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MenuBaton Station

MenuBaton Station is the ordering app for a tablet your staff set up at a counter or on a table. Customers order on it themselves, and pay on it whenever the order has to be paid first. It runs on Android and Apple tablets and phones, and its screens are in English.

What a Station does

Each Station takes orders for one place at a time — a counter or a table — and staff choose which. What happens when a customer confirms depends on that choice:

	Set to a counter	Set to a table
Who orders	Customers at your counter, one after another.	The party sitting at that table.
Paying	Always, before the order reaches the kitchen.	Before the order reaches the kitchen only while Pay on Order is on. Otherwise the order goes straight to the kitchen and is paid at the cashier.
Name	Every order asks for a first name and last-name initial, so you can call it out.	None: the order belongs to the table.
After the order	The receipt shows, then the Station starts afresh for the next customer.	The table keeps ordering, unless the Station clears the table after each order.

Station orders reach the same kitchen screens and printers as every other order, and the Orders page marks each one as a counter or table order.

Before you start

Add your counters. On the portal's Tables page, press + Add Counter and name it, such as Front Counter. A counter exists only for Stations, so it has no QR code. Tables and counters together count towards your plan's table limit. Your tables are already there — see Tables, counters & QR codes.
Set the change table password. Open Settings, click Edit, type a password of at least 4 characters under MenuBaton Station Apps, and click Save Changes. Staff type it to sign a Station in, and every time they move it to another table, reset a table or pair a card machine, so your own account password is never typed on a tablet a customer holds. Until you set one, your account password does all of that. Once saved, the password is never shown again: type a new one to replace it, or press Remove to go back to your account password.
To take cards, connect Stripe or Square on the Receive Account page and choose it under Who takes customer payments — see Set your receiving account. Every counter order is paid first, so counters take no orders until a provider is chosen.
Install MenuBaton Station on the tablet, and keep the tablet on charge.

Open MenuBaton Station and press Sign in.
Enter your manager email and the change table password — or your account password, if you have not set a change table password.
The Station opens on its list of counters and tables.

It doesn't use up your sign-in. You can be signed in to only one of the manager apps at a time, but Stations don't count: signing one in leaves the Restaurant Portal and your other apps signed in.
Back after a while off? A Station that was switched off for a while asks to be signed in again, saying "This device was off for a while, so it needs to be signed in again." Your email is remembered: only the change table password is needed.
Changed the password? Stations already signed in stay signed in for up to 24 hours, then ask for the new one.

Choose a counter or table

From the top, the Station's list shows:

RECEIPT PRINTER — the printer beside this Station, or None paired. See receipts that print by themselves.
CARD MACHINE — the Stripe card reader or Square Terminal paired with this Station, shown once a provider takes your payments. See Set up a card machine.
COUNTERS, then TABLES — each table with its number of seats, and each one saying whether customers pay on the card machine or by card on the screen.

Tap a counter or a table and confirm with Yes, start. The Station stays on it until a member of staff enters the change table password. Use the reload button after adding tables in the portal, and Sign out (top right) to stop the Station taking orders until a manager signs it in again.

Clear the table after each order

A switch above the tables, on the Station's list of counters and tables, decides how a table's turn ends on this Station. It fits two ways of working:

	Off — a Station left on the table	On — a Station staff carry
Who holds it	The party at that table, for their whole visit.	One table at a time: staff hand it over, and take it back after one order.
After an order	The menu comes back, so the table can order again — another round, dessert.	The Station locks, saying "Order sent for Table 5" and "Please hand this device back to a member of staff." Nothing more can be ordered on it.
Order History and receipts	The table's orders and receipts of the last 24 hours stay on the Station until staff reset the table.	None to keep: each table has just its one order, and a paid order's receipt is shown once, with its QR code.
Moving on	When the party leaves, staff press Reset table for the next party, or Change table to move the Station.	Staff press Change table on the locked screen, enter the password and choose the next table.

Every Station starts with the switch off. To use a Station switched on:

On the Station's list of counters and tables, turn on Clear the table after each order and confirm with Turn on.
Tap the table you are taking the tablet to, and confirm with Yes, start. The box says the Station will take one order for that table, then lock until staff enter the change table password.
Hand the tablet to the table. The customers order, and pay on it if the order has to be paid first.
Once the order has gone through, they close the "Sent to the kitchen" box — or, for a paid order, the receipt, whose button now says Done — and the Station locks.
Take it back, press Change table, enter the change table password, and choose the next table.

The lock holds even if the app is closed or the tablet restarts: it comes back locked, so the next table's order can never land on the last table's bill. An order that was cancelled before it was paid doesn't lock the Station; the customers can simply order again. The switch is kept on that tablet only, even through signing out, asks before it changes either way, and makes no difference at a counter, which starts afresh after every order anyway.

How customers order

They browse your menu by category. A sold-out dish is greyed out and can't be added.
They tap a dish, choose how many, and can type a note for the kitchen — "no onions", up to 200 characters. Once the note is typed, Add another with a different note puts more of the same dish on a line of its own, with its own note: one curry with no onions, one extra spicy.
Check Out opens Your order: every line, a note for the whole order (optional, up to 300 characters), and — if you turned tips on — Add a tip? with your percentages, No tip, and Custom for a percentage or an amount, when customers may enter their own. Price add-ons are included in the total.
They press Confirm. At a counter, the Station first asks "What name is the order for?" — a first name and a last-name initial.

An order that needs no payment goes straight to the kitchen, and the Station says "Sent to the kitchen". One order can hold up to 300 dishes.

Paying on the Station

With a card machine paired, the Station shows Pay on the card machine and the amount appears on the machine. The customer taps or inserts their card, and the order goes to the kitchen as soon as the payment is approved.
Without one, the customer presses Pay by card and types their card into the card form on the screen.
How long they have is your Time to pay (5 minutes unless you change it; a Square Terminal waits at most 5). The Station says so while it waits. An order not paid by then is cancelled, and nothing is charged.
Check payment asks again whether the payment has gone through, and Cancel order stops it — the Station asks first, and says "Nothing was charged, and your order was not sent to the kitchen."

After the order

Receipts

When a customer pays on the Station, it says "Thank you — you have paid" and shows the receipt with a QR code: "Scan with your phone to save your receipt". The link works for 24 hours and saves the receipt as a PDF. With a receipt printer paired, the receipt also prints, once.

At a counter, the receipt stays up for a minute, then "Starting a new order in" counts down 20 seconds — Continue keeps the receipt up for longer. Start Order starts the next order straight away.
At a table, Menu goes back to ordering, and the Receipt button at the top lists the table's paid orders of the last 24 hours, each with its QR code, until staff reset the table.
At a table on a Station that clears the table after each order, the receipt is shown once: its button says Done, and the Station then locks for staff. There is no Receipt button.

Order History at a table

The Order History button counts the table's orders. It lists every order placed on this Station at this table in the last 24 hours, newest first, with its number, the time it was placed, how many dishes it holds, and whether it is Preparing or Served. An order is Served once its dishes are marked served, or once it is completed or times out. Tap an order to see its dishes with their notes, and the note for the whole order. Nobody at the table can take an order off the list. A counter has no Order History, and neither does a Station that clears the table after each order: each customer there has just the one order.

Staff-only controls

These all ask for the change table password, so a customer holding the tablet can't use them:

Change table — goes back to the list of counters and tables, where staff can choose another place or sign the Station out. Leaving a table also clears its Order History and receipts from the Station. On a Station that clears the table after each order, it is the one button on the locked screen.
Reset table — beside Order History, on a Station that keeps the table. Clears the table's Order History and receipts for the next party; the Station stays on the same table. It says "Table reset. Ready for the next party."
Card machine — pairing, replacing or removing the Station's card machine. See Using, moving and removing a card machine.

A wrong password changes nothing, and the Station simply asks again. After five wrong tries in a row, your restaurant's Stations wait a minute before they accept another.

When a Station won't take orders

"This restaurant is not taking orders right now." — your service isn't running. Start a trial or subscribe on the Services page; see Start your service.
"This restaurant has no tables yet." — add tables (and counters) on the Tables page, then pull the Station's list down to reload it.
"Nothing on the menu here yet." — add dishes on the Menu page and remember to press Save.
"Wrong password." — check the change table password in Settings. If none is set, the password is your account password.
"Invalid credentials." when signing in — the email must be your manager email, with the change table password (or your account password if none is set).