The counter

The counter is the takeaway orders' screen, made for a computer with a printer. You open it with Counter in the left sidebar, with the restaurant chosen at the top.

Each paid order arrives with a sound, and its ticket prints by itself on the computer that prints the tickets (how to set it up is below): the kitchen works from the paper. Orders sit in three columns:

• In the kitchen: those whose ticket has printed (or is waiting to).
• Ready for pickup: those you marked Ready. The customer is told.
• Scheduled: those the customer ordered for later. Their ticket prints by itself a while before pickup (20 minutes, unless the location has another time); Print now prints it earlier.

Who can: everyone who works at the location sees it. Marking Ready, Picked up and reprinting: the owner, admins, the manager, the cashier, waiters and staff. Pausing orders: the owner, admins, the manager and the cashier. Cancel and refund: only the owner, admins and the manager, or someone with a custom role that cancels orders and makes refunds.

An order, start to finish

1. The order arrives, already paid with Mercado Pago: it chimes and the ticket prints.
2. When it is ready, click Ready. It moves to Ready for pickup and the customer is told. If it was a mistake, Undo sends it back to the kitchen: it shows on that screen for 10 seconds.
3. When the customer picks it up, click Picked up.

Reprint prints the ticket again, with the word "REPRINT" at the bottom.

Not printed

If a ticket did not reach the printer, the order is marked Not printed and a notice with its number shows at the top. It happens when Chrome could not print it or showed the print dialog (see below), and when 5 minutes went by without the computer that prints printing it, for instance because it did not have the counter open: then it says 12 minutes ago (or however many) in red. Click Reprint on that order, or It printed if the ticket came out anyway. The order is not lost: it stays there until its ticket prints.

The screen knows that Chrome handed the ticket to the printer, not that the paper came out: if the printer ran out of paper or jammed, the order is not marked Not printed. When a ticket does not come out, click Reprint on its card.

Orders keep coming in even with the counter closed: when you open it on the computer that prints, it prints the missing tickets by itself, oldest first.

Earlier days' orders, cancelled ones and refunds are in History, at the top right (Takeaway orders).

Pausing orders

If the kitchen is swamped, click Pause orders and choose for how long: 15 minutes, 30 minutes, 1 hour or Until I resume them. The menu stays visible and customers see that orders are paused; orders already in go on. Resume orders opens them again sooner.

Cancel and refund

If you cannot make an order, click Cancel and refund, choose the reason and confirm. Mercado Pago refunds the customer the whole total, tip included; it may take a few days to show. If the ticket had printed, another one saying "CANCELED" prints by itself, so the kitchen stops.

Setting up the counter's computer

Once, on the computer that stays at the counter:

1. The printer: an 80 mm thermal one (an Epson TM-T20III, for instance). Install its driver, make it the system's default printer and set the paper to 80 mm roll, cutting at the end of each page.
2. Chrome printing directly: start Chrome with the --kiosk-printing option, so it prints each ticket without asking. Add --autoplay-policy=no-user-gesture-required so the sound works without a click. On Windows they go at the end of the Target field of a Chrome shortcut, for instance: chrome.exe --kiosk-printing --autoplay-policy=no-user-gesture-required. On a Mac, from the Terminal: open -a "Google Chrome" --args --kiosk-printing --autoplay-policy=no-user-gesture-required (with Chrome closed first).
3. Choose it to print: sign in to Restoman, open Counter and turn on This computer prints the tickets. It stays saved in that browser.
4. Leave the page open the whole shift. The screen asks the computer not to sleep while it is open; if the bottom says the browser may turn it off, turn the display's sleep off in the system.

Only the computer that has it on prints by itself. Other screens that open the counter (another computer, a tablet) show the same orders without printing anything by themselves; from them, Reprint and Print now print on their own printer.

Without --kiosk-printing, Chrome shows the print dialog with each ticket, and since the page can't tell whether you printed it or canceled, each ticket stays in Not printed: click It printed if it came out, or Reprint if it didn't. For an everyday counter, use --kiosk-printing. Without the other option, click Sound off: click to turn it on when the shift starts.

If the connection drops, the top says Reconnecting…: the screen comes back by itself and catches up on what happened meanwhile. If your session ended, it says so; reload the page to sign in again.