The purpose of Cash Drawer Locking is to provide a "soft lock" for cash drawers to remove, or at least greatly reduce, the need for using a physical key to control access to the drawers. When a clerk signs onto POS, the cash drawer (if one is available) is assigned to them, meaning that they are the only user who can access and use that drawer until they "release" it. When they go on break, they simply log out of POS, which eliminates the need to remove and secure their till, or have a manager physically lock the drawer. Another clerk can sign on and use that station as long as there is a second cash drawer that is available, but if there are no available drawers, the clerk cannot sign into that POS station. There is override security available to allow the use of a station for non-cash transactions, as well as security that allows a manager to use a clerk's locked drawer.
Cash Drawer Locking is easier and can be more secure than managing physical keys to lock cash drawers, because often you ultimately end up with duplicate keys that increase the risk of anyone with a key having access to the drawer, regardless of who is signed on.
Note: This feature assumes cash drawers are set up to be used by clerk (option 5419 is set to ‘by Clerk’), not by terminal or by store. In addition, Epicor recommends that you use the Cash Drawer Balancing feature (option 5419 is set to Y) in conjunction with Cash Drawer Locking.