With Service Templates it is possible to charge for servicing at a fixed rate amount. These servicing amounts calculated from ticket amount and cannot be changed. This forces customer to pay for servicing but in most restaurants customers are free to give tip or not. This tutorial shows how this feature can be added to SambaPOS.

Normally there is no pre-implemented feature for tips in SambaPOS but it can be done by using automation features of SambaPOS. Here we'll demonstrate using ticket tags with rules and actions features.

First of all we'll create a ticket tag. This will add a Tip button in ticket display.

While creating ticket tag I enabled Free Tagging to be able to enter custom amounts. I unchecked Save Free Tags because I don't want every value I entered saved into Sub Tags. I changed Tag Type to Price so users will be able to enter only decimal values. Finally I created some sub tags. I'll use these tags as “Most Used Values”. Additionally I changed button color.

As shown here I assigned this tag setup to a department. This setting will display “Tip” button on tickets I created on “Restaurant” department.

Now I'll create a Service Template for including Tip amounts in Tickets.

Normally after creating a Service Template I'll assign it to a department and every tickets created from this department will calculate this amount. But this time I won't do it because I'll add and change servicing amounts differently. Since Tip amount varies I'll leave “Rate and Amount” value zero.

Now I have a ticket tag and a servicing template. Now I'll tell SambaPOS “When I select Ticket Tag, change Servicing Amount”. First of all I'll create an action that will change servicing amount.

I named Action as “Update Tip Amount” and set the Action Type as Update Ticket Service Amount. Now I'll setup parameters to tell action which Service Template should added to ticket. I selected “Tip” service template. The important part is the “Amount” value. If I enter 0.50 here when this action executes it will update Service Amount to 50 cents. But I don't want a fixed value. I want to copy value from tag value. So I'll enter a variable name inside brackets. I named variable as “Tip Amount”.

Now I'll create a rule and this rule will tell sambaPOS when it should execute this action.

When this Rule will Execute? It will execute after I select a ticket tag because I selected Event Name as “Ticket Tag Selected”.

When I select an event SambaPOS will display supported Conditions. I only want to execute this rule if Ticket Tag is “Tip” so I selected Tag Name as “Tip”

Now I'll click “Select Actions” link to select which actions will execute when a tip amount is selected. I'll select “Update Tip Amount” action that I created on previous step. I can select multiple actions here if needed.

Do you remember? Instead of entering a fixed amount to the action we entered a variable name in brackets. Now when I expand blue Update Tip Amount bar it will display me assignable parametes. I'll match Tip Amount with Tag Value here.

Now our setup is complete. Lets see how it works.

This is the newly added Tip Button. I'll click this button to update Tip value.

When I click it SambaPOS displays me Most used values I entered and a editing box on top to enter custom values. This editing box is visible because I enabled “Free Tagging” and I can only enter decimal values because I selected Tag Type as Price Tags. I entered 2.75 there and clicked Add And Save button.

As we configured tip button turned green to indicate a value enterd. As we can see “Services Total” appeared over Ticket Amount.

Additionally a yellow bar appeared below ticket and it displays tip amount. Let me explain why it is neccessary. In some restaurants tip is not the only amount we need to track seperately. Sometimes customers pays Parking Fees, Taxi Fares or other types of spendings all from their credit cards to restaurant. We can create additional buttons for including these spendings and that yellow bar will display us the details. Services Total amount will always display the summary.

To be able to list detailed servicing amounts in printed bills, use {SERVICE DETAILS} template value.

Now lets see what how it displayed in Work Period Report.

Total Sales is what we earned from sales. Tip value at the top of the report is the amount we need to give waiters and the Grand Total value is the total amount we processed.

Since we used ticket tags to determine Tip values an additional small report will appear under “Ticket Tags” part. The rate value calculated from ticket totals which tagged with a tip value.

Lastly I want to show how to change previously entered tip amounts. To change a tip amount we'll click to “Tip” button again and enter another value. We have to click “X” button to clear tip amount.

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