Support saying an expired device can be used but it won't record cash transactions?

[rickinny]

We have a problem where some of our ipad square devices don't show that any cash sales have been made during the day, when you end/close the drawer. We've been pulling our hair out trying to figure out why. Sorry if the post is a bit long. I'm just astonished if all this is true.

The support agent yesterday told me:

A) that it's because the device is "expired" and expired devices don't record cash transactions. They do record CC transactions, but not cash.

B) She said a device is marked as "expired" after being offline for 24 hours.

C) She confirmed my question/statement that:

• 1- devices can go offline, "expire", and manager is not notified or aware of it,
• 3- Mgr can open a cash drawer, send it out with an employee who takes cash transactions and,
• 4- none of those cash transactions will be recorded AT ALL. But,
• 5- they can accept CC transactions, even though the device is expired, and those will go through.

She also said that:

D) a device will "expire" if offline for 24 hours. Is that true?

The device in question processed CC and cash transactions on 9/3/22 and all cash transactions show up in a report as expected. So it was then certainly *not* expired on 9/3/22 from 10am-5pm when it was used. It sat in an office all night with wifi, but even IF the wifi was off, it was only off for at most 17 hours, as that ipad was then used Sat 9/4/22 at 10am.

• So when was it offline for 24 hours?
• How did it expire?
• Why wasn't anyone notified?
• How can an expired device be allowed to be used by Square?
• How can an expired device accept cash as a payment method if they KNOW those transactions won't be recorded.
• Why wouldn't it notify you that cash transactions WONT be recorded but CC will? 

Something HAS to be incorrect here. I don't see how what she told me corms to the reality of this one device and its behavior.

Help?

[MayaP]

Hello @rickinny,

Welcome to The Seller Community. I am sorry you are dealing with all this confusion but certainly happy to investigate this further. 

When you say device you are referring to the actual Square Hardware correct? How did we determine the device is expired? Where is that information coming from? 

[rickinny]

Hi MayaP,

yes, Square hardware, meaning it's an Apple iPad with Square app on it if that's what you mean. 

I can see the expired status here:

https://squareup.com/dashboard/business/devices

in our account.

I assume the support rep looked in the same place. We gave her approval to look at our dashboard. 

This account I'm using here is not the account with the devices on it. I created a second account with a different email to use here. 

Thanks!

Rick

[MayaP]

Oh, I see you are referring to the device code. That is just an alternate way to log in instead of an email password. But it shouldn't affect the cash reporting. To be clear, the issue is the cash is not being reported in the cash drawer. You are seeing the cash sales in reports, it is just not giving you the cash drawer report. Is that correct? 

[rickinny]

Device code, yes I think that’s right. The support tech kept saying, clearly and repeatedly that because the device is “expired” that’s why this happens” 

no, not correct. this one ipad did *not* record *any* cash transactions on 9/4/22. And therefore does not show any expected cash during ending/closing the “drawer”.  

[MayaP]

And do you only have one Square iPad with the cash drawer? What kind of cash drawer is it, make/model? 

[rickinny]

The drawer I’m referring to is the virtual “drawer” that you open and enter a starting amt of cash into to track an employee’s handling of cash money. There is no physical drawer. 

when this problem happens and you end the drawer at the end of the day and close it out, the closing drawer report during that process says it is expecting zero dollars in cash because there have been zero cash transactions. When we know for a fact that a cash transaction has been entered that day. A manager stood there and watched the employee perform the cash transaction properly and give the customer their change in cash.

the support rep, “Diana” repeatedly and clearly articulated that because the iPad had expired, it will not record any cash transactions. I honestly think she was confusing an off-line device with an expired device. I can copy and paste in her comments I think she’s wrong what she was telling me. I think she was trying to say when a device is off-line, meaning not on the Internet, it cannot accept cash transactions but will only accept credit card transactions. I happen to think she’s also wrong about that. I thought your device and system will remember all transactions regardless of if the Internet is off or not and it will retain them and send them up to square as soon as it’s back online.

[rickinny]

btw... THANK YOU so much for the help. This is driving the owners crazy, thinking their losing money, transactions or at the very least correct reporting.

[MayaP]

If you don't have a physical cash drawer then you shouldn't have a cash report available. When you say virtual cash drawer are you referring to going into Reports >Cash Management?  

From the navigation bar at the bottom of your screen, tap ≡ More.

Tap Reports > Current Drawer.

Tap Starting Cash to enter the starting cash amount in your drawer.

Tap Start Drawer > Confirm Start Drawer.

Enter an optional drawer description.

Go back to your Register to start accepting sales.

Can you provide a screenshot or video of how you are tracking cash?   Of course happy to help get to the bottom of this! 

[rickinny]

We have always accepted cash and have never had a connected cash drawer (if youre referring to a square-drawer that is activated by a wired or wireless connection). We have always used a standard generic non-square cash register to hold cash, (something like this: 

 

 or the outside vendor employees have cash aprons which act as the drawer. We do exactly what your link says:

----------------------------------

Start a Cash Drawer Session
After you start a cash drawer session, you’ll see basic information on the current session, including starting cash amount, cash sales, cash refunds, cash paid in/out and the expected cash amount in the drawer.

From the navigation bar at the bottom of your screen, tap ≡ More.

Tap Reports > Current Drawer.

Tap Starting Cash to enter the starting cash amount in your drawer.

Tap Start Drawer > Confirm Start Drawer.

Enter an optional drawer description.

Go back to your Register to start accepting sale

-------------------------------------

Here is the process:

Reports - Current Drawer

Start the drawer

Add an amount, confirm

 

 Now I've selected an item to sell to a customer for $20

They tender $20

 

Send receipt, or none

 

Then end of day, we end the drawer

 

See it says $20 expected in drawer? and $20 in cash sales? THAT's what we are missing. 

When we have problems, it says Expected: $0 and  Cash Sales: $0. But we DEFINITELY have had cash sales

 

 

 

When we end the drawer, it says in an End Drawer screen how much cash you should have in your apron, pocket, bin, bucket, walmart register, whatever you hold your money in. It also says how many cash sales there were. It gives a numerical count. On 9/3/22, this particular ipad had 3 cash sales for roughly $60. The End Drawer page showed that. On Saturday 9/4/22 it had one cash sale for roughly $20, but the End Drawer page showed ZERO. for $0.

[MayaP]

Hello @rickinny,

Hmm, that is really bizarre. I do not have any idea right now what is causing this. In order for us to take a deeper dive into this, I am going to recommend the owner of the account reach out. We need to be able to look at your actual regulator account at hand to be able to correlate the cash transactions to the drawer. Since we cannot discuss account-specific information through this platform it is going to be best to reach out to direct support again, 1-855-700-6000 squ.re/contactsqsupport. I am sorry I couldn't offer more assistance right now. But let's have the owner try contacting Direct Support again, and we can investigate more by looking at the transactions. Please reach back out to this thread if you have additional questions, or need assistance on this inquiry. I will certainly try and help however I can! 

[rickinny]

I'll just copy the most important part of our conversation here, where she consistently says the "Sunflowers" ipad isnt recording cash transactions because it is "Expired". She also seems to conflate being in "offline mode" with being "Expired" which I think is wrong.

================================

(Me:) that's why I told you in the Cash transactions report for September 2022, Sunflowers *does* show 4 cash transactions on 9/3/22 

06:14 PM 

so we know it *can* work. There's no configuration issue. Nobody is changing cash drawer settings 

Diana06:16 PM 

Sunflowers device show that has expired. 

Diana06:17 PM 

That is the reason why cash transactions do not appear. 

06:17 PM 

I did see that and I had it on my list of notes to ask you about 

06:18 PM 

Wth does expired even mean? and why would it let you use it if it's "expired"? 

Diana06:19 PM 

When accepting payments offline, you have 24 hours to reconnect your mobile device to the Internet and upload your payments. 

Diana06:20 PM 

If a payment is not processed within 24 hours, it will expire and the funds will not be captured. 

06:21 PM 

that doesnt make sense in this context 

06:22 PM 

the device did 3 CC transactions. It may have been offline for part of the day but definitely was onlinewithin a few hours when it was back in the office. The known cc transactions were all there. 

Diana06:25 PM 

I see, but that is what Dashboard shows, that the device has expired. 

06:26 PM 

what does that mean though? 

06:27 PM 

how does that have anything to do with a device going offline? If it goes offline, it continues with transactions and saves everything right? When it reconnects, as long as it's within 24 hours it sends everything 

06:28 PM 

so youre telling me that every time a device temporarily loses internet it expires? then it wont record cash transactions? If so, that's ridiculous 

06:29 PM 

I know for an absolute fact the Ice Cream device was off wifi on and off yesterday. Why isnt it expired? Why did it record cash transactions? 

Diana06:29 PM 

Yes, because when accepting payments offline, you have 24 hours to reconnect your mobile device to the Internet and upload your payments, If this doesn't happen then it expires. 

06:29 PM 

It did happen 

06:30 PM 

It did *NOT* pass 24 hours 

so why did it expire if it wasnt offline for 24 hours? 

Diana06:30 PM 

I'm sorry, but the device expired. You can see it on your Dashboard. 

06:31 PM 

if it *were* offline for 24 hours, why did the CC transactions show? 

If it had expired why did the CC transactions go through? 

06:32 PM 

It's not physically possible that it was offline for 24 hours. It's in the office every night for 14 hours on wifi. 

06:34 PM 

youre saying that if a device is "expired" it won't capture cash transactions? 

Diana06:36 PM 

Yes, unfortunately only Swiped Card Payments can be accepted in Offline Mode. 

==============================================

^^^^^^^   here she seems to conflate, incorrectly, EXPIRED and OFFLINE

=================================================

06:36 PM 

yeah, I don't accept this answer. Going offline and expiring only applies to credit transactions. Sure, you can lose credit transactions. But cash? c'mon. 

Diana06:38 PM 

Cash, Chip (EMV) and Tap (NFC) payments cannot be processed in Offline Mode since they require an internet connectivity for payment authentication. 

06:38 PM 

so youre saying the opposite? that in offline mode you can *only* accept CC, not cash? 

cash "requires an internet connectivity for payment authentication"???? what? LOL 

06:39 PM 

what "payment authentication" is happening for a cash payment? 

Diana06:40 PM 

Cash payments cannot be made in offline mode because they are entered manually. 

Without internet the system does not take them. 

06:41 PM 

I know for a fact that the ipad was online when the cash payment was taken. The manager had just done a speedtest on the ipad. It was online a minute before that cash transaction. 

but it *did* take it 

So therefore the system "doesnt" take cash transactions offline, but it allows you to continue taking cash transactions without telling you it wont record them 

Diana06:43 PM 

When making transactions offline that is what happens. 

Diana06:44 PM 

The information I have provided is the most up to date and correct information in regards to Offline Mode payments. I am sorry that is not the answer you were hoping for but I do not have a different answer to provide at this time. 

06:45 PM 

So I can have ipads that have gone offline at some point, expired, and not know it and i open a drawer and send employees out to use them and it wont record cash transactions because *that* needs internet while a CC transaction can be held until later when it's back online, and even though it's expired, the cc transactions will still go through. Is that all accurate? 

06:46 PM 

I'd like you to just verufy I have understood what youre telling me properly. Is the above summary correct? Did I get anything wrong? 

Diana06:46 PM 

You are correct. 

06:47 PM 

Well, that's quite amazing to me that Square has created that possible scenario. But if you say so, I'll go with it. 

[rickinny]

Any updates? We’re going into our second weekend and really need to get this resolved. One thing I noticed is that not all of the iPads were activated with a device code. The one device in question we had a problem with last weekend “Sunflowers” iPad, had an expired device code. I’ve made sure that every device now has a device code that is active and connected to a square reader. There is one iPad device that started this morning without a device code so that may be a good test to see if that is what is causing a problem.