Venue settings, hours and targets

This page covers Settings › Venue, with its two tabs Venue and iPads and service, plus Settings › Hours & scheduling and Settings › Targets: every setting, what it changes, and what a new bar starts with. The defaults in the tables are what a bar created through sign-up starts with.

Change a setting

Who can do this: admins. Managers can open Settings › Venue and see every setting greyed out, under "You can view venue settings, but only admins can change them." Targets are the exception: managers can change those too.

1. In the back office, go to Settings. It opens on Venue.
2. Pick the tab: Venue or iPads and service.
3. Change the setting. These two tabs have no Save button ("Changes save as you make them."):
   • A switch or a dropdown saves as soon as you change it.
   • A text box saves when you click out of it or press Enter, if the value is valid. An invalid value shows its message under the box and isn't saved.
   • A list of reasons or prices saves each time you add or remove one.
4. Watch the notice at the top right: "Saving…", then "Saved" — or the reason it failed, such as "Could not save" when you're offline. A switch or dropdown whose save failed flips back; a text box keeps what you typed, with the error under it.

If two people edit at once, each setting saves on its own and the last save wins. The page doesn't show someone else's changes until you reload it.

When the iPads pick up a change

Settings aren't pushed to the iPads live. Each iPad reads them when the app starts and every time someone signs in with a PIN — as the page says, "Changes reach each iPad the next time it signs in." A few are read at other moments:

• Counting method — each time Count or Waste opens.
• Received prices include IVA — each time the iPad's Purchasing screen loads.
• Custom drinks — at sign-in, and every time the custom drink builder opens.

Anything Barform works out itself — check totals and tax, closing the day — uses the new value at once, even on an iPad that hasn't signed in again.

If an iPad can't read its settings (a network blip), it keeps asking for a manager PIN for voids, discounts and comps, keeps closing the day with staff on the clock switched off, shows neither From the safe nor To the safe on Cash In / Out, and falls back to printing on, signing out after 3 minutes and tip buttons of 10, 15 and 20%.

Venue details

The Venue card on the Venue tab: "Name, address, and where in the world it is."

• Renaming the venue doesn't change the address of your public booking page.
• The timezone also decides, on the iPads, the clock, tonight's reservations, the time clock and printed dates, from their next sign-in. It shows read-only in Settings › Hours & scheduling › Service time, with Change it under Venue.

Taxes

The Taxes card on the Venue tab.

How a check's total is worked out

The total is worked out on the subtotal after discounts, every time the check changes:

• Tax-inclusive pricing on: total = subtotal − discount, and the IVA is the part of that total that is tax at your rate. A $116.00 total at 16% includes $16.00 of IVA.
• Tax-inclusive pricing off: IVA = (subtotal − discount) × the rate, rounded to the centavo; total = subtotal − discount + IVA.

On the iPad, with tax-inclusive pricing on, the order screen shows one line, "Total · includes IVA $X", and the receipt prints "Includes IVA (16%)" under the total, with no Subtotal. With it off, they show Subtotal, IVA and Total.

• An open tab picks up a new rate at its next change; paid checks keep the totals they were paid with. Change these settings on a day the bar is closed.
• Rates with decimals, such as 7.5, aren't possible.
• The Income report works out the IVA inside payments into customer accounts, and inside imported history, at your current rate each time it runs — so changing the rate also re-splits those past amounts.

Languages

The Language card on the Venue tab sets two separate languages, English or Español.

Use a different language on one iPad

1. Turn on Allow iPads to override.
2. On the iPad, sign in as an admin or manager. The switch reaches the iPad at that sign-in.
3. Tap ··· More. Under This iPad, the Language row offers Auto, English and Español. Auto follows the venue's iPad language.

Turning the switch off drops every iPad's own choice at its next sign-in, and the Language row disappears. Unpairing an iPad also clears its choice. Before an iPad is paired, it uses the language picked on its pairing screen. More in Signing in on the iPad.

Purchasing

The Purchasing card on the Venue tab appears on plans that include inventory.

• Changing it later doesn't change the suppliers you already have: each keeps its own Their prices include IVA.

• The email goes out when an order is sent from Inventory › Purchasing, in the Admin portal language. Without an address, or if the email fails, the order is still sent.

• More in Purchasing and Receiving.

The iPads

The The iPads card on the iPads and service tab: "Changes reach each iPad the next time it signs in."

• Auto sign-out: after that long with no touch anywhere on the screen, the person is signed out, and an iPad left in the background for longer is signed out when it comes back. Nothing is lost: the drawer and the tabs stay open.
• More on seats in Taking orders, on counting in Stock counts, and on printing in Printing and receipts.

End of day

The End of day card on the iPads and service tab holds two rules the close follows, and the switch for the safe. The close itself is done on the iPad by an admin or manager: see Closing the day.

• The expected cash at the count is: opening float + cash sales + cash tips (when the switch is on) + cash paid into customer accounts + cash in − cash out.
• With staff left on the clock, anyone still clocked in from a previous night is asked about it when they first sign in on the next service day.
• Open tabs always block the close, whatever these switches say.
• Use the safe is off for a new bar, and for a bar that never counted its safe or recorded money in or out of it. A bar that had already done either stays on.
• When you change Use the safe, the sidebar and Today follow at once, with no reload. Each iPad follows the next time someone signs in on it, or straight away if someone there tries to move cash between the drawer and the safe after it went off. What it turns on and off is in The safe.

Manager approval on the iPad

The Manager approval on the iPad card on the iPads and service tab: "Each switch asks for a manager PIN before that action on the iPad. Off, the action goes through and records who did it." A signed-in admin or manager never sees the PIN prompt: they approve their own actions.

• Marking a product out of stock (86) and correcting a payment always need a manager, whatever these switches say.
• If an iPad can't read these switches, it asks for the PIN for voids, discounts and comps.
• More in Discounts and comps and The floor and tabs.

Quick picks

The Quick picks card on the iPads and service tab: "The buttons your staff tap on the iPad."

A new venue starts with the three reason lists saved in the language picked when it signed up (the defaults above are the English ones). A list nobody has edited follows the iPad language when you change it; once edited, it stays as written. No starter Cash In list has an opening-float reason: the float is entered with Opening float, not as a cash in.

Add or remove a reason

1. Click into Cash In reasons, Cash Out reasons or Discount & comp reasons.
2. Type the reason where it says "Add a reason…", then press Enter or a comma, click +, or click away. It saves at once.
3. To remove a reason, click the × on it, or press Backspace in the empty box to remove the last one. It saves at once.

• Each list holds up to 20 reasons ("List is full (20 max)"), each up to 120 characters. A duplicate (ignoring capitals and spaces) is dropped.
• Reasons show on the iPad exactly as you typed them, in whatever language you wrote them, and the Z-report groups by them. On the iPad an Other button always lets staff type a one-off reason.
• From the safe and To the safe, the iPad's options at a bar that uses the safe, aren't on these lists: they're Barform's own, and show first. See The safe.
• If you remove every reason from a list, Barform saves its built-in list instead, in the iPad language. (The box stays empty on screen until you reload the page.) In English, the built-in lists are: cash in — "Change from the bank", "Cash added to the drawer"; cash out — "Bottle purchase", "Musicians", "Supplies", "Bank deposit"; discounts and comps — "Frequent customer", "Promotion", "Service issue", "Manager comp", "Staff".

Set the tip buttons

1. In Tip presets (%), type up to three whole percentages separated by commas, such as 10, 15, 20.
2. Click out of the box or press Enter. They're saved from lowest to highest.
3. To go back to 10, 15 and 20, clear the box and click out of it.

The iPad's payment screen shows None first, then your percentages, then Other — four buttons in a row, which is why you can set three. A percentage typed twice counts once. The change applies at each iPad's next sign-in.

• "Write the tip presets as whole percentages separated by commas, like 10, 15, 20." — for letters, decimals or minus signs.
• "Each tip preset must be between 1 and 100."
• "3 tip presets at most — the None button takes the fourth spot on the iPad. Remove one."

Custom drinks

The Custom drinks card on the iPads and service tab: "What the iPad's custom drink builder offers: its price buttons, and what a drink made from scratch takes off stock." How the builder works is in Custom drinks.

• The button opens your first custom drink product — in category order, then product order — and skips one that's 86'd. With no custom drink product, or with every one 86'd, there's no button.
• The custom drink tile shows "from" the price of the cheapest price button.
• To add a price, type it where it says "Add a price" — such as 230, 280.50 or 1,200 — and press Enter, click +, or click away. To remove one, click the × on it.
• Messages: "Enter a price above zero, like 230 or 280.50.", "That price is already a button.", "Six price buttons at most." and, for the pour, "Between 5 and 500 ml."

Hours of operation

Settings › Hours & scheduling › Hours of operation lists when you're open, as time blocks for each day: "Indicate when you are open for in-venue service. A day with no block is closed." A day can have several blocks — a lunch and a dinner service, say — and a block can run past midnight.

Who can do this: admins. Managers don't get the Hours & scheduling tab, and opened by its address the page lets them see the hours but not change them.

Add opening hours

1. Go to Settings › Hours & scheduling. It opens on Hours of operation.
2. Tick the days: Daily, Weekends, Weekdays, or single days.
3. Set the Start time and End time: hour, minutes (00, 15, 30 or 45) and AM or PM. The form starts at 6:00 PM to 3:00 AM.
4. Click Add hours. One block is added for each ticked day, and saved at once: "Hours saved."

To remove a block, click the × on it ("Click x to remove a time block"); it saves at once. To change a block, remove it and add the new one.

• "An end time at or before the start time runs past midnight — 6:00 PM to 3:00 AM is one overnight block." A start equal to the end is a 24-hour block.
• Times are in your venue's time zone. Up to 60 blocks.
• "Pick at least one day." · "Those blocks are already listed." If a save fails, the previous list comes back.

What uses these hours: your public booking page offers only times inside them, and with no hours at all it shows every day as closed; Today shows "Tonight so far" while you're open by these hours, even before a drawer is opened; and Today's setup checklist asks for them. The iPads don't use them.

Service time

Settings › Hours & scheduling › Service time sets when a night starts and ends for every report, the day each week starts, and the two overtime figures the Labor report pays by.

Who can do this: admins.

1. Go to Settings › Hours & scheduling and click Service time.
2. In "Reports will reflect days spanning from", pick the start hour. The page shows the end, such as "to 3:59 PM" for a 4:00 PM start.
3. In "Your service week begins on a", pick the day.
4. Under Overtime, set Ordinary hours per day and Double-time hours per week.
5. Click Save. "Service time saved." Unlike Hours of operation and the Venue tabs, Service time has a Save button.

• Reports work out the nights every time they run, so changing the start regroups all your history, not just new sales. The iPads use the same boundary from their next sign-in. How Today and Sales place a sale on a night: Today.
• Overtime follows Mexico's federal labour law: hours past the ordinary day are overtime, and within a service week the first hours of overtime, up to the double-time figure, pay double and the rest pay triple. The Labor report applies the ordinary-day limit per person per night — all their shifts that night together — and counts the week's overtime from the start of the service week, even when the dates you pick start later. More in Labor.
• Messages: "Ordinary hours per day must be between 0 and 24." (0 is refused too) and "Double-time hours per week are out of range."

Choose your service-day start

Pick an hour when the bar is always shut and nobody is working: after the last close and the last clock-out of the night, and before anyone opens the drawer, clocks in or opens a tab the next day. For a bar that closes by 3:00 AM, 6:00 AM works well, and it's where a new bar starts. Bars created earlier started at 4:00 PM, and keep that start until an admin changes it here.

Everything recorded before the start belongs to the previous day. With a 4:00 PM start, for example:

• a tab opened at 3:00 PM is the previous night's sale on Today and Sales;
• a payment taken at 3:00 PM is on the previous day's Income;
• a shift clocked in at 3:00 PM counts on the previous night in Labor;
• a drawer started at 2:30 PM is filed under the previous night on Shift closes (Z) and in Today's Needs attention, and from 4:00 PM the iPads call it a drawer left open from an earlier day and ask for it to be closed (see Cash drawer).

With a 6:00 AM start, all of these belong to their own day. The start also decides which night a booking belongs to, and what "today" means on the iPads: the checks paid today in Check history, today's punches on the time clock, and when a shift counts as left open from an earlier day.

Weekly targets

Settings › Targets holds three standing goals for every service week. Today measures the week in progress, and last week, against them on the card "This week vs target".

Who can do this: admins and managers.

1. Go to Settings › Targets.
2. Type a figure in Weekly sales target, Weekly customer target or Average spend per cover.
3. Click out of the box or press Enter. The notice says "Saved".
4. To stop tracking a goal, set it to 0 or clear the box.

• "Three independent goals. Customers are counted as covers — a table of four counts as four. Leave a goal at 0 to stop tracking it."
• The week is your service week (see Service time).
• "Sales target must be a positive amount." · "Spend target must be a positive amount."

Related

• First steps
• Pair and manage iPads
• Printing and receipts
• Closing the day
• Labor report