Repricing & Discounts
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      1. INTERNAL - Bepoz Help Guides
      2. HOW-2
      3. Repricing & Discounts

      Public Holiday & Weekend Surcharge Setup

      Overview

      Summary or Problem Definition 

      The Bepoz platform is capable of adding a surcharge to transactions which is commonplace in hospitality applications for Public Holidays, some weekends, and a few other cases. While there are a great number of various ways that Public Holiday or Weekend surcharges can be set up, this document aims to outline the preferred method.  

       

      Following this method for applying PH Surcharges will provide customers with flexibility to accommodate membership pricing, partial application of surcharges (ie, on Food items only), as well as both automated and manual application. 

      About this Procedure

      • Pricing Numbers to drive all surcharge functionality 

      • Product Pricing to enable the above Pricing Numbers and to allow for flexibility in applying surcharges 

      • Pricing Schedules for automation around calendar based events like Public Holidays 

      • Weekly Schedules for automation around regularly occurring events like Weekend or Sunday surcharges 

      • Jobs and Function Key Mapping for manual triggering from tills 

      • Account Pricing to manage members pricing tiers while still applying surcharges 

       

      Goals 

      • Create multiple Price Numbers to accommodate Standard, Public Holiday / Weekend Surcharge, as well as Membership pricing tiers 

      • Ensure that surcharges are also applied to membership pricing tiers 

      • Allow PH Surcharge to be applied to specific items for partial application (ie, Food items only) 

      • Provide an automated scheduling feature for forward planning holidays 

      • Provide an automated scheduling feature for repetitive application (ie, every Sunday) 

      • Provide manual On and Off till function key maps 

      • Allow for all of the above to be configured and controlled by H/O in Multi-Venue setups 

       

      Limitations 

      • Using a Surcharge Price Number will act as a multiplier for the base Price Number only. As such, pre-existing Price Numbers in use must be qualified properly. Examples include: 

      o Separate Dine-in and Takeaway pricing 

      o Membership pricing tiers (see method of using Accounts to manage this) 

      • Using Pricing Schedules to automate changes does not yet feature VenueGeoups or VenueSets, so localised holidays need to be set up for every venue in the localisation 

      • 100% unsure as to how this all interacts with online / self-ordering. Needs to be tested 

       

      Prerequisites & Versions 

      • Version 4.6 or greater. Please refer to separate documentation for 4.5 and below 

      • Membership Pricing to be set via "Maintenance / Accounts / Account Group or Account" and NOT via Price Number. See [Separate document or section of this document] 

      • BackOffice is running (on HO for Multi-Venue) and logged in with Administrator / Support operator privileges 

       

      Steps to follow

       

      1. Set up Price Numbers 

      This is where we set up multiple pricing levels as the backbone of the surcharge setup.  

       • Navigate to System Setup 

      • Navigate to Venue, Stores & Tills 

      • Edit Venue Settings* 

      • Navigate to the Names tab 

      • Set Price Names for Public Holiday (and/or Weekend or Sunday, etc) 

      • NOTE: You can also set a Discount Totaliser if you have set one up in Discounts and Surcharges but this is not necessary. An example might be "Service Surcharges".   

      • Select "OK" to save and close the Edit Venue dialogue box 

      • *Repeat the procedure for each venue in a group for Multi-Venue customers 

       

      2. Set up Product Pricing 

      This needs to be established for all products. It can be set at product or product group level, allowing for some scaling across entire inventory and consistency across types of products. Here is where we will look at establishing surcharges for Food but not Drinks as an example 

       

      • Navigate to Maintenance 

      • Navigate to Product 

      • Edit any Product* 

      o NOTE: Product Pricing can only be set at product level, NOT product group. See Pricy Copy notes below for scaled application of product pricing 

      • Navigate to the Store / Pricing Settings tab 

      • For each Size, go to the Public Holiday Mode and choose Percent Disc from the drop-down menu 

      • Then enter a surcharge percentage of the base price (Proce Number 1).  

      o Positive numbers are a discount, negative are a surcharge.  

      o A Dollar sign is always prevalent even though this will be a percentage 

      o Ie, -$5.00 will represent a 5% Surcharge 

      o Choose Use Base Price for any products that should NOT have surcharges applied to them. Do not try to use 0% (ie, $0.00) as this can cause multiplier problems in other areas of the software 

      o Ie, set Use Base Price for all Drinks products if Weekend Surcharge is only applied to Food every Sunday 

      • Select "OK" to save and close the Edit Product dialogue box 

      • *Repeat the procedure for each venue in a Product that needs to be affected by Public Holiday or Weekend surcharges, etc 

       

      NOTE: Each product may have 3 or more Price Numbers. Standard, Public holiday, Weekend, etc. This allows for flexible application of surcharges. As an example Beverage products at the bar may have public holiday surcharge applied, but weekend surcharge NOT applied. Beverages sold but the bottle may have no surcharges applied, on weekends or on Public Holidays, and so on. 

       

      PRICE COPY NOTE: The Price Copy function can be used to set Price Number settings across groups of products and across multiple stores and venues. This a very powerful tool for large customers (ie, multi-venue customers with many sites), but extreme caution needs to be exercised with use. Any mistakes made will be scaled out across all products in groups / stores / venues, causing widespread problems. Please talk to Bepoz Support if you have high numbers of products to set new pricing levels.  

       

      3. Set up Pricing Schedules 

      Now with multiple Price Numbers set for all products, we can automate the switch between Standard and Public Holiday pricing. Any number of schedules can be created, allowing for future planning for all holidays occurring ion a year or beyond. Each holiday requires 2 schedules – one to turn ON surcharges and another to turn them OFF again.  

       

      This is for use for Public Holidays set by calendar. See next step for weekly surcharge schedules 

       

      NOTE: VenueGroups or VenueSets have not yet been implemented. For State-based or local Public Holidays, Schedules will need to be created for each venue in a State for these to be separated from "All Venues". 

       

      • Navigate to Operational Setup 

      • Navigate to Pricing Schedules 

      • Select Add Scheduled Pricing from the top menu*. A New Pricing Schedule dialogue box should appear 

      • Select the Venue to schedule, or leave on All Venues (see note above regarding State based Public Holidays) 

      • Select the Stores to run surcharges on, or leave on All Stores 

      • Select the Date and Time to initiate surcharges 

      • Set the Pricing Schedule Type to Price Number.  

      o Note: Setting to Service Charge and applying a % surcharge is a blanket approach to the Standard Price Number and will not facilitate member pricing, etc 

      • Choose the Price Number to set. In this case, choose Public Holiday 

      • Select "OK" to save and close the New Pricing Schedule dialogue box 

      • Now create a new schedule with the exact same Venue, Store, Time, and Pricing Schedule Type settings as above, but set the date to a future date (when the holiday is no longer) select the Reset to Default checkbox. This         will stop the surcharge from being applied and return to Standard pricing.  

      • *Repeat the procedure for each Public Holiday to be set, or for each venue within a State for localised Public Holidays. Note also that each schedule can be copied and modified to save time 

       

      4. Set up Weekly Schedules 

      Now with multiple Price Numbers set for all products, we can also automate the switch between Standard and Public Holiday pricing on a weekly cadence. Each weekday schedule requires 2 schedules – one to turn ON surcharges and another to turn them OFF again. This is useful for regular Sunday surcharges, etc 

       

      NOTE: VenueGroups or VenueSets have not yet been implemented. Weekly schedules must be set for each venue within a Multi-Venue group 

       

      • Navigate to Operational Setup 

      • Navigate to Weekly Schedules 

      • Select a Venue from the Venue drop-down menu* 

      • Select Add New Event from the top menu. A New Week Schedule dialogue box should appear 

      • Set the Workstation to All Tills 

      • Select the Day of the Week to schedule. In this example we'll select Sunday 

      • Select the Time to initiate surcharges 

      • Set the Price Number to Weekend 

      • Leave all other schedules as they are 

      • Select "OK" to save and close the New Week Schedule dialogue box 

      • Now create a new schedule with the exact same settings as above, but on the following day (ie Monday). Set the Price Number back to Standard (Price Number 1). This will stop the surcharge from being applied and return         to Standard pricing.  

      • *Repeat the procedure for each Venue in a Multi-Venue group 

      o NOTE: Weekly schedules cannot be copied, so will need to be created for  

       

       

      5. Set up Function Key Maps (and Jobs) 

      Perhaps even more powerful than automating the switch between Standard and Public Holiday or Weekend surcharge pricing is providing the ability for venue staff to switch between pricing modes manually from their tills. This provides full control in the event that automated schedules have been created incorrectly, or if an ad-hoc decision has been made, or to cope with any other edge case that can occur. We do this by providing Function Keys to turn Public Holiday or Weekend Pricing ON and OFF again. 

       

      Setting up Function Keys is itself a 2 step process. Firstly we set up Jobs to run (for each venue within a group for Multi-Venue customers), then we create Function Keys. 

       

      Creating Jobs 

       • Navigate to System Setup 

      • Navigate to Scheduled Jobs 

      • Select Add Job from the top menu*. A New Job dialogue box will appear 

      • Give the Job a name. A suggestion would be "Public Holiday Surcharge ON", or "Public Holiday Surcharge OFF" 

      • Choose a Venue from the Drop-down menu. It's important that this is just a single venue 

      • Set the DLL Name to Jobstd.Dll 

      • Set the ClassName to Till Current Setup 

      • Set Run As to an Administrator operator with full privileges enabled. In this example we're using "Vectron Manager" 

      • Do not change any other settings or try to set up and schedules in the top section of this dialogue box 

      • In Job Options:  

      o Set Override Map to No Change 

      o Type a message to send to the till to indicate to the operator that the keymap has worked. Suggest something like "Public Holiday Surcharge is now ON" 

      o Set PriceNumber to Public Holiday 

      o Leave all other settings unchanged 

      • Select "OK" to save and close the New Job dialogue box 

      • Repeat this procedure for the same venue, but set the PriceNumber to Weekend and set an appropriate Till Message 

      • Repeat this procedure again for the same venue, but set the PriceNumber to Standard (Price Number 1) and set a Till Message "All Surcharges are now OFF" 

      • * Repeat this procedure for each venue within the group for Multi-Venue customers. Each site should then have 2 or more jobs set; one for each Surcharge type they are running and another to return to standard pricing.  

      • Leave this tab on while working on Function Keys below. You will need to reference the Job ID's from each job you have just created. Alternatively, export the list of jobs to PDF to refer back to 

       

      All of the required Jobs are now set that can manually trigger surcharge pricing to turn ON and to turn them OFF again. These jobs now need to be mapped to Function Keys on tills. 

       

      Creating Function Keys 

      • Navigate to System Setup 

      • Navigate to Till Function Maps 

      • Select a venue from the Venue drop-down menu^. It is recommended to configure 1 venue at a time 

      • Highlight the Function Override Map you wish to add keymaps to and select Edit Highlighted Function Map from the top menu 

      • Set the Panel to desired Function Panel. In this instance we are configuring pnlpricing (Pricing panel) 

      • Select an empty Function Key* 

      • Set Button Text to "Public Holiday Surcharge ON" 

      • Set the Function to Non Sale Functions 

      • Set the Sub-Function to Run Job at Server 

      • Set the Item (JobID) to the corresponding JobID for the current Venue and Surcharge. In this instance we are looking for the JobID that corresponds to Public Holiday Surcharge ON 

      • Set Function Map colours as desired 

      • Important: Leave No Manager Required unchecked to ensure that a manager code is required to set or remove surcharges 

      • Select Save Function Map from the top menu and Select OK for further prompts 

      • * Repeat the procedure for the same venue, but create a new Function Key with an Item (JobID) set to the Job that returns to Standard pricing. Set the Button Text to "Holiday (and/or Weekend) Surcharges OFF" 

      • ^ Repeat this procedure for each venue in the group for Multi-Venue customers 

       

      Checking Function Keys 

       Once the Function Key Maps have been set, it's always best practice to test the changes. Complete the following from a till (in each venue for Multi-Venue customers). It is critical for each venue to be checked in Multi-Venue setups to ensure that each venue is only affecting itself and not running jobs that correspond to other venues within the group. 

       

      • Log in to the Till 

      • Press Products (or other key to navigate to the Function Panel configured above) 

      • Press "Public Holiday Surcharge ON" and wait several seconds. You should be presented with the till message configured in the Job setup earlier 

      • Ring up some products to check their pricing, then clear off again 

      • Press "Holiday Surcharges OFF" and wait several seconds. You should be presented with the till message configured in the Job setup earlier 

      • Ring up some products to check their pricing, then clear off again 

      • Alternatively, if you have your Function Panels and Maps configured, go to Manager Menu and press Price Level KeySets. Check the current Price Level here. 

       

      6. Set up Members Pricing 

      The last remaining consideration is establishing pricing levels for members that provide them with the benefit of their membership, but also attract surcharges set by the venue. Some Membership pricing is configured using Price Numbers, though it is preferable to use Accounts / Account Groups for this purpose.  

       

      NOTE: Setting Membership pricing and other benefits is an advanced administration task. It is highly recommended to contact Bepoz for support and to test all changes thoroughly. The approach here is simplified to comply with the Surcharge methods outlined above and is not a complete guide to managing Accounts or Loyalty & Membership programs 

       

      • Navigate to Maintenance 

      • Navigate to Account 

      • Select the Account Group for the given Membership Tier*. We are using Gold / Silver Bronze and will select Bronze. 

      • Double-click the Account Group or Account to edit 

      • Set the Price Number to Use Till PriceNumber 

      • Set the Pricing Type to Discount 

      • Set the Pricing Percent Discount 

      • Select "OK" to save and close the Edit Account / Group dialogue box 

      • * Repeat this procedure for each Account Group or Membership Tier 

       

      This will set a discount to the Price Number that the till is currently using. When surcharges are active, the member will receive their discount, but the on the surcharged amounts.  

      Related Articles:

      • Example 1

      • Example 2

      • Example 3