When a customer wants to buy an item you have on promotion but you are out of stock, you can create either a regular raincheck or an advanced raincheck. Regular rainchecks simply print out the item(s) the customer wants on the receipt printer. Advanced rainchecks are saved in the system. Once the advanced raincheck is saved, the items on it can not be changed or deleted, nor can additional items be added to it.
The following is a list of features of advanced rainchecks:
If you were previously using regular rainchecks (those that are not saved in the system), two new features will make the transition to using advanced rainchecks easy:
Advanced rainchecks say "RAINCK #" at the bottom of the receipt, whereas regular rainchecks say "JRNL #". This distinction will help you identify rainchecks you created after you began using advanced rainchecks. This is important because with advanced rainchecks, the clerk needs to use the raincheck redemption feature so that raincheck history is properly updated.
You can set the option "have Ctrl-P prompt for raincheck" to Yes, so that a clerk can redeem a raincheck by pressing Ctrl-P (or the Promo button). When you activate Advanced Rainchecks, you want clerks to redeem rainchecks by using the new "redeem raincheck" feature. However, clerks are usually in the habit of clicking the Promo button to redeem rainchecks because customers typically return for their raincheck item after the item has gone off promotion. With the "have Ctrl-P prompt for raincheck" option set to Yes, you eliminate the problem because the clerk can properly redeem a raincheck when he or she clicks Promo (or Ctrl-P).
The price at which you will sell the raincheck item to the customer is conveniently retained in the system.
You determine how long customers are given to redeem advanced rainchecks.
You can quickly and easily view advanced rainchecks in the POS viewer.
You can print a list of advanced rainchecks by running the Open Orders/Pick Tickets Report (ROO). The ROO report also purges past due and deleted rainchecks.
The system tracks the total current raincheck quantity for items in your Inventory. With this information, the Suggested Order Report (RSO) automatically orders raincheck items (unless you choose the option to not order them). The system also uses the value you enter in the "raincheck order percent" field in Options Configuration when it calculates the quantity of raincheck items to order. Or, if you want to indicate an order percent for individual items, you can enter a value in the "Percent to Order" field on an item-by-item basis in Inventory Maintenance.
So you're alerted when raincheck items are received, they are reported on the Receiving Report (RRP).
The system tracks "all-time raincheck quantity" and "all-time raincheck quantity sold", and uses these two quantities to calculate the percentage of rainchecks that are actually redeemed. This percentage is helpful in determining the quantity of raincheck items to order.
You can view raincheck information from Inventory Maintenance by displaying the item, then clicking the hot link (blue) Raincheck Qty field.
When you create an advanced raincheck, the system automatically creates a Short ID for it using the letters RCX (an abbreviation of "raincheck") and the phone number of the customer. For example, if the customer's phone number is 555-1212, then the Short ID would be RCX5551212.