MicroSale Cash Discount Options
Give customers a choice. Keep your margins protected.
With MicroSale, you can offer two powerful pricing strategies that offset credit card fees—without compromising transparency or compliance.
Option 1: Seamless Fee Transparency
Add a small processing fee to card payments — and remove it when customers pay with cash.
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Auto-applied Fees
As you build the check, MicroSale automatically calculates and adds a processing fee based on the rate you’ve set. No manual entry. No errors. -
Clear at Checkout
The virtual check shows both Cash Total and Card Total — so guests always know what to expect. -
Receipts that Explain Themselves
The receipt shows the processing fee and the matching cash discount that cancels it out when customers pay with cash.
Option 2: Built-In Cash Discounts
Bake fees into your prices, and reward customers who pay with cash.
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Menu-Price Inclusive
Your pricing includes the cost of card processing — so card payers see exactly the advertised price. -
Instant Cash Savings
Guests who pay in cash automatically receive a discount at checkout. No codes, no scanning, just savings. -
Simple Receipts
Show both totals before payment. If they pay by card, the receipt shows one thing: the Charge Total.
Why It Works
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Protect Your Margins — Keep your pricing fair while recouping processing costs
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Fully Automated — No staff intervention needed
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Always Transparent — Customers understand what they’re paying and why
About
MicroSale offers both non-cash adjustments and true cash discounting within Version 10. In recent trends, true cash discounting has gained popularity among customers. While both the surcharge option and dual pricing/automatic discount can impact a customer's total bill amount, they are essentially opposite approaches - one adds an extra fee while the other takes away from the total charge.
What's the Difference?
Dual-Pricing: Menu item prices increased, discounted for cash payments (potentially incentivizing customers to choose cash payments, enhancing the overall customer experience).
A credit card processing surcharge (or non-cash adjustment) is an additional fee that is added to a customer's bill when they choose to pay with a credit card. It essentially adds a "service fee" to all transactions, but is automatically discounted if the customer pays with cash, debit or gift card. This way, they don't have to increase the prices of the products they sell.
Important Update
If your surcharge rates are over 3%, you must adjust your rates as soon as possible.
Helping Merchants Stay Compliant:
[Supported in Version 10.0.1250+]Stay ahead of the curve and ensure your restaurant remains compliant with the new Visa surcharge rules. If your cash discount/upcharge is set at 5% or more, MicroSale automatically resets it to zero (and prompts warnings that a reset was done due to incompliancy).
This change safeguards you from any potential VISA/Mastercard compliance issues.
Dual Pricing or "true cash discounts" cannot exceed menu price increases over 5%.
Surcharging: How it works in the POS
- As items are added to a check, the surcharge/processing fee increases (based on your programmed percentage).
- Both Cash and Credit Card totals are presented at the bottom of the virtual check as well as on the payment screen, both on the user side and customer display side, if applicable).
- The customer receipt shows "Processing Fee" (or other custom fee label) below the subtotal. When cash is used, the processing fee line is followed by a discount that cancels out the fee (the discount is automated, you do not have to program this in your POS system).
Dual Pricing: How it works in the POS
- The restaurant’s menu prices reflect a marked-up amount to include the processing fees in the main price.
- Customers who pay by credit card simply pay the advertised menu prices.
- Customers who choose to pay cash receive an automatic discount.
- The customer receipt shows both a Total and a Cash Total before payment is taken.
- If the customer pays with a credit card, only the “Total” is listed.
Please Note:
Your version of MicroSale must be 10.0.1224 or higher.
The version number is listed on the ID Screen in the lower, right corner.
Surcharge (Credit card, Non-cash adjustment): Setup
Supported in MicroSale Version 9.0.1396+
How to |Set up Surcharges (or also termed, non-cash adjustments)
- Ensure your version is Version 9.0.1396 or later
- Create the surcharge in Managers Menu > Discount/Gratuity Maintenance. You can call the surcharge anything you want in the “Name” field. The Name is shown on customer receipts as well as your reports. In this example, it is called “Process Fee”.
- Next to Type, select Charge Percentage followed by the percentage amount in the Amount In this example, the fee is 4 (for 4%).
- Access level must be set at a low level, such as Cook or Cashier. (Allowing the process fee to automatically add to all checks).
- The category must be assigned to Processing Fee from the list of options
- For Sales Tax, you'll typically keep it at the default of 1. This means the Processing Fee is taxed. If you are not sure what your set rate is, you can go to Manager Menu > Register Setup > Sales Tax Menu). In most states, surcharges/service fees are taxable. Please check with your local laws to be sure.
- Alternatively, you can set the Sales Tax rate to 0, to make the surcharge Tax Free / Tax Exempt.
- Select Save
- After your discount has been saved, select Discount Events (located in the Discount/Gratuity Maintenance screen as well)
- Click on the drop-down menu on the top and select Processing Fee from the list of events.
- After it is selected, scroll through the list of discounts/surcharges and check the box next to the processing fee name that you created (in this example, the fee is named “Process Fee)
- Save and Exit when completed.
- Alternatively, you can set the Sales Tax rate to 0, to make the surcharge Tax Free / Tax Exempt.
Dual Pricing: Setup
Supported Release: MicroSale Version 10.0.1224+
Cash Discounting, or Dual Pricing, refers to a discount offered to customers who pay with cash instead of a credit card. This discount can be seen as an incentive for customers to pay with cash and can also help businesses save money on transaction fees.
- Those who pay by credit card simply pay the advertised menu prices
- Customers who choose to pay cash receive an automatic discount
Please Note:
Your version of MicroSale must be 10.0.1224 or higher.
The version number is listed on the ID Screen in the lower, right corner.
Part 1: Raising Menu Prices
Decide internally how you want to raise your menu prices.
Manually and Individually Raising Prices:
Pricing can be raised manually and individually by going to Managers Menu -> Menu Maintenance -> Menu Items and Pricing.
Globally Raise Prices by a Percentage:
This method is recommended as prices can be quickly and easily adjusted as needed.
- Go to Managers Menu → Register Setup → Terminal Configuration → Register Options → Global Setup → Dual Pricing area. Then, enter the desired markup percentage in the "Set Dual Pricing Percentage" field and Save. The changes will deploy to all registers.
- (The 'SVC FEE %' must be used when assigning a global percentage in the Dual Pricing setup area)
- After changing the items' prices, regardless of which method you chose, you must now assign the automated discount to the Cash Payment tender.
Part 2: Assigning a Discount Percentage to the Cash Tender (Cash Payment Button)
- After the items’ prices are raised, go to Managers Menu > Register Setup > Terminal Configuration > Tenders-Job Codes-Paid Outs-etc.
- Select Cash from the Tender dropdown list
- Select the dropdown (where it says Convenience Fee by default), and select Cash Discount %
- Type in the percentage amount (only enter 3.99 for 3.99%)
- Select Save
To use a discount name other than Cash Discount, type in a name under Alternate Name and then select Save Alt.
Supported Release: MicroSale Version 10.0.1244+
Now supporting split payments with cash discounting.MicroSale Version 10.0.1244+ automatically adjusts processing fees when customers pay with both cash and credit card.