Merge phone & take out orders with Orders tab on POS

[RoniM]

We currently receive orders 4 ways at our restaurant:
1. Dine in - customer walks in and sits down and orders from the table

2. Online - customer places an order online through our Square site or Doordash
3. Phone order - customer calls in their order and pays at pickup
4. Take out - customer walks up to the counter and places their order and pays

Phone and take out orders are difficult to manage because there is no true current flow in place for them within the system. There is no place within Square for Restaurants dedicated for phone and take out orders the way there is for dine in (Floorplan) and online orders (Orders).

When a take out customer pays, the order disappears from the POS and can only be found in Transactions, even though the order isn't complete yet. For phone orders, we are currently placing them on a table we created on the floorplan named 'Phone Orders'.

Merging phone and take out orders with the Orders tab would be a great way to allow restaurants like us to manage ALL to go orders in one place. It would simplify orders into two categories, dine in or take out. It would also allow us to notify customers when their order is ready while allowing our staff to not lose track of take out and phone orders. 

[_Violet]

Hi @RoniM - Thanks for submitting this Feature Request.

I've updated the status to "Open". This step in the Feature Request process will be a time in which other Square Sellers can add their use cases to your idea to make it stronger and demonstrate further how much it is needed. Later on, we'll re-visit the most popular feature requests in the "Open for Votes" status and bring them to our Product Team.

To other Sellers who see this feature, please “like” the post and reply with a use case that your business would have. This will help to signal that this feature request is even more important to address.

[max_waicman]

I have been requesting this feature since we started with square for restaurants  many many times

3. Phone order - customer calls in their order and pays at pickup
4. Take out - customer walks up to the counter and places their order and pays

Also being able to lookup a customer and attached the customer to the order when they place a walk up or telephone order. We also have inhouse delivery drivers that need customer information on the ticket...

[RoniM]

@max_waicman thanks for joining this thread @max_waicman. I'm sure this feature will be helpful to many other restaurants so I hope they see and join this thread so we can get the feature added. 

[BistroSupport]

+1
We FULLY support this request and have asked for similar on this thread...

https://www.sellercommunity.com/t5/Square-for-Restaurants/Add-quot-Schedule-for-pickup-quot-function...

[RoniM]

Thanks for joining @BistroSupport 

[ptrbkr]

Similarly:

- QR code/self-service orders that are tied to a specific table don't show up as checks on that table at any POS systems.
- Checks started at a table via QR code can't be adjusted or added to from a POS system.

The fact that the QR code ordering process is built off of the "online store" paradigm and remains completely separate from in-house service styles is maddening, and we're actively worked to get off of Square if we can't fix it.

The process we expect to be able to use is:

1. A guest sits at a table and starts a check from the QR code, pre-authorizing their credit card
2. That check is attached to their table, and the table view on the POS systems shows open checks by the table
3. A server is able to walk around with the mobile POS and ask if anyone would like anything, and add that thing to the existing check attached to that table

What it's actually like right now:

1. Someone sits at a table, opens a check, orders a drink
2. Drink is fulfilled, but no way to checks by table, so if the printer didn't print (which has happened plenty), it's nigh impossible to find an order
3. Server walks around to ask if anyone would like anything else, and to be generally hospitable. Someone says yes, but now they have to create a NEW tab with the mobile POS system, or be told to go back through the QR code again.

It's very clear that the online store functionality being used for QR code/self-service functionality is not fully integrated and needs serious work. Our guests hate it right now, and I see no serious efforts toward addressing the hybrid system that many bars and cafes are using. We're only use Square for a month and we're ready to rip it out.

[RoniM]

@ptrbkr thanks for sharing that. I was planning on implementing QR code ordering but will now hold off till it's updated. Square has a lot of good features and just needs time to continuously be updated. We should be patient. 

[ptrbkr]

They’ve had this QR code functionality for years. There are mentions of this same issue going back over two years. I can’t be patient when I see no plan for improvement.

[Gina-Mia]

Why can't it just be a required option of the ordered item whether it is for here or togo?