Offline Mode

Purpose of Serve Offline:

In the event that the local computer cannot connect to the network, Serve Offline gives you a way to serve Breakfast, Lunch, Supper and Other using the basic serving functions. (Offline Mode includes only the POS Serve Screen, no other options, or reports.)

When the network problem is resolved and the internet is reconnected, the transactions that were entered in Offline Mode will be automatically re-synced to the Meals Plus database.

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How it Works:

Whenever the Serve Breakfast/Lunch/Supper/Other Point of Sale Serve Screen is opened, it saves a small database on the local machine that includes all the students assigned to the selected serving site. It also has the district’s full Meal Item list and the security settings for authorized Meals Plus Web users at this site.

When you log into Meals Plus Web, if the computer cannot connect to the network, it will automatically switch over to Offline mode, so you can still log in to the serving screen and serve meals.

Only one site will be available and the serving date cannot be changed (for security reasons).

The system date of the local machine will be used as the effective date of the transactions. If the system date is wrong, the transactions will have the wrong date. Be sure the SYSTEM date on the machine is correct before you proceed.

OFFLINE SERVING PROCEDURES ARE EXACTLY THE SAME AS ONLINE, NO NEED TO LEARN ANY NEW PROCEDURES!

  • You just select a student, select items, enter payment, and process as Cash or Account.
  • You can serve Breakfast/Lunch/Supper/Other, with touch screen or keyboard.
  • All the transactions will be saved locally until you reconnect to the network.

When the computer goes back online, the transactions will be automatically synchronized with the Meals Plus database the first time Meals Plus Web is opened.

  • The offline transactions will be merged with the existing transactions and student balances will be updated.

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In Offline mode, only the main serving features are available:

  • Security: Only users who had serving rights at this site the last time this computer was ‘synched’ from the serving screen can log in and serve.
  • Served Items Buttons: Only the items that were available for the last cashier that served Breakfast/Lunch/Supper/Other on this machine will be available for serving. No custom colors or item display sequences are used.
  • Balance: The Student’s Pending Balance will show as whatever it was before the system went offline (no matter how many transactions are entered while offline). Students can purchase meals based on their free/reduced status and can pay cash or use their accounts, but the balance will not be refreshed until the system goes back online.
  • Unavailable Features: Since there is not an active connection to the database, some features are not available, such as: Visiting students, limits on charges or a la Carte purchases, and student pictures.
  • Hardware: Keypads will still work
  • Disable Features: The History button is disabled.

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Syncing Transactions:

When you log back in with an active network connection, it will process any offline transactions automatically and merge them with the online database. You may notice a message while this is happening.

  • In most cases this will run without any user action at all.

The transactions that were entered while offline can be viewed using any of the Transaction History reports.

  • The effective date will be the date the transactions were entered, and the cashier will be the user who served offline.
  • The status will be what the student had the last time this computer was used to serve online.

Any money that was collected offline will be on that day’s Meal Summary for the cashier who served offline.

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Alternate Item for Extra Meals:

Since the history is not available when serving offline, the system cannot perform the usual edits to prevent a student from getting more than one reimbursable meal.

  • It will do a check for multiple reimbursable meals at the time the transactions are synced.
  • If duplicates are found, it will automatically convert the extras to a second meal with nutrition code 2 (non-reimbursable).

You can set up an alternate item (in Served Item Setup) and link it to your nutrition code 1 meal. Enter the prices that would apply to non-reimbursable meals.

  • If there are duplicate meals and you do not have a nutrition code 2 meal, it will set one up automatically with zeros in all the prices.
  • On the system-generated Alternate Item, the description, short description, and pricing information can be modified in Served Item Setup.

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Offline Sync with Errors:

If there is a synchronization error that cannot be resolved, you will get the following error message:

  • Offline synchronization completed with errors. One or more OFFLINE TRANSACTIONS failed to process. Please contact technical support.

This can only happen in very unusual situations, such as a change to your data source configuration. You will need to contact Meals Plus Support. They will be able to access the Exception Log to resolve the problem.

 

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Meals Plus Web Help, 10/2019