This article walks through installing the Tips add-on, choosing your settings and letting your customers tip. For what Tips is and who can use it, start with Tips at a Glance.
Before you begin
- You are on the Premium plan, or on a Premium trial.
- If you use QuickBooks Online or QuickBooks Desktop, your sync is connected and healthy. Biller Genie creates a Gratuity item and a tip account in QuickBooks when you turn tipping on. See How to Connect QuickBooks Online or QuickBooks Desktop Sync Page Settings.
- You are not connected to Xero. Tips is not available with Xero.
- You have the right to install add-ons (see Managing Users in Biller Genie).
Step 1: Install the add-on
- In your Merchant Portal, click Add-ons Marketplace.
- Narrow the results to the Tools category, or find the Tips tile.
- Open the tile and click Continue. Tips now appears under Add-ons in your sidebar.
Installing changes nothing for your customers yet. Tipping stays off until you turn it on in the next step.
Step 2: Choose your settings
Open Add-ons > Tips. The page has two cards, Tip Settings and Suggested Amounts. Every setting is explained below. Click Save when you are done.
Tip Settings
| Setting | What it does | Default |
|---|---|---|
| Enable Tipping | Turns tipping on for your customers. Turning it on creates the Gratuity item and tip account in QuickBooks if they do not exist yet. | Off |
| Post Tips To | Choose Tip Income (recommended) when tips are your revenue. Choose Tips Payable (liability) when you hold tips owed to staff. Choosing Tips Payable records what you owe your staff. Paying those tips out and clearing the balance is done in your payroll or accounting software; Biller Genie never distributes tips. | Tip Income |
| Use an Existing Account | "Use Biller Genie Default" posts tips to the Biller Genie Tip Income or Tips Payable account for the choice above, creating it if it does not exist yet. Choosing one of your own accounts posts tips there instead, and the choice above follows that account's type. QuickBooks Online only, shown until the Gratuity item reaches QuickBooks. | Use Biller Genie Default |
| Tip Label | Read only. This is the name of your Gratuity item and is what your customers see when they pay. Rename it in your accounting software or remap it on the Item Mapping tab. With no accounting software, rename it on your Items page after your first tipped payment. | Gratuity |
| Apply Technology Fee to Tips | Shown only when you surcharge. When on, your Technology Fee rate also applies to the tip (the rate times the tip, nothing compounding). On some gateways the surcharge is applied to the full charged amount, including the gratuity, so this setting shows as on and cannot be changed. Dual Pricing merchants never see this setting. See Setting Up Technology Fees on Your Account. | On if you already surcharge |
| Tax Rate | The tax rate your accounting software applies to your Gratuity item. Used only to split a collected tip so the receipt still totals what the customer paid. We strongly recommend leaving your Gratuity item non-taxable, in which case leave this at 0. | 0 |
Suggested Amounts
| Setting | What it does | Default |
|---|---|---|
| Tip Type | Percentage (%) or Fixed Amount ($). Percentages are calculated on the amount being paid, before any Technology Fee. If you switch to Fixed Amount, the numbers in the preset slots stay as typed, so 10, 15 and 20 become $10, $15 and $20. | Percentage |
| Presets (three slots) | The buttons your customers see. Leave a slot blank to skip it. Presets must be greater than zero, support at most two decimal places, and percentage presets cannot exceed 100%. | 10, 15, 20 |
| Maximum Percent of Payment | Caps the tip at this percentage of the payment amount. 0 = no cap. Presets above the cap are hidden from the customer, and a typed amount above the cap is rejected. | 0 (no cap) |
| Allow Custom Amount | When off, customers can only choose one of your preset amounts. | On |
Keep the Gratuity item non-taxable
Step 3: Let your customers tip
Allow Tips is off for every existing customer until you turn it on. You can do it for everyone at once, by customer type, or one customer at a time. The customer setting wins over the customer type default.
- Open Control Panel > Customer Defaults (see Customer Defaults: Global and By Customer Type).
- Set Allow Tips to On for each customer type you want.
- To update the customers you already have, pick Allow Tips in the bulk update dropdown and choose Set value to all customers or Set value to ALL customers of ALL customer types.
- To make an exception, open a customer, set Allow Tips on or off, and save. New customers inherit their customer type default.
Allow Tips is greyed out?
Step 4: Check the Gratuity item in QuickBooks
When you turn Enable Tipping on with QuickBooks connected, Biller Genie creates a Service item named Gratuity and an account named BG Tip Income or BG Tips Payable, depending on your choice. On the Integration Mapping page you will see a Gratuity row on the Item Mapping tab and a matching row under Item-Linked Accounts.
If the Tips page shows "Your Gratuity item has not reached QuickBooks yet", wait for your next sync. Customers are not offered a tip until the item exists in QuickBooks.
- QuickBooks Online: you can change Post Tips To later. Biller Genie repoints the Gratuity item without rewriting past transactions.
- QuickBooks Desktop: the income or liability choice locks once the item is created. Decide before you turn tipping on.
- No accounting software: the Gratuity item appears on your Items page after your first tipped payment. Rename it there if you want a different label.
Renaming the label your customers see
Customers see the name of your Gratuity item, so to show "Service Award" instead of "Gratuity", rename the item in QuickBooks (or map the Gratuity row to an item of your own on the Item Mapping tab). Receipts already issued keep the label they were issued with.
Turning tipping off
Switch Enable Tipping off to stop offering tips while keeping every setting. Uninstalling the add-on does the same; your settings and each customer's Allow Tips flag are kept, so reinstalling picks up where you left off. Tips already collected stay in your books.
Related articles
- Tips at a Glance
- What Your Customer Sees: Adding a Tip at Checkout
- How Tips Sync to QuickBooks and How Refunds Work
- Customer Defaults: Global and By Customer Type
- Setting Up Technology Fees on Your Account
- How to Connect QuickBooks Online
- QuickBooks Desktop Sync Page Settings
- Managing Users in Biller Genie