Split Tender and Layaway
Split tender pays one sale with more than one method at once, and layaway takes a deposit on goods a customer collects later. Both have their own screen, both need a connection, and both are refused offline. See Working Offline.
Split tender
A split settles one sale across several methods in a single submit. You compose the legs on the device and settle once they cover the amount due.
Exact cover
The legs must match the amount due precisely. The screen refuses to settle until they do, and it names how much is short or over. Because the cover has to be exact, no change can be expressed.
Cash cannot join a split
Change is the point of cash, and a split expresses no change, so cash cannot be one of the legs. The two kinds of till refuse for different reasons and with different sentences:
- On a drawerless till, a cash leg sends the whole sale to a register. Take no money on the phone first.
- On a drawered till, a cash leg is refused because a split carries no change. Take the whole sale in cash on the payment screen instead, or send it to a register.
What the legs can be
A split is made up of redemption tenders, on account, and a card leg where your store runs an integrated terminal. Typed card details are not accepted in a split, so on a store that records cards on its bank's terminal a card cannot be a split leg. See the card boundary in Cash and Card.
Other things worth knowing:
- Each leg has its own retry key, minted once, so a reload can never push a leg twice.
- One authorization settles one leg. A reference already used by another leg is refused.
- Your store can cap how many ways a sale may be split. Unset means no limit; over the cap, the refusal names the store's policy.
- A converted quotation is paid in one payment, so it cannot be split.
- Abandoning a split reverses every leg already taken. Walk away and nothing stays captured.
- A leg already taken blocks sending the sale to a register, and blocks a plain single payment, until you finish or release it.
Layaway
A layaway plan is an order plus a payment. The deposit books as a customer advance, and no revenue or stock moves until the goods are collected. Opening and running a plan needs the layaway permission.
Opening a plan
- A plan needs a named customer. A layaway keeps goods aside for weeks, so a walk-in is refused.
- The deposit must meet your store's minimum. The minimum is re-checked on the server, not just suggested on the screen.
- A cross-store basket cannot lay away, and a gift-card line cannot lay away. Each is refused up front.
- A deposit takes a card and nothing else. Gift card, store credit, loyalty, and on account are not offered for a deposit. On a store that records cards on its bank's terminal, the typed card route is closed too, so the deposit is taken at a register.
The plan builds a schedule for you, and its rows add up to the plan total exactly, with any rounding residue on the final row.
Instalments and settling
- An instalment is taken by card. Cash instalments are not taken on the device and go to a register. On a store that records cards on its bank's terminal, the card route is closed too, so both routes lead to a register today.
- Settling reads the card entry and nothing else. A plan that picks up serialized or batch-tracked goods needs a register to pick the units.
When a plan ends
- A cancellation works out a fee as your store's configured share of what was collected, capped at what was collected. What remains is the refund owed. The refund is not paid on the device: it is paid at a register, from the register's own drawer. The plan stays open until that refund is booked, and it closes only when the booked refund matches what was owed. A mismatched amount leaves it open with a reconcile flag.
- A forfeiture is an operator tapping a control. Nothing forfeits a plan automatically, and nothing scheduled cancels or closes one. A plan left alone stays open.
- The forfeit control is always shown on an active plan, whether or not the plan is past its window. Tapping it does nothing until the plan is genuinely past its window. A tap that appears to do nothing is the eligibility check, not a broken screen or a missing button. Never read whether the control is present as whether the plan is eligible.
Turning layaway off at the store closes new plans only. Plans already open stay collectable and settleable. The deeper policy behind deposits, cancellation fees, and forfeiture accounts is set up in the back office.