Working offline
Most tills stop. SmartAI POS takes the money.
“Offline mode” usually means you can look at the menu. This page is the detail of what SmartAI POS actually does when the line goes down, and what happens to those orders afterwards.
The sequence
Three moments, in order
Every step below maps to behaviour in the product — the indicator, the queue, the sync.
The part most people miss is the third one. Taking a sale offline is the easy half. Applying it exactly once when a shop’s two tills reconnect at the same moment is where offline systems usually go wrong.
- No mode to switch on and no button to remember — the till notices
- Staff see an indicator, and nothing else changes
- Manager approval still works; permissions are cached on the device
Example · 11:42
The connection goes
Nothing on screen changes. There’s an indicator, and that’s it. Staff keep serving.
11:42 – 12:19
You keep selling
Modifiers, split bills, refunds, a manual card entry. All complete, all queued.
12:19
It comes back
The queue syncs. Each order applies exactly once, even if the sync retries or a second till reconnects at the same moment.
What still works
What can you still do with no connection?
- Ring up a saleFull product grid, modifiers, variants, open items
- Split a billBy item or evenly, across as many payments as you need
- DiscountOrder and item level, with manager approval if you require it
- Take cashChange calculated, drawer opens, takings recorded
- Take cardOn a paired terminal — or manual entry if it can’t be reached
- Refund and voidBoth recorded, both audited, both sync with the rest
- Issue a receiptPaper docket, or a digital receipt once you’re back
- Clock in and outStaff hours keep recording through the outage
The part most people miss
Your plan can’t switch itself off
In SmartAI POS, plan permissions are cached on the till and they fail open. A feature you pay for cannot disappear mid-service because head office was unreachable for ninety seconds.
That sounds like a small thing until it happens during a Saturday lunch rush, and the screen your kitchen depends on decides it can’t verify your subscription.
Idempotency keys
Every order carries one. A retry, a crash mid-write, or two tills racing cannot produce a double charge.
The queue survives restarts
Close the app, restart the tablet, drop the battery. The queued sales are still there.
Transient failures aren’t poison
A server error or a rate limit is retried. A genuinely bad record is surfaced rather than silently stalling everything behind it.
Questions
About working offline
What if the tablet restarts while orders are queued?
They’re still queued. The queue is stored on the device, not in memory, so closing the app or restarting the tablet doesn’t lose anything.
What if two tills were offline at the same time?
Both queues sync independently. Because each order carries its own idempotency key, two tills reconnecting at the same moment can’t duplicate an order or double-apply a payment.
Can I still take a card payment?
On a paired terminal, yes. If the terminal itself can’t be reached, you can record the payment manually so the sale still closes — selling never blocks on a device.
Do my reports include the offline sales?
Once they’ve synced, yes — they’re ordinary sales. Nothing about an offline order is second-class in the reporting.
How long can it stay offline?
<<CONFIRM the honest limit — queue size, time, or “no practical limit”. Do not guess this one.>>
Offline selling is on every plan — see what’s on Starter and Pro, or the full feature list.
Next step
Watch us pull the plug
We’ll drop the connection during the demo and keep selling. It’s the fastest way to see the difference.
Or email support@smartaipos.com.au