Select Maintenance > Taxes > Surcharge to access this function.

A surcharge is an additional charge applied to a check when specific items are sold. It is different from regular charges because a surcharge can be based on the quantity of the item sold, and not necessarily on the price of the item. You use it in instances such as in Florida where each alcoholic drink you sell has its own surcharge assessed.

Restaurants in some jurisdictions require a method to recapture a surcharge on certain menu items. In many cases, a surcharge is an additional flat-rate tax levied on alcoholic beverages on a volume basis. For example, a state might have a surcharge of $13.50 per gallon on liquor. The Aloha POS system allows restaurant owners to recapture such taxes through the Surcharge feature. You have the option to explicitly charge the cost to the guest, or reduce it as a cost of business. If you opt to collect the money from the guest, the charge shows up as a line item on the guest check. If you opt out of collecting money from the guest, the charge shows up as an expense and thus deducted from the Net Sales calculation. When the Aloha POS system assesses a surcharge on an item, the amount accumulates as a collected surcharge or a not-collected surcharge.

You can also apply an exclusive tax to a surcharge. In this situation, the tax is applied to the surcharge only, not to the item to which the surcharge is applied. The exclusive tax applied to the surcharge appears on the tax line of the guest check.

Surcharges affect the following reports: Restaurant Sales, Server Sales, Flash, and Daily Summary.

Surcharge tab

Use the Surcharge tab to create and configure the basic options for surcharges.

Group Bar: Settings

Name — Specifies the descriptive name for the surcharge. Type a maximum of 12 characters.

Description — Describes the purpose for the surcharge. Type a maximum of 50 characters.

Method — Indicates the calculation method to use to determine the surcharge amount applied to an item.

Amount — Calculates the surcharge as a flat amount.

Percent — Calculates the surcharge as a percentage of the item price.

Amount — Indicates the flat rate, in dollars and cents, to apply to the price of items that require a surcharge. For example, in the case of a surcharge of $13.50 per gallon of liquor, you can base the amount on the apportioned amount of liquor served in a single drink. One ounce of liquor requires a surcharge of $0.1055 to recapture the surcharge amount. You can then assign this surcharge to all appropriate liquor menu items that require a surcharge. Required Options: You must select Amount as the ‘Method’ for calculating surcharges to enable this option.

Percentage — Indicates the percentage of the item amount to use when calculating the surcharge. Required Options: You must select Percentage as the ‘Method’ for calculating surcharges to enable this option.

Tax surcharge — Specifies the existing tax record to apply to the surcharge, when applicable.