Captain handheld

The captain handheld is the phone a server carries on a full-service floor. It seats a party, takes the order seat by seat and course by course, fires rounds to the kitchen, shows what the kitchen has plated, and drops the check — without walking back to the counter for each step. This page is for the manager setting handhelds up and for the servers using them.

How it fits with the register

The handheld is a second way into the same tables the POS register runs. A round fired from a handheld lands on the same open tab as a round fired at the register, so a server can start a table on the phone and a cashier can finish it at the counter, or the other way round. Two handhelds on one table see each other’s lines as they are typed.

What stays on the register:

The floor plan layout. The handheld reads the plan; it does not edit it. Table names, seats and sections come from Floor & Tables.
Printing. A phone has no printer. Kitchen tickets, checks and receipts for a handheld’s tables print on a register — see Kitchen tickets.
Refunds and the till. Till sessions, X and Z reports and refunds are register work only.

Before you start

The POS register is switched on for your account in Feature Settings. A handheld fires into the register’s open tab, so with POS off there is nothing for it to fire into and the handheld will not enrol.
The outlet uses tables. In the outlet’s Order Flow (POS/KDS) section, turn on Tables / floor plan on the register; for courses, covers and a server per table, choose the Fine dine (table service) service style. See POS register.
Staff have PINs. Servers sign in to a handheld with the same staff PIN they use on the register — Dashboard → Operations → Devices → POS Staff (/configuration/devices/staff).

Setting up a handheld

Create the device under Dashboard → Operations → Devices (/configuration/devices/list) with the type Captain Handheld and the outlet it works in.
Generate a login code. It is an 8-character, single-use code.
Open the handheld on the phone and enter the code. The handheld runs in the phone’s web browser; your onboarding contact gives you its address. A code generated for another kind of device — a register or a kitchen display — is refused by name and is not used up, so you can enter the right one straight after.
Sign in with a staff PIN. Pick your name if the screen asks, then enter your PIN.

Each handheld can carry Handheld defaults on its device record:

Default floor section — the section the floor view opens on.
Start with “my tables” only — open the floor showing only the tables assigned to the signed-in server.
Idle lock (seconds) — how long the handheld waits before locking itself.

Both floor settings are filters, not permissions: any server can widen the view and pick up a colleague’s table.

On the floor

The Floor screen lists the outlet’s tables by section with their state — free, reserved, seated, ordered, with the kitchen, paying — and how long each has been in it. My tables narrows the list to your own tables.

To seat a party, tap a free table, set the covers (how many are eating) and choose Seat & order. If the table holds a booking in the next few minutes the handheld says so before you seat someone else there. Parties with a booking are seated from the booking itself — see Reservations.

Table actions cover the rest of the table’s life: change the covers, add a table note, move the party to another table, merge another table in, hand the table to another server, and clear it.

Taking the order

Add items opens the menu with search and categories. Each line can carry a note for the kitchen, and belongs to:

a seat — the dish one guest is eating, shown as S1, S2 and so on;
several seats — a shared dish; or
the whole table — bread, a bottle of wine.

Seats are what make pay by seat possible later. With coursing switched on, each line also belongs to a course (starters, mains, dessert — the names are set on the outlet).

The handheld will not add a dish that is 86’d or not available for dine-in, and it says which. Reorder last round repeats the previous round in one tap, which is how a second round of drinks is usually taken.

When the connection drops

Lines added while the phone has no connection are kept on the phone and sent as soon as it reconnects. Anything that changes money or the kitchen — firing, voiding, moving, merging, clearing and taking payment — needs a connection and is refused offline rather than guessed at.

Firing rounds

Fire sends everything not yet sent to the kitchen. With coursing on, the Fire a course sheet shows one card per course: fire the next course, fire everything, or hold a course — for a few minutes, until a set time, or until released — so mains go when the table is ready for them.

A fired line is the kitchen’s from that moment. Removing it afterwards is a void, which needs a manager’s approval because the dish may already be made.

Kitchen tickets

A fired round reaches the kitchen display straight away. The handheld does not print, so the kitchen ticket for a handheld’s round is printed by a register at the outlet that has Table print jobs from a handheld switched on (on the register’s setup screen, under Auto-print incoming orders). The same setting prints the handheld’s checks and receipts. It is off by default; switch it on for at least one register per outlet — each job is claimed by one register, so it never prints twice.

Running food

Ready shows the dishes the kitchen has marked ready at the pass, by table. Tap Served once a dish reaches the table, and it leaves the list. The same check-off the kitchen does on the kitchen display is what puts a dish here, so the list is only as good as the kitchen’s habit of marking dishes ready.

Dropping the check

Print check prints a pro-forma check — the bill the guest reviews before paying, clearly marked as not a receipt — on the register that prints the handheld’s jobs.

Take payment then settles the table, at the table or at the register:

Split the check whole, evenly, by seat, by item or into custom amounts.
Pay by cash, by the guest’s wallet (identify them by phone number or their QR code first), or by card on the card reader assigned to the handheld — see Card terminals.
Send a receipt by email or SMS, or print it at the register.
Or choose Settle at register and let the cashier take payment.

Tips and automatic gratuity follow the outlet’s settings, exactly as at the register.

Manager approval

These actions ask for a manager’s PIN on the handheld, and the approval is checked on the server, so it cannot be skipped on the phone:

Action	Approval
Void a fired line	Always
Clear a table that has not paid	Always
Merge two tables	Always
Comp or discount a line, remove automatic gratuity	Always
Move a party, hand a table to another server	Only if your account requires it

Locking and unpairing

Lock returns the handheld to the PIN screen without closing the table you were on. It also locks itself after the idle time set on the device, with a short countdown first. Unpairing a handheld from its own Settings needs the device PIN; to take a lost phone out of service, Deactivate it under Devices & staff PINs.

Troubleshooting

Symptom	Try this
The login code is refused	It may be for another device type, or already used — generate a fresh Captain Handheld code
“Handhelds are switched off”	Turn on the POS register and the Captain Handheld switch in Feature Settings
The floor is empty	No tables yet — add them in Floor & Tables; the layout itself is drawn on the register
A round, check or receipt never printed	Switch on Table print jobs from a handheld on a register at the outlet
An action says it cannot be queued	It needs a connection — move closer to the Wi-Fi and try again
A dish never shows in Ready	The kitchen has not marked it ready on the kitchen display
“This table is being paid on another device”	Someone else has the payment open; finish or cancel it there

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