Bar / Pub

Q: Rounds won't go to the bar until I take payment. What's wrong?

Require payment before accepting order is on. That setting is for a counter that's paid up front — turn it off in Settings → Orders configuration and tabs will behave normally.

Q: Can I split a tab between a group?

Yes, two ways. Multiple checks gives a group separate tabs from the start; split receipt lets one tab be paid by several cards at the end.

POS setup and configuration for a bar or pub. Tabs that stay open across rounds, age checks, and drinks that reach the bar in seconds.

What it does

A bar runs almost nothing as a single sale. A group arrives, opens a tab, adds four rounds over two hours, orders food halfway through, and settles once — often split several ways by someone who didn't order any of it. Meanwhile every round has to reach the bar in seconds, some of it can't legally be poured without a check, and whoever opened the tab may have left before it's paid. This guide sets POSolid up for that: a tab any device behind the bar can add to, drinks that print or appear on screen the second they're rung in, and a stop-and-ask on anything that needs an age check.

The short version: the tab and the age check are the two things worth setting up before your first busy night. Everything else is detail.

What you need

Thing	Why you need it	Notes
Till device (tablet or small touchscreen PC)	opens tabs, rings rounds, takes payment	One at the till is enough to start; add a second once you're carrying orders on the floor.
Internet + Wi-Fi router	POSolid is a cloud app and needs a connection during service	Fixed broadband and your own router. Keep tills and printers on the staff network, never the guest one.
Fiscal printer — depends on your country	required by law in some countries to record sales	In Poland: Posnet, Novitus or Elzab. See Supported Fiscal Printers, or Fiscal Printers in Other Countries if you trade elsewhere.
Card terminal	most bar tabs are settled by card, often split	From your payment provider, works on its own. You record which method was used so takings match what the terminal took.
Optional: a phone or tablet for floor staff	taking rounds at the table instead of walking back to the bar	Any device with a browser and a staff PIN. Every device sees the same open tabs.
Optional: a screen at the bar	so the person pouring sees a round the second it's rung in, without a printer	Any tablet or monitor running the Kitchen Display as a bar screen.
Optional: a printer at the kitchen pass	if you also serve food	A thermal ESC/POS printer, or a screen — see "Setting up the bar and kitchen" below.
Optional: a cash drawer	if you still take cash	Opens automatically on a cash sale if wired to your printer; works fine without one too.

"Optional" means your choice — not an upsell. Every optional line above is hardware you may or may not want; none of it unlocks anything in POSolid. Open tabs, age checks, the bar and kitchen screens, split payments, stock tracking, staff PINs and reports are included in your subscription from day one, with no per-device or per-feature charge. The only thing you'd ever spend money on is the physical equipment itself — and only if you decide you want it.

How everything connects

One router, everything on it:

Router (broadband + Wi-Fi)   --( internet )-------> POSolid
Till, floor devices, screens --( staff Wi-Fi )-----> Router
Till with the Print Agent    --( USB or staff Wi-Fi )--> Printers

Every device reaches POSolid over the internet. Tills, floor phones and the bar screen just open POSolid in a browser — nothing to install.
The Print Agent runs on one device only — normally the till behind the bar. It only makes outgoing connections, so there's nothing to configure on the router.
Keep printers off the guest Wi-Fi. Guest networks isolate devices from each other, which is exactly what the Print Agent can't work around.

Getting started

Create your organization — see Create Your Account. Set your country, currency and, in Poland, your tax settings.
Build the drinks list in Menu → Catalog: beers, spirits, cocktails and food, with variants for measures and sizes and modifiers for mixers, doubles and garnishes — see Modifiers. Mark anything alcoholic with the age-restricted flag on the item.
Tune the register in Settings → Orders configuration: require payment before accepting order off — a tab has to reach the bar before it's paid — multiple checks on if groups split a tab, and split receipt on so one tab can be paid by several cards.
Install the Print Agent behind the bar and link it with the one-time code — see Printing.
Set up your bar and, if you serve food, kitchen stations — see "Setting up the bar and kitchen" below.
Add your staff and roles in Staff & Roles, with a PIN each — decide early who can discount, void a line or reopen a tab.
Do a dry run: open a tab, ring a round, add a second round from a different device, try adding an age-restricted item, split the tab two ways, settle it, then check Reports.

Tabs, rounds and settling

The tab stays open all evening. With payment-first turned off, a round is accepted and sent to the bar without being paid — staff keep adding rounds until the guest is ready to leave. That's the normal way to run a bar, and it's why takeaway advice ("always take payment up front") doesn't apply here.

Any device can add to the same tab. Ring a round from the till or from a floor phone — both write to the same open tab, so the person who took the fourth round doesn't need to find whoever opened it.

Splitting a tab. Turn on multiple checks when a group wants to pay separately from the start — one tab per payer instead of one for the whole table. Turn on split receipt for the far more common case: one tab, several cards at the end.

More than one payment method on one tab. Part cash, part card is handled on the same settle — you don't need to ring it as two separate sales.

Age checks and stock

An age-restricted item stops and asks. Mark a drink age-restricted once, in the catalogue, and it carries an 18+ badge everywhere it's shown — including a QR menu, if you use one. Adding it to an order stops and asks the server to confirm the customer's age before it goes on the tab. It's a prompt at the point of sale, not an ID scanner: the check is still the server's to make, but it can't be skipped by accident. See Catalog.

Recipes turn a pour into a stock movement. Give a cocktail a recipe — the spirits and mixers it actually uses — and selling one draws those ingredients out of what you hold, in the same units you buy in (bottles, kegs, litres). A stocktake then checks the shelf against what the system expects, instead of a guess at the end of the month. See Recipes.

Setting up the bar and kitchen

Bar station. Point drinks at a "Bar" station with a screen or a printer behind the bar. A round appears the moment it's rung in, so pouring starts while the server is still with the guest.

Kitchen station, if you also serve food. A second station keeps food dockets away from drink orders, so neither queue holds up the other.

Items with no station just go through. A bottle from the fridge assigned to no station never joins a queue — it counts as ready the moment it's ordered.

If you print dockets and keep a screen open somewhere, keep it to one screen per station. Each open board watches for new orders on its own, so an auto-printing station can produce one docket per open screen.

Recommended setup

Minimum — small bar

Till, fiscal printer, card terminal. Payment-first off, split receipt on. One person rings tabs and pours. Everything else can wait.

Recommended — busy bar or pub

Add a bar screen so rounds appear the moment they're rung in, a phone for floor staff so a round doesn't need a walk to the till, and staff PINs so the team swaps in seconds. Turn on multiple checks before your first busy Friday, not during it.

Full — bar with a kitchen, late shifts

Add a kitchen station, stock with recipes so pour cost is a number rather than a guess, loyalty cards for regulars, a QR Menu for table orders, and Work Shifts so late and split shifts are recorded properly. Use the hour-by-hour report to see when the night actually gets busy.

Key things to know

Turn payment-first off. With it on, a round can't reach the bar until it's paid — the opposite of how a tab works.
Multiple checks and split receipt are different things. Multiple checks = several tabs from the start. Split receipt = one tab, several payers at the end. A bar usually wants both available.
An age-restricted flag travels with the item everywhere — the till, the QR menu, everywhere it's shown — and the check happens once per new tab, not on every round.
Recipes are what makes stock tracking meaningful for a bar. Without them, a bottle only leaves stock when someone remembers to record it by hand.
Roles matter here as much as at a restaurant. Decide who can discount, void a line or reopen a settled tab — see Staff & Roles.
Keep printers and the bar screen off the guest Wi-Fi. Guest networks isolate devices, and that breaks printing silently.
Poland: the fiscal printer is not optional, and the daily report has to be printed to close the fiscal day.

FAQ

Q: Rounds won't go to the bar until I take payment. What's wrong?
A: Require payment before accepting order is on. That setting is for a counter that's paid up front — turn it off in Settings → Orders configuration and tabs will behave normally.

Q: Can a tab stay open across several rounds?
A: Yes — that's the normal way to run it. A tab stays open until it's settled, and any device behind the bar can add a round to it, so whoever is free serves the next one.

Q: Does POSolid handle age-restricted drinks?
A: Yes. Mark a drink age-restricted in the catalogue and it carries an 18+ badge everywhere it appears. Adding one to an order stops and asks the server to confirm the customer's age before it's added to the tab.

Q: Can I split a tab between a group?
A: Yes, two ways. Multiple checks gives a group separate tabs from the start; split receipt lets one tab be paid by several cards at the end.

Q: Can I set up measures, doubles and mixers?
A: Yes. Measures and sizes are variants with their own price; mixers, doubles and garnishes are modifiers, so the price follows the choice instead of being worked out by hand.

Q: Can drinks and food go to different places?
A: Yes — set up separate bar and kitchen stations. Each sees only the tickets that belong to it.

Q: Can I track bottle and keg stock?
A: Yes. Give a drink a recipe and selling it draws the ingredients out of stock automatically, so a stocktake checks the shelf against a number instead of a guess. See Recipes.

Q: Can I control who's allowed to void a line or give a discount?
A: Yes. Permissions are set per role in Staff & Roles, so discounting, voiding and reopening a tab can each be restricted to managers.