Enable tips and gratuity to allow customers to tip sales either by entering gratuity on the screen of the register or writing it on a paper receipt. Managers can pay out credit card gratuity to employees directly from the cash drawer and the Business Owner can request adjustments for incorrectly entered tips. Gratuity reporting helps you track tips by date range, by cashier, and total gratuity payouts.
Gift cards are only available for Lightspeed Retail merchants on select pricing packages. Visit our Integrated Gift Cards article to learn more.
To learn how to enable tips and gratuity for your Lightspeed eCom (E-Series) webstore, visit our eCommerce setup article.
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Enable Gratuity Settings
To allow your business to accept tips from sales made with credit or gift cards, enable gratuity settings and decide how customers will tip at the register: on screen or on paper receipts. Gratuity settings can be configured from BackOffice or from the Retail POS (S-Series) app.
Tip and signature on paper receipts is not available when using the Clover Go card reader with the Retail POS (S-Series) app for iOS.
To learn how to enable tips and gratuity for your Lightspeed eCom (E-Series) webstore, visit our eCommerce setup article.
Sign into BackOffice as an employee with the relevant permissions or the Retail POS (S-Series) app as the Business Owner and open receipt settings.
In BackOffice, click ‘Settings’ and select ‘Receipts and Tips’. Don’t see ‘Receipts and Tips’? Visit our troubleshooting guide for help.
In the Retail POS (S-Series) app for iOS, tap ‘Receipt and Tip Settings’ on the Main Menu. For the Retail POS (S-Series) app for Android, tap ‘Setup’ on the register menu, then select ‘Receipt and Tip Settings’. Don’t see ‘Receipt and Tip Settings’? Visit our troubleshooting guide for help.
Customize the ‘Signature’ and ‘Tips’ settings as desired.
With signature on screen and tips enabled, cashiers can authorize a customer’s card and enter their tip at a later point. Visit the Tip Later article to learn about this feature.
With tips enabled, customers can leave a tip when paying with an Integrated Gift Card. Customers will be required to tip on screen for sales paid with gift cards regardless of the selected signature option.
Signature | Set how customers sign for credit sales and leave tips (if enabled): on the screen of the register or on paper receipts. With tips enabled, when a customer wants to leave gratuity for a sale paid with a gift card, gratuity must be entered on screen. Tips | Toggle to enable or disable the ability to leave gratuity for sales paid with credit or gift cards or the Pay by Link tender.
(Optional) Only with tips enabled and signature on screen, configure additional gratuity settings:
aCheck the box to combine the tip and signature screens or uncheck it to keep them separate.
Note: This feature is only available on the Retail POS (S-Series) app for iOS if EMV payments are disabled.
bCustomize each suggested tip’s value and type (‘$’ or ‘%’).
Suggestions appear on the register’s gratuity screen with tips enabled on screen (see step 3).
cSelect whether to have customers enter a tip before or after inserting an EMV chip card into the credit card reader.
This feature is only available to merchants using the Retail POS (S-Series) app for iOS with EMV payments enabled and a compatible Ingenico card reader.
If updating tip settings from BackOffice, get updates on the iOS or Android register to sync the changes to the register.
If you receive an error while getting updates, visit our troubleshooting guide for help.
Gratuity at the Register
Learn how to accept tips at the register when a customer wants to leave gratuity on a sale paid with a credit or gift card. Depending on the setup of your account, customers will either sign and tip for credit card sales on the register’s screen or on a printed paper receipt. For sales paid with a gift card, customers will always leave their tip on the register’s screen.
Gratuity must be added manually at the end of a sale and cannot be added automatically or before the sale is tendered.
To learn how customers leave tips on Lightspeed eCom (E) online orders or Pay by Link sales, visit the relevant article below:
With this method, customers enter tips for sales paid with credit or gift cards and sign for credit sales directly on the register’s screen. Learn how it works below.
If you do not have EMV payments enabled or are using the Clover All-in-One Credit Card Reader and Printer, your process will be different than the steps below. Visit one of the following articles for help:
To prompt for tip entry later in the sale after inserting a credit card, toggle the BackOffice setting found in step 4c of the Enable Gratuity Settings section.
The customer confirms their total and taps 'Charge'.
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The gratuity cannot be changed or adjusted at the register after the customer taps ‘Charge’. ShopKeep Payments by Lightspeed merchants can request adjustments for incorrectly entered tips. Learn more about tip adjustments here.
If prompted, the customer either taps ‘Yes’ to confirm the tip amount or ‘Re-enter Gratuity’ to enter a different amount.
This warning appears when the gratuity entered is more than 50% of the sale total.
bFor gift cards, swipe the customer’s gift card through your card reader, or tap ‘Manual Card Entry’ and enter the gift card number or scan its barcode.
Swiping gift cards is not supported on the Clover Go credit card reader. Learn how to process a manual gift card transaction on a non-iPad device here.
The customer follows the instructions on the reader's screen, removing their card when prompted.
Select a receipt option and tap ‘Done’, or tap 'No Receipt'.
Merchants using Lightspeed Payments with a supported payment terminal can enable the ability to tip directly on the screen of the terminal for a more seamless customer experience.
Tipping on terminal can be enabled in your settings in the Back Office:
In the Main Menu under Settings, click Receipts and Tips.
Click the Tips and Signature tab.
Toggle on Tips Before Payment to enable tipping.
Enter Suggested Tip amounts you wish to display to your customers and whether the amounts are in dollars ($) or percentage (%).
Note: By default, customers also have the option to select Custom or No tip on the payment terminal.
You can also update the Signature option using the dropdown.
Note: Showing the tip screen after inserting an EMV card is not supported with Lightspeed Payments.
Click Save.
Note: Your terminal receives new or updated configurations when it connects to your POS application. It can take up to five minutes to receive new or updated configurations.
Performing Gratuity Payouts
Managers perform gratuity payouts to give cash from the drawer to employees for tips accrued during the day. Payouts help keep the cash drawer balanced at the end of the register shift.
Sign into the Retail POS (S-Series) app as a Register Manager.
The ‘from x.xx gratuity total’ amount is the total of all tips collected at the register for the shift, including tips from Lightspeed eCom (E) orders that were paid online by credit card and closed at the register. Payouts and tip adjustments do not change this amount.
Tap ‘Open the Cash Drawer’ and remove the payout amount from the drawer.
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Request a Tip Adjustment
If the wrong tip amount is accidentally entered when a sale is closed, merchants processing credit cards with ShopKeep Payments by Lightspeed can request the tip be adjusted to the intended amount. Instructions for requesting tip adjustments are available in the Retail POS (S-Series) app for iOS.
This feature is only available to merchants processing credit cards with ShopKeep Payments by Lightspeed and using the Retail POS (S-Series) app for iOS.
Tip adjustments are not reflected in BackOffice or register reporting. After an adjustment is made, reporting will continue to show the tip amount originally entered at the register.
In the Retail POS (S-Series) app for iOS, tap ‘Sales History’ on the Main Menu.
Tap the 3 dot menu on a credit sale, then ‘Adjust Tip’.
Read the instructions for requesting a tip adjustment.
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(Optional) Tap to see what information is required if the signed credit receipt is unavailable.
Download a copy of the sales receipt from the BackOffice Transactions Report to find the details needed. Read our Transactions Report article to learn more.
Email [email protected] from the Business Owner email address for your Lightspeed Retail account with the documentation required for the tip adjustment.
Wait for an email from our team within 24 hours confirming the tip adjustment was made.
Be aware that BackOffice and register reporting will continue to show the tip amount originally entered at the register.
Gratuity Reporting
View detailed reporting in BackOffice on the non-cash tip and gratuity totals for the business, the total tips collected by cashier, and total payouts performed at the register.
To view gratuity reporting from the Retail POS (S-Series) app, run an X or Z report on each register. Visit our X and Z Reports article to learn how to run this report, including how to filter it by employee.
Gratuity by Date Range
The Dashboard shows total non-cash gratuity for a selected date range along with an overview of sales activity.
In BackOffice, click 'Reports' and select 'Dashboard'.
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Select a date range.
The ‘Non-Cash Gratuity’ tile shows the total amount of tips collected from sales made with credit and gift cards at the register and from Lightspeed eCom (E) orders* during the selected date range, minus refunded tips.
*Excludes tips left on orders not paid online by credit card (e.g. cash orders) that are placed while eCommerce online ordering is enabled. To learn more about how tips for online orders appear in reporting, visit our eCommerce Advanced Topics article.
To view non-cash gratuity collected by an individual employee, use the Sales by Employee report.
This information is also available from the Retail POS (S-Series) app via the X and Z Reports. Cashiers can view their own gratuity on the report, while Register Managers can filter by employee.
In BackOffice, click 'Reports' and select 'Employees'.
This report is only available for Lightspeed Retail merchants on select pricing packages.
The 'Tips Total' column on the table displays the gratuity for selected employees.
This shows the total amount of tips collected from sales made with credit and gift cards at the register and from Lightspeed eCom (E) orders* during the selected date range, minus refunded tips.
*Excludes tips left on orders not paid online by credit card (e.g. cash orders) that are placed while eCommerce online ordering is enabled. To learn more about how tips for online orders appear in reporting, visit our eCommerce Advanced Topics article.
The Shifts Summary gives an overview of cash flow during each shift. ‘Payouts’ contains total payouts and non-cash gratuity payouts performed at the register.
