Tables & reservations

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The Tables tab

At the bottom of the register screen, between Menu and Orders, you will find the Tables tab. It shows the floor plan your backoffice published — the rooms and tables drawn there, exactly as drawn. See Tables & reservations in the backoffice to set the plan up. Pinch to zoom, drag to pan, double-tap an empty area to re-fit the room. If you have several rooms, switch between them with the room pills at the top-left.

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Reading the floor plan

Each table shows its status at a glance:

• Free — a plain table with its label.
• Occupied — a lifted table with a colored pill. The pill counts how long the order has been open and changes color as time passes (azure, then amber, then red) so a slow table stands out. How long until amber and then red is set per location in the backoffice (see Tables and reservations).
• Reserved — a free table with an amber ring and the guest’s name underneath, when an upcoming reservation holds it (see below).

The toggle at the bottom-left switches what the occupied tables display: Time open, Total so far, or Covers.

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Seating a walk-in

To seat a party across several tables, tap Join a table on the covers card: the plan switches to selection mode, tap the free tables you want, then Seat here.

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Moving or charging an open table

Tap an occupied table to open its card: it shows the order total, time and covers, with three actions.

• Move — switch to selection mode and pick the new table(s); the order moves there.
• Charge — jump straight to the pay sheet for that order.
• Open order — open the order on the Menu tab to keep adding items.

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Reservations

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The Reservations panel

When a provider is connected, a Reservations button appears at the top-right of the floor plan, with a count of the bookings still to seat. Tap it to slide out the reservations panel. The panel lists the service’s bookings grouped by time, with a Now line marking the current moment. Each row shows the time, the party name and covers, the status, and badges for anything worth knowing at a glance — VIP, a prepaid amount, a card imprint, or allergies. A booking that is past its time and not yet seated is flagged in red (for example 12 min late). By default the panel shows the open business day’s service. The ‹ › arrows next to the title step to the previous or next day. Tap a row to highlight its tables on the plan.

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Searching for a booking

Tap the search icon at the top of the panel to look a booking up by guest name or phone number. Search spans every loaded day, not just the day on screen, and groups the results by day (Today, Tomorrow, then the date) with each booking’s time. Tap Cancel to return to the day’s list.

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Reserved tables on the plan

A confirmed booking that holds tables shows them with an amber ring and the guest’s name under the table. If you try to seat a walk-in on a reserved table, the covers card warns you who it is held for — you can still seat them if you choose.

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Opening a reservation

Tap a row to open its sheet in the panel — and highlight its tables on the plan. The sheet gathers everything you weigh before acting: the status, any lateness, any prepayment, the details (table, covers, phone, occasion, allergies, internal note) and the actions. The status (confirmed, arrived, seated…) is kept up to date by the provider and by what you do on the floor. A booking with no name — a walk-in taken in your provider — shows as a Walk-in, exactly like a party you seat yourself from the floor plan.

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Marking a guest arrived

The guest walks in, but their table isn’t ready — or they’d rather have a drink at the bar first. Tap Mark arrived at the foot of the sheet: the provider is told, the panel row is badged Arrived, and no table is taken. Arriving and being seated are two different things. Marking an arrival opens no order — you seat the guest when their table is ready.

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Seating a reservation

When the booking already holds tables and they are free, seating is a single gesture. To seat them elsewhere, tap Choose another table below the button: the plan switches to selection mode, you tap the tables you want, then Seat here. That is also what the sheet offers when the booking holds no table, or when the ones it holds are taken. Once seated, the sheet’s bottom action becomes Open order, which jumps to the order it opened.

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Changing a booking’s table

Seating means sitting the guest down now and opening their check. Re-planning the room before service is something else: you decide where each booking will go, without opening anything. Open the sheet and tap Change table (or Assign a table if the booking has none yet). The plan switches to selection mode with the current tables already ticked, you tap the ones you want, then Assign here. No check is created. The change travels to your provider too. It is the same change as if you had made it in your booking tool: the two stay in agreement about the table. If another booking already expects that table at an overlapping time, the register says so and lets you decide — two services on one table happens every night. Once the guest is seated the button disappears: it is then the order that moves, from the Actions tab (see Order actions).

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When the register warns you

The sheet flags what is worth a look before seating:

• The table is taken — the banner names the order holding it and for how long. The button becomes Seat on another table.
• The booking isn’t from the current service — you can still seat it, but the button drops its recommended colour and says it will open an order today for a booking from another day.
• The booking is still far off — the due time and the wait are spelled out. Seating a very early guest stays possible.

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Fixing a seat

Seated the wrong party? Open that booking’s sheet and tap This is the wrong booking under Open order. The order goes back to being a plain walk-in — it keeps its tables, covers and contents — and the provider expects that guest again.

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Marking no-show or cancelled

Below the seating button, the sheet offers two gestures:

• No-show — the guest never came.
• Cancel booking — the booking is cancelled.

A cancelled or no-show booking leaves the day list but stays findable through search — struck through, with its status. That is the safety net for a mis-tap.

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Creating a reservation

NowOS keeps no reservation book of its own — your booking tool does. If your manager has set the link in the backoffice, a + button appears at the top of the panel and opens your tool’s booking form directly on this device, on the day shown in the panel — which matters when a service runs past midnight.

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The guest profile

From the sheet, tap the guest card at the top to open their read-only profile: contact, visit history, occasion, allergies, notes, tags and stats (visits, average spend, no-shows). Guest details are managed in the provider — this view only shows them. The same profile appears in the order’s Guest tab, see Taking an order.

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Linking a walk-in to a booking

If you seated a party as a walk-in and then realise they had a booking, open the table’s card and tap Link to a booking, then pick the reservation from the list. The order is attached to the booking from then on. The same Link to a booking button is in the order’s Guest tab.

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Prepayment at checkout

When a booking arrives with a prepaid amount (a deposit or full prepayment collected by the provider), its order shows a green prepaid banner on the pay sheet. Tap Apply to use the prepaid balance toward the bill. It is recorded as its own payment and the amount due drops — settle the rest with cash or card as usual. Prepaid money never comes from your drawer, so it is kept separate in your close-of-day totals.

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Setting covers

Covers are the number of guests at the table. Seating a table or a reservation sets them; you can change them later from the order’s Actions tab — see Order actions.