Managing Cash Drawer Reports at Shift Change

[AutodidactRon]

Looking for some guidance as to how we can effectively manage ending and starting a cash drawer at our shift change. 

We want to have two physical drawers in rotation– one for AM and one for PM shifts. Each with $200 starting cash.

When the AM shift ends, an employee from that shift takes their drawer out and counts it up. They would then go back to the POS and enter the actual cash amount in the system, and officially end the AM drawer in the system.

Meanwhile, the PM shift employee would have already put their drawer into the register and started their shift. 

The problem I see coming is that while the AM employee is counting their drawer, any sales done during that period would count against the AM drawer because it's still technically active in the POS. Only once the AM employee goes through the POS and enters all their report data will their drawer end, and the PM drawer can begin.

Are there any tricks to managing this other than to just hope there aren't cash sales for that lag time?

[Laurie_]

Hi @AutodidactRon!

Really great question, this is definitely a common scenario for many Sellers, especially in the restaurant space.

The challenge right now is that you can’t run dual cash drawer sessions on a single device, so managing shift transitions comes down to a few workaround options.

Assuming we’re only talking about a short overlap (e.g. a few minutes for the AM staff member to count their drawer), one approach is to temporarily accept card-only payments during that window. I’ve heard from a number of Sellers who use this method successfully, it’s not a perfect solution, but it helps avoid the small discrepancies that can occur when two staff are transitioning over the same drawer.

Another option is to manually document the transition time and keep written records of any cash sales processed during that overlap. This can help reconcile the PM shift’s cash drawer more accurately, again, not ideal, but a workable stopgap.

Whichever method you go with, my main advice is to stay consistent. Make sure the entire team is aware of the process and follows it the same way every time to reduce confusion and error.

I’ll leave this thread open so other Sellers can chime in with ideas, and I’d also encourage you to submit a feature request to our Product Team for future visibility, this has come up before, and more voices always help move things forward.