House Accounts enable you to create payment accounts for individual customers. These can be used to accrue a balance that can be paid later or to prepay an account. This guide will walk you through how to set up, manage, and close house accounts.
Setting Up a House Account
From the Manager's Menu:
- Go to the Manager’s Menu > "Gift Certificate/House Accounts".
- Fill in the three main fields: Name, Account # (must be longer than 4 characters), and toggle the “Pre-Paid Balance Only” checkbox on or off as needed.
- Click "Save Account Information", then select “House Account” when prompted for the account type.
From the Order Screen:
- Navigate to the Ordering Screen > "Verify Account" > "Create Account".
- The House Account setup screen will load, follow the steps as mentioned above to complete the account setup.
Closing an Order to a House Account
When you tender an order to a house account, it is counted as a regular sale. More specifically, a non-cash tender, categorizing with the credit cards and gift cards, etc on your balance sheet and other payment reports.
- When you are ready to “cash-out” the customer, tap on Pay (from the Order Screen)
- From the Payment Screen, tap on the House Account payment media.
- The House Account payment tender may be listed under a more descriptive payment name such as:
- “To be billed later”, “To be collected” or, "House Account"
- The House Account payment tender may be listed under a more descriptive payment name such as:
- When prompted, swipe the house account card, or manually type in the account name or account number associated with the customer
- If the account is not in the list, select “No Acct Name”. You can also search with the Search Function
- Click "Accept Amount"
Note: When you tender an order to a house account, it counts as a non-cash tender on your daily balance sheet.
Collecting Payment for a House Account
When applying a payment to a balance on a house account, note that it is considered non-sales revenue and will not count as a sale on your daily balance sheet.
How to Collect Payment
- Go to the Ordering screen and tap on Apply Payment.
- Depending on your settings, this button may be named differently, such as Collect Payment, Funding Account, etc. However, Apply Payment is the default name.
(A popup window opens) - When prompted, enter the amount that the customer is paying.
- When paying catering orders billed through house accounts, reference the invoice/receipt. You can use the Proposal or go to Transaction Review and reprint the catering receipt so that you can enter the exact amount from the invoice.
- Tap Pay Order.
- Tap on the payment type for how the customer is paying, such as Credit Card, Cash, etc.
- ***DO NOT USE THE “CATERING BILLED LATER, etc.,” PAYMENT TYPE***
- After closing the check, the system will prompt you to swipe the customer's house account card or manually enter the account number or customer name to update the account payment.
Printing House Accounts
- Go to the Manager’s Menu > Gift Certificate/House Account > "Reports/Utilities".
- On the top right of the screen, select “House Account” to print only those statements.
- Click “Print Account Statements”.
Emailing Invoices
- Follow the same steps as above, but instead of clicking "Print Account Statements", click "Email Statements".
Note: An email address must be assigned to each House Account you are emailing the statement to.
Preparing Your System to Accept House Accounts
Creating a Tender Type:
- Go to the Manager’s Menu > Register Setup > "Tenders – Paid Outs – Customer Requests – More".
- Click the “Tender Types” box at the bottom of the screen.
- Enter a Tender Name and select the “House/Gift Account” check box, then click SAVE.
Linking a Tender Type to a New Account Type:
- Go to the Manager’s Menu > "Gift Certificate House Account" > "Link Tender To Accounts".
- Type in a new name for the “Account Type Setup” field.
- Select the tender type you created earlier from the drop-down list.
- Select either Yes or No for Tip Accepted.
- Leave the Billing Amount at zero.
- Select ‘House Account’ as the Default Account Type, then click SAVE.
Terminating a House Account and Refunding the Remaining Balance
- Select Load Only to filter specific types of accounts (Gift Cards (Internally Hosted), House Accounts, and Memberships are managed through this account area).
A new feature called "Close House Account" has been added
Designed for employees or customers with prepaid accounts seeking to close their accounts and retrieve the remaining balance. This functionality enables you to close the account and disburse the balance as a Paid Out, which can be configured in the Paid Out setup area and linked to the respective house account.
- Create this in the Paid Out setup area and link the paid out to a house account.
House Accounts Reports
- Go to Managers Menu > Gift Certificate House Account
- Select Reports/Utilities
- If you select the “Accounts Balance Summary” report it will show you each individual account by name
- If you select the “Accounts Type Charge Summary” report will show you the totals per account type
- From the House Account screen, if you select a person’s name from the list and select the “Print Account Activity” button it will show you the complete detail of a specific account