answer, thanks! 

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@Dirky wrote:

Question 1

I was hoping that the iPad upstairs in the bar would pass the orders through to the printer but I think it seems that the iPads outside will need a bluetooth connection (or lan/wifi) in order to print? Is that correct? (If so I think they will be out of range for Bluetooth).

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Best bet is to have the printer connected via Ethernet to your network. Then all devices will be able to have it configured as a ticket printer as long as they’re on the same network (even with Wi-fi order BT I’d double check your coverage around all the external areas so you know how far it gets 

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@Dirky wrote:

Question 2.

Will the orders coming in via selfe-serve print out on the printer too? I was informed they would, if so, is that via bluetooth connection from the upstairs iPad.

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Yup - this is something you’d configure on your main iPad upstairs. They’ll come though as online orders & you can easily set them to automatically print off for you 👍

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@Dirky wrote:

Problem 1.

We cant use restaurant version as it does not allow cost prices to be set in the products.

Otherwise this may have been a better option.

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I’ve not used the retail version so I’m not a lot of help on this one! As long as the retail version has a setting for order tickets then you’re good to go (will be in the printer station settings). As far as I know all the apps are using the same base workflow, just designed around different business areas. I really like the restaurant workflow, but also use the main app too & switch depending on business right now.

[Dirky]

Hi @Sam_400º that makes sense about the wifi etc.

As for the printing of online /self serve orders, I cant see this option on Square for Retail? Am I missing something or does it not exist?

I could perhaps use the standard Square POS app just for that? Are you saying you can actually have it print them automatically, as soon as they are entered online ?

Thanks

D

[tranguyen]

Hey @Dirky, I'm just stepping in for 400º here! I think the Square Point of Sale app might be the better fit in this case. From checking on my end here, it isn't possible to set up online order printing within the Square for Retail app.

However, this feature is available with both the Square Point of Sale app and the Square for Restaurant app, free and Plus. With it, you'll be able to configure it so orders are printed out automatically when they're received online. 

[Dirky]

Thanks @tranguyen . Am I right in thinking we can take orders downstairs/outside on the square for retail and just use the square POS upstairs for printing ?

[tranguyen]

As the Square for Retail doesn't have an open ticket function that'll let you save orders and send it to the upstairs Point of Sale app for printing, it might be best to use just the standard Square Point of Sale app for both taking orders and printing @Dirky. While there are limitations in terms of setting cost price per item, the standard app does give you a lot more flexibility in terms of taking orders, managing and printing them. 

[Dirky]

Thanks, I am getting the impression the retail one is not as well developed.

However, my main reason for not using the regular, was no cost prices.

If I set the cost prices all on the backend, will my reports all work correctly, so I can see profits?

Thanks @tranguyen 

[tranguyen · Accepted solution]

Hey @Dirky, thanks for your reply! The Retail app is definitely more geared towards a traditional retail shop so there are certain limitations with it.

In this case, if you subscribed to the Square for Retail Plus and set the cost prices in the backend, you should still be able to generate a Cost of Goods sold report through Square. 

I hope this will help but do let me know if you have any other question and I'll do my best.