Why can't I add a title to Custom Amounts in POS (for Retail or regular)?

[ManicMermaid]

Like most shops we have a catalogue of items that we can enter into the library...However, we also have MANY one-off items that don't fit that mold.  With our previous POS we could add a custom item, give it a title/amount and add it to the customer's sale.  Yet after talking to multiple Square reps it appears the best options I'm being given is to either:

Add a Custom Amount and put the item's title in the notes (which is an extra keystroke to get to that page - not very efficient during weekends or holiday time).  AND that information in the notes won't be on my reports...so I'll have $30,000 in 'Custom Amount' charges with no idea what they are.  The IRS is going to love me over that one. 

Or the other option is to switch from Retail POS to the regular one, make the customer wait while I create a listing, then add that listing from the library to their sale.

We can't be the only shop who needs to add specialty, one-of-a-kind items to a customer's sale.  This seems quite out of character for a company like Square to not already have this in place like the other POS's do.

Again - if I had a smaller inventory list that I could easily get into the library, I'd do it.  But imagine 1000's of items...each with about 12 variations and about 8 different price points - each of those also has variations of color or weight or size - It is much easier, instead of creating a million listings in a library for one-of-a-kind items, to just make it a custom sale with enough info to deal with inventory, our accountant and the IRS.

Thanks for any insights or work-arounds you might have

[Donnie-M · Accepted solution]

@ManicMermaid In our restaurants, we have a button for breakfast called Breakfast-NP and a Lunch-NP button.  These are items I created to cover those one off charges (i.e.  Can I get a bun and a side of lettuce or how much to put 12 eggs in a burrito).  Just weird stuff I am not gonna do more than 1 time a month or more.  You could pre-create some broad category with no prices like: Figurines, trinkets, closeout, whateveryousell, etc.  The NP for me stands for no price, but you could do whatever you want.  This way on reports you would see an item that has some sort of general classification.  If you really need to know the exact item, that is where you really do need to create the item and then ring it up.  Using the notes is a great way for a specific item to show up on a receipt.  While the general reporting will only show the broad item name, you can export transaction details to a spreadsheet if you really want to know how many purple medium size half broke widgets you sold.

For years, when we just used the good ole Casio type cash register, we didn't have a plu or sku for anything but broad categories and the IRS and the accountants were good with that, so I think this would fit your need for some classification and speed.  This is my recommendation.

[ManicMermaid]

Oh gosh @Donnie-M - I so appreciate your detailed answer.  This helps greatly.  I didn't know I could do buttons without prices...so I'll go work on that and see what I can come up with that will fit this situation.

Thank you for taking time to help us out...I've talked to 4 square reps so far and none had this answer.  You're a genius!!

All the best in your business - I'm so grateful for you

[Donnie-M]

@ManicMermaid Yes, just create the item and don't put in a price and you effectively have what I call an open key.  And thank you for the kind words 😊