Announcing the New Square Square Online Discussion Board

[Tom]

More and more sellers in our community are pressing on with Curbside Pickup and Local Delivery by opening up online stores for their business. With that in mind, we created the Square Online Discussion board — a space within our Seller Community where you can share your experiences, ask questions, and discuss all things related to your Square Online site.

If you're just getting started, check out our latest feature releases in our Product Updates section and have a look at some of our most viewed topics. If you don't see what you're looking for, feel free to start a new thread and we'll make sure you get the resources you need.

The Community is looking forward to hearing from you! Click reply below if you’d like to introduce yourself, share a link to your store, or let us know if you have any questions or suggestions!

[RKTOYS]

Nice to see this medical marijuana spam post showed up in my mailbox because I dared to comment in the same thread.  I'd say this forum software definitely needs some work.  If you'd like, I can hook you up with a few dozen foreign recruiters that keep spamming me for 1-month jquery.NET contracts on Mars.

[manyhats]

I'm at Ecoworks Creative Reuse Center and I'm slowly adding the online store function to our store. We've used square since our opening and have been trying to find a way to sell online with the local area only. We're doing curbside pickup At this time we're only offering specific items as part of the system and not the usual store inventory. I haven't gotten far enough into the process to figure out how to get only those specifics in the store, However, if this works well and we're closed even longer we may want to add some of our other items as well. I'm finding it hard to figure out a way to let someone do a mock shopping trip to determine what works. I've tried to do a preview but it doesn't seem to do what I need. I don't think there is an actual solution to this problem but it what came out as my fingers were moving on the keyboard. I hope I'll be able to come back with actual questions and a need for support. Thanks all.

[Donnie-M]

What I did was publish the site to yourstorename.square.site and then go to that in a separate browser window and just act like a customer up until time to put in a credit card.  I also tested it on my android phone to see how it looked (photos, modifiers, item types etc).  This really helped me on what I needed to do to be customer friendly.  The preview option is ok, but I like to see the live site.

[manyhats]

Thanks Donnie. I've been reluctant to go live for even a few minutes because it's not public eye ready yet. I'm a little paranoid that someone will find it before we're ready and  I will have trouble unpublishing it. By the way, do I just send the link to the online store to customers? Maybe I will be brave.

Thanks again.

[dabblrscre8ions]

@manyhats   A friend of mine who's had her own small business for a while reminded me to add my website address to my email signature.  That way it'll go to existing customers as well as new, potential ones.

Also, in Weebly's online store editor, I found an "Unpublish" option for my site in the "General Settings" section under the "Website" category. It reads:

"Unpublish

Republish your site anytime to get it up & running again."

I assume this means we can open and close our sites as needed.  So let the testing begin... 😁

[vhovar]

@dabblrscre8ions, When I was first trying to setup my online store I resorted to unpublish/publish but now that I'm getting closer to opening the store I've just started to turn on and off the ability to shop. You may be aware of this setting but if not; under Setting/Checkout you will see the toggle to turn on and off ordering. I actually like this so customers who are searching for our site may happen on the site and can see that we are working on the online store. I did forget to turn it off a couple weeks ago and ended up with a drink order for 9:30 the next morning 😮  Well, my bad and since they had paid for it I went into the cafe and made their drinks and was at the door when they showed up. They were surprised to see that we were actually closed. I asked how they found the site and they said it came up in a google search. We are looking forward to turning things on next Monday and getting back to serving our customers!

[dabblrscre8ions]

Thanks for pointing out the toggle option, @vhovar.  My "unpublish" tip actually was for @manyhats who was concerned with turning on a not-ready-for-primetime site just so it could be previewed and tested as if @manyhats were a customer placing an order.  I get not wanting to launch an unpolished site, but I couldn't put mine off anymore.  The new manager of our farmers' market needed active links, photos, etc for the vendor guide/menu she's putting together for our first pre-order market on the 16th.

[TriforksEmpire]

I created a 100% off coupon code that I use when I need to test the online store.

[dabblrscre8ions]

Does anyone else have a headache from trying to set up the sales tax calculator for your store?  If so, read on for solutions that might help you...

Because of Virginia's varied tax rates (https://www.tax.virginia.gov/sales-tax-rate-and-locality-code-lookup), it took me until today to figure out what customized settings to use so my online store won't overcharge my customers.  Setting the rate in the Square app was easy-peasy; I just had to type the numbers in under the app's tax setting.  But that info isn't something that syncs with the online store, and I couldn't simply use the "Automatically calculate taxes" option for two reasons.

First, the program has the wrong base rate set for Virginia (5% when it should be 4.3% for general merchandise statewide). Then, behind the scenes, it automatically added the 1% local tax based on the zipcode I gave as the pick up location, even though I didn't set a zipcode modifier.  That means my test order was charged 6% sales tax when it should've been 5.3%. (I know, it's a difference of pennies, but it's bad business practice, plus a matter of conscience and principle.)

Changing the state rate to 5.3% and checking the "Don't charge local taxes" box was one option.  However, as this is my first year collecting sales tax, I didn't know if I'd have to provide detailed tax collection records at some point so I went with editing the base rate to 4.3% and letting the system add the 1%.  For now, it's working correctly.

Hopefully, this helps everyone else trying to figure out the tax set up part...

[raylab810]

hi everyone!

We serve brunch on weekends from 10-2pm and dinner after that. i can't figure out a way to allow times for each menu, so in the middle of brunch someone can order a burger and our kitchen isn't big enough to do both menus and then we have to call them back and disappoint them. 

also is there a way to NOT allow people to pre order? someone will send in an order say at 7am for 6pm pick up, which would be fine if we were retail and could just package it up and set it aside. But restaurants need to make the items so they are delivered fresh and hot to the customers.  the problem being, is that the customer usually picks a time that is right in the middle of our rush and our kitchen not only has to remember to start cooking the ticket but has to gage when to start cooking it to be ready at the specified time.  

[Donnie-M]

To limit order ahead go to online store --->>Settings ---->Pickup & Delivery ---> Go to the right and Edit Location --->  Edit Pickup Settings ---->  And toggle off Scheduled Pickups

This should let them order only when you have your hours set for pickup available.  I sometimes set these hours a little different than the store hours.  If I open at 7AM the pickup window starts at 7:30 AM.

As to schedules for Menus I do not believe it is currently functional, you can hide items from your online store, what we did was put the tag on our breakfast items at 7-10AM and lunch Items Available 11-3pm etc. as the category name and made sure it was prominent on the order page.  It is not ideal, but customers pick up on those things and it helps.

[RLiss]

Hi guys,

I'm glad this thread has started. I own a small restaurant in Baltimore and had been using square's POS with great success. When we were forced to close in March I immediately set up a square commerce site. https://le-comptoir-du-vin-online-shop.square.site/ We are lucky that Maryland is letting us sell wine to go so now we are half bottle shop half pantry with a limited carryout menu. So far the shop has been very successful.

While set up was mostly intuitive I have come across a few issues and would love any suggestions:

1. The weebly for square app often does not show the pick up time a customer has added and acts like the order is being shipped when I go to complete it even though it's for pick up. Anyone else experience similar issues with the app?

2. I really want to get rid of the pick up immediately option and force customers to choose pick up times. Many of our customers don't see the option to choose a different pick up time and its very stressful having so many people coming at once when we are trying to keep people safe.  

3. Since we are a small operation and not trying to add third party delivery I was hoping to set up delivery times for after our shop hours. Unfortunately pick up and delivery times have to be at congruent times. Does anyone know if there is a work around or if this will change in the future?

4. We sell food and alcohol, but I am unable to set up different tax codes based on product. Is there a good work around? I currently have tax included, but I would like to change this.

5. This past week we had a lot of customers complain that the square code to access their saved info weren't working. I also experienced this trying to buy a coffee at another shop in Baltimore so it seemed like a larger problem beyond my shop. Anyone else experience this.

Thanks everyone!

[sayra]

Hello@RLiss-

Your website is cool! Wish I was in your city to order a Funky Bunch Wine Package. When you set up your online store taxes, did you do this in your Square Online Store or your Square Account (POS), under taxes? As of today pick up and delivery times are congruent and there is no way to separate the two. We continue to gather feedback on this feature to better our Pickup & Delivery settings

Regarding your Square code, I'm not clear on what code you mean. What code are your providing your customers to save their information?

[RLiss]

Hi @sayra thanks for responding. When I add each new menu item for my online store on my dashboard it gives me the option to choose my tax code (6% or 9%), but when I upload the items to my square store I can only choose one tax code. 

Having pick up and delivery times that could differ would be huge for us.

The square pay verification code is a code square will send you via sms when you put in your email at check out to verify your identity. Then all of your payment information is automatically added and it makes check out easier for customers that order every week. Last week a lot of our customers said the code square would send them wasn't working at checkout, but this seems to have been resolved.

Thanks for your help.

[dabblrscre8ions]

@RLiss -- I see what you meant about your tax set up options.  When I posted my comment about this topic on Saturday, I had 2 different listings for VA sales tax at one point, and if I'd needed to create more like for an alternate location, there was a setting for that.  Today, it's only giving me the option to add extra tax rates for other countries, but not for other U.S. states, much less the same address.

[Donnie-M]

I think that Square should visit the ability to code a custom tax modifer even if it is a 2nd united states so we could pick the option to have 2 tax rules.  In TN we have a different tax on groceries.  In our business a prepackaged pack of say pop tarts has a lower tax rate than the regular sales tax rate.  Currently if I see any type of grocery item online I can only charge the higher sales tax rate which could be an issue if a consumer were to complain.

As far as sales tax receipts, I think on the accounting side if you have gross sales, the state looks at that number for calculating what you pay in taxes.  i.e.  If i sell $1000 in product and tell all of the customers it is tax free, the state will say you owe us 92.50 since you should have collected 1092.50.  If I tell people tax is included in the price it is the same net result, I owe the state 92.50.  So regardless of your reporting, the state will look at gross sales.  If you claim tax exempt sales then you would have to support those sales with proof of tax exempt status of the buyers (not tax advice here just opinion).

[RLiss]

Agreed @Donnie-M for the most part square is very intuitive and makes my job so much easier. When we use square up pos for the restaurant it’s so easy to crest different tax codes for different products. I’m surprised this is even an issue on the commerce platform. Hopefully now that so many of us are using it due to this new covid-19 landscape these updates will be made. Maybe these issues are more Weebly connected vs square connected? The weebly App is very glitchy and I’ve never had any issues with square in the past. 

[sayra]

Thanks for your reply@RLiss.

Good news! We have updated our pick and delivery features. Take a look at this thread with @Isabelle__ best answer. 

Let us know how your experience with this update goes. 

[RLiss]

Thanks @sayra I'm excited about these changes. I'm especially excited that we can now limit the amount of customers. This will help with the issue we have with folks constantly choosing: "pick up immediately" the day before and having way too many order as soon as we open.

A lot of our customers are complaining that they don't see the option for choosing their pick up time and it only shows the option for immediate pick up. I think the issue is you can't choose your pick up time until after you put your personal information in so up until that point it just shows you whatever the next available pick up time is. If customers could choose their pick up time before putting in their email address this would be very helpful.

Thank you for all your hard work!

[sayra]

Hello @RLiss.

I tested the pickup feature myself and was able to see both pick up options next to each other (see picture below). However, I did have to enter my personal information first, as mentioned by you. At this time, the option to choose a pickup time before entering personal information is a feature request. We continue to gather feedback for this feature and will make sure to update you if the checkout flow changes. 

Thanks for your continued feedback. 

[RLiss]

@sayra thanks for checking. We have older customers that get confused by this and its caused a few issues. I would love to see a work around for this. 

Thank you!