We want to hear from you about the strengths and weaknesses of Square for Restaurants

[lucasisaza]

Hello!

At Square we are constantly looking for ways to improve our products and services. Over the last couple of months we’ve interviewed some of you to better understand why you chose to run your business with Square for Restaurants.

We’d like to continue learning from you by sharing the following survey. Our objective is to develop a better understanding about the things that Square for Restaurants does well today and those that we can improve on. The results will help us prioritize, and continue to improve the product for all of you. 

We’d appreciate hearing from some of you! The survey should take no more than 5 minutes and is available for US sellers only until September 15, 2022. To thank you for your time and feedback, we can provide you with a $5 Amazon gift card.

Thanks!

Lucas

[Donnie-M]

@lucasisaza 

Strengths:

1. Ability to customize the point of sale screen from the desktop.  Text based icons instead of graphical based icons.

2.  The KDS system is becoming more and more functional.

3.  Fast and quick interface, works offline.

4.  The ability to use the POS/Retail/Restaurant all at same time or separately.

Weaknesses:  

1.  KDS is currently missing some features:  Ability to place a ticket on hold for later, all day counts for modifiers, ability for multiple items to be flagged.

2.  KDS missing split item cost feature (common with competition)

3.  More customer order notification systems (order ready screen)

4.  NEED A BUMP BAR FOR THE KDS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  hard to clear orders and an ipad just to clear tickets is expensive.  Need to be able to use kb9000 or the like bump bar from bematech.  I can plug one into the ipad and it is recognized, but no commands can be mapped to serve off tickets.  Code me some hotkeys to clear the first ticket at least.

5.  Need to be able to see when people have time off scheduled on a calendar, need to be able to schedule partial time off for a day, not just whole day.  

[ZP]

We would love a report specific to tips. It would be great for my shift managers to see what was collected via credit cards without having access to all of our detailed sales for the day. Thanks!

[lucasisaza]

Hey thanks for responding here! Have you used the Shift and Close of Day reports? Both of those reports include specific line items for both card and cash tips.

[spnick]

Can’t use it on register.

[lucasisaza]

Is there a specific feature would like to use on register that is not available today?

[VladCocotte]

Hello, thank you for the thread. I have to say that I really like Square there are a lot of features that made my life so much easier. I do appreciate what you guys are doing.

#1 There should be a way to somehow verify that the ticket was actually printed.

Things happen in our businesses. Sometimes we need to change a paper in the printer or the internet went down or the iPad was too far away. Square will not let us know if the order was not printed. We are working under pressure for several hours. When one ticket isn't printed by the time server realizes his food is taking too long it's already too late. On top of it, the whole kitchen line got screwed with ASAP orders.

2. I would really appreciate a clear separate window on the Ipad to present to our guests at checkout.

3. Square online. When creating an item I'd love to also have a feature to automatically add it to square online.

At the moment I have to go to square online and select a category to which the item belongs. It's becoming an issue when I have to wait for a square online to load. It takes some time to get to.

4. Having the ability to add/edit/delete items from the Ipad. (like regular Square) Maybe there is a reason why this feature isn't there, it's just not obvious to me.

5. Pictures would be nice.

People navigate a lot better when they see the wine label on the screen rather than reading, per se Pinot Grigio, Bottle, Santa Margherita, 2018

6. Sending Notes to the kitchen faster.

Right now it's dug so deep and the button is so tiny. It's done better in regular Square

7. Grubhub integration would be great. It works so very nice with doordash

8. A way to charge/return deposits.

9. Splitting one item is not crucial for us. Yet it would be really nice to have it.

10. When splitting the check if something goes wrong with a one payment all other payments will be canceled. Imagine having 5 cards, how about 15? On top of it, the payment that was just canceled will be shown on customers' bank accounts as charged. It's hard to prove to some people that they aren't going to be double charged when swiping a card for a second time. What if the same thing will happen once again?

[lucasisaza]

Thanks for the detailed requests! The context around each one makes it easy to understand. It's also good to see that some of the stuff we are currently working on addresses some of the issues you've pointed out. Is the numbering the specific order of requests from most important to least important?

[Mestezo]

Make the system more mobile business friendly. We have different locations and hours everyday. So it would be great to add locations and times like a calendar that updates on the site with map display - we had this on our word press site with Food truck theme - and it was the best. During Covid we switched to this platform for ease of management but still miss having that flexibility ever day. 

[Den_Distiller]

I agree with all the previous posts on the additional features needed.  The one area that is lacking from square is the ability to communicate and log information for our staff.  Full transparency:  I used 7Shifts to manage staff schedules, list daily events, log issues, inventory needs, and maintenance requests in the 7Shifts Managers Logbook.  This is a daily need!  

The other area of focus would be to provide inventory functionality.  I use the very simple retail inventory function for hats & shirts...but what's really needed is a more robust inventory system for restaurants.  I used another system to inventory daily & weekly items such as lemons, limes, alcohol, sodas, meats, cheeses, glassware, gloves, dishwasher detergent, etc.  

Hope this helps.

[lucasisaza]

Thanks! Do you also track ingredient inventory on your other system or do you only track menu item inventory? For example, do you track stock of the burger or do you track stock of the meat, cheese, sliced tomatoes, etc.

[RedRocksBeer]

My staff and customers would REALLY LOVE the ability to hold Credit Card information and give the card back to customers instead of holding onto a huge stack of cards. 

[sarahhruby]

need the ability to change conversational modifiers. specifically for pizza ordering. (first half, second half, whole pizza)

[EdNewbold]

Apple Pay is NOT an option at live checkout time for our food truck.  Fortunately, our customer did not get mad and used a regular credit card instead.  Square needs to get Apple Pay working ASAP!

[lucasisaza]

Hi, thank you for the feedback. Was the customer able to tap their phone on the buyer-facing display on the Square Register or on the card reader connected to an iPad? 

[BettysFoodTruck]

Yes, the customer (and I) tried numerous time to tap their phone on the attached card reader, with no response.  Thank you.

[Colinsolacoffee]

I think y'all have done a good job making the quick highlights within reports helpful, but they lack a depth. As an owner, it's great to see how the raw numbers at surface level interact with each other in a year-by-year basis, but the customization of reports is extremely limited. What about reporting that would allow us to compare days side by side (not just the same day or the previous week/year), reporting that would allow us to understand more about taxing? We have experienced many problems with running tax reports, particularly with separate reports giving different numbers for the same statistic, or being unable to run the report at all and coming back with an error. I just think with a company of this size, the reporting would have some stronger/more consistent capabilities!

[lucasisaza]

This is great! I appreciate the details. Is there a specific metric or metrics that you frequently compare for different time periods?

[bellitaliapizza]

Hi @lucasisaza without being repetitive, I would say the most important things are:

1. Charge half price for any Item: Pizza friendly options 1/2 modifier or 1/2 item charge. Make a function to charge only 1/2 price of regular item price. Something that does a simple formula of X * 1/2 = 1/2X . Please this is very important for restaurants with pizza. I have to build these "1/2" modifiers manually so instead of having 30 modifiers as pizza toppings, I have 90 of them because I need: 30 for full toppings, 30 for 1st half toppings and 30 for 2nd half toppings. Same goes for Half and Half Pizzas.  
2. Ability to make Modifiers Unavailable or 86-able: If you have item modifiers as add-ons such as pepperoni, sausage, bacon, etc. So if you run out of bacon for example, there is no way to make that modifier unavailable unless you delete that modifier. If you delete it, you have to remember to add it back on. 
3. Make NON-AUTOMATIC Category Dependent Discounts: Make NON-AUTOMATIC discounts applicable to only certain item categories. Many sellers out there have coupons that are applied only when presented and not all the time/all purchases. Case scenario: If we offer a 20% off discount coupon to be applied to all food items but we need to exclude alcohol beverages, we have to create an automatic discount. Automatic discount means every customer would get the discount regardless of having the coupon or not. Then what is the point of issuing and presenting coupons? There is no option to make this non-automatic and on-demand or manual. 

Please look into these. We have committed to Square for Restaurants but don't understand why but it is lacking basic features that all other platforms have.

[lucasisaza]

Thanks, when it comes to 86'ing modifiers do you also have a Square Online site and find yourself doing the same thing on there to remove modifiers?

[bellitaliapizza]

Hi @lucasisaza, yes that is correct. We have a Square Online site and get 50-60% of the total orders through the site. In order to 86 a modifier, we have to do it manually there as well. So that is in 2 places, for the POS and Square Online site. 

*A clarification on the Discounts item: If the discount rules could be enabled without having to make the discount Automatic, I believe it would solve the issue. This would be great help as well!

Thanks in advance!

[lucasisaza]

Noted, thanks for the feedback!