Price Markdowns and Discounts: Priority and Conflicts

Customer Discounts | Giving Discounts on Sales | Price Manager

There are several ways for you to offer different prices and discounts on sales. Click a link for a brief description of each option.

Pricing Options (these are not discounts)

Regular Price

This is the everyday retail price you charge, with no price reductions or discounts.

Markdown Price Levels

Markdown price levels allow you to offer different prices for different needs or for different customer groups. For example, you may offer different prices to employees or when selling items at wholesale prices. The price at each price level is a markdown (or markup) from your regular price. The price level being used on a sale is called the active price level. You can manually change the price level on a sale. You can also assign a price level to a customer so that it is automatically active on sales to that customer. Charging a different price via a price level is not considered giving a discount and is not reported as a discount on receipts or reports. Likewise, using a markdown price level on a sale does not affect your ability to give any other discount on the sale.

Discount Options

Manual Item Discounts

A manual item discount applies to a specific line item being sold and is always given against the active price level for the item. Defining your manual item discount names in Price Manager makes them available to select on the receipt when you give an item discount.

Global Discounts

A global discount is manually applied to the receipt or customer order subtotal, rather than to line items. A global discount is not "spread" across the items on the document (except for purposes of calculating sales tax amounts for each item). Learn more about global discounts

Customer Discounts

Basic A specified percentage off associated with a customer record. Suggested on all sales to the customer, but can be applied or not at your discretion. Customer discounts are applied to all items being sold and are always given against the active price level on the receipt.

Customer Rewards

Pro Customer rewards give discounts given to your loyal customers based on how much they purchase. You are alerted when a customer reward is available and can apply it to the current sale at your discretion. Depending on how you have set up your program, a customer reward can be applied as either an item (% off) or a global ($ off) discount. Additional information on redeeming customer rewards is given below.

Automatic Discounts

Pro Set up in Price Manager, these discounts are automatically applied to qualifying item sales. Typically these discounts apply only to selected items during a specified time period, and may require a quantity purchase (e.g., Buy 3 and Get 20% Off). Automatic discounts are always applied as item discounts against the active price level. Learn more about automatic discounts

Coupons

Pro Set up in Price Manager and issued to customers, coupons are automatically applied to qualifying items when scanned or entered on a receipt. Typically, a coupon applies only to selected items during a specified time period. Coupon discounts are always applied as item discounts against the active price level. Learn more about coupons

Discount Priority and Conflicts

Use care if you use more than one of the discount options or you could run into situations where the combination of customer and items on the sale qualify for more than one discount, resulting in a discount "conflict."

In some cases, such as customer-associated discounts and customer rewards, you are prompted to apply the discount (or not) and have some control over conflicts by the choice you make. When a conflict does occur, Point of Sale follows these rules to apply the discounts.

Basic Rules

- Only one discount can be applied to any single item on a sale (there is no "stacking" of item discounts) :

- If a manual item discount is given after another discount has already been given to the same item (customer discount, % off customer reward, automatic, coupon, or another manual discount), the new manual discount overrides the original discount.

- If a customer discount, % off customer reward, or coupon is applied after a manual or automatic discount, Point of Sale will compare the two and give the better discount (lower price) to the customer. Example

  A customer has a 15% discount defined on his customer record. He comes in and purchases an item that is also in an active automatic discount for 10% off. If you choose to apply the customer discount when prompted, the customer's normal 15% off discount will be applied to the sale because it gives the customer the better price. If the Price Manager discount had exceeded the customer's normal discount, it would have been applied instead. Note: If you choose not to apply the customer discount when prompted, then the Price Manager discount would be applied no matter the percentage.

- The active price level generally has no effect on item discounts; discounts are taken off of whatever the active price level is. Exceptions:

- If you change price levels after applying a manual item discount, you are asked if you want to apply the price level change to the previously discounted items. If you answer yes, the price level is applied and the manual discount removed.

- If you change price levels after a customer discount is applied, the discount is recalculated relative to the new price level.

- If you change price levels after an automatic discount is applied, the discount is still applied to the new price level ONLY if you specified the price level as eligible for the discount when setting it up in Price Manager.

- Conflicts between two automatic discounts are resolved as described further below.

- Global discounts and $ off customer rewards, neither of which are item discounts, can be given in addition to any item discounts you have given. Example

  You make a sale of two items, applying a manual discount of 10% to one of the items. You also then choose to apply a 10% global discount. The global discount is applied to the receipt subtotal, further discounting the entire sale.

Automatic Discount Rules (Pro)

- If an item is included in more than one active automatic discount, only one of the discounts will be applied:

- Scheduled discounts take priority over nonscheduled discounts. Example

  You have an item in one active discount at 20% off with no scheduled dates. The same item is in a second discount scheduled for this weekend at 15% off. When sold this weekend, the 15 % off scheduled discount takes priority and is applied, even though a larger discount is also defined for the item.

- Among two active scheduled discounts, the latest start date takes priority. Example

  You have the same item in two active scheduled discounts with overlapping dates: Discount 1: Gives 10% off and the scheduled start date was one week ago. Discount 2: Gives 15% off and the scheduled start date was yesterday. The second discount for 15% off will be applied to the sale because of the later start date.

Customer Reward Discount Rules (Pro)

- You are prompted to apply an available reward when you select Take Payment on a receipt. If you choose to apply the reward:

- If it is a percentage off reward, and other item discounts are already given, the "best discount" (item by item) is applied. If the reward discount does not "win" for any sale items, the reward is preserved for a future sale.

- If it is a dollar off reward (amount), it is added as a separate line item and functions in the same manner as a global discount, that is, is in addition to any item discounts given.

- The Discount Name is auto-filled with Reward.

Learn more about customer rewards