Set up layaway

Layaway lets a customer put a deposit down on an item and pay the rest over time while you hold it for them. Everything is set in Layaway Settings (left menu, under System, called Layaway). The colored boxes at the top show whether layaway is on for the website and at the counter, and how many terms are active.

1. Turn it on

• Layaway on the website shows a Put on Layaway button on product pages that qualify.
• Layaway at the counter shows a Layaway button on the POS screen. You can use the counter without turning on the website.
• Minimum deposit is the smallest part of the layaway total taken up front. At the counter you can take more.
• Minimum price: only items priced over this can go on layaway. 0 means no minimum.
• Items in your own stock can go on layaway covers anything with a quantity on hand in Local Inventory.
• Every dropship item can go on layaway is best left off. Pick distributors one by one under Dropship sources instead.

Click Save.

2. Choose your terms

A term is how long the customer has to pay, plus the markup it adds to the price (your fee for holding the item). Your store starts with six terms (30 to 180 days), all switched off. The layaway button stays hidden until at least one term is active.

1. Switch on Active for each term you want to offer. The right hand column shows what a $1,000 item would cost on that term and the deposit.
2. Change the length (1 to 730 days) or the markup (0 to 100%) right in the row.
3. To add one, fill in Add a term. Use Up and Down to change the order customers see, or Delete to remove one.
4. Click Save terms.

Changing or deleting a term never changes a layaway that has already started. Each layaway keeps the term and markup it began with.

3. Set the cancellation fee

Under Cancellation fee, pick what the store keeps when a layaway is cancelled or not paid off in time: Keep the deposit, Keep a percent of the layaway total, or Keep a flat dollar amount. Click Save fee. When you cancel a layaway on the Layaways screen, it shows what has been paid in, the fee the store keeps, and the refund due (paid in minus the fee). Cancelling never refunds anything by itself; any refund is your call, made with the refund button described in Manage layaways.

4. Check the customer agreement

The Customer agreement is what the customer agrees to at checkout, what your staff read out at the counter, and what prints on the customer's copy. Each line is one point, and the Preview beside it updates as you type. Your store name, phone number, deposit percent and cancellation fee fill in for you; the fill ins are listed under the box. The Product page line is the short sentence under the Put on Layaway button. Click Save agreement, or Put back the default text to start again.

5. Reminders and payments

This box decides what your customers hear from you and what happens when a layaway runs late. Click Save reminders and payments when you are done.

• Email customers about their layaway (on to start): an email when the layaway starts (with the agreement), after every payment, when it is paid in full, and when it is cancelled. They come from your store's own email in your store's template.
• Send payment reminders (on to start): one reminder 7 days before the pay off date, one on the pay off date, then a past due reminder every 7 days, up to 3 times. Change any of the numbers; 0 days before or 0 times means none. A customer never gets more than one reminder in a day.
• Grace period (14 days to start): this many days after the pay off date the layaway is flagged Grace over on the Layaways screen.
• Mark defaulted automatically after the grace period (off to start): leave it off to decide each one yourself. When it is on, a layaway still unpaid after the grace period is cancelled as defaulted: the item goes back on sale, you keep the cancellation fee, and nothing is refunded.
• Customers can pay online (on to start): customers can pay any amount up to their balance from My Account or the link in their layaway emails, with the card on file or a new card.
• Offer a refund button when a layaway is cancelled (on to start): shows the refund due and a button to send it back to the card. Nothing is refunded until someone presses it.
• Include shipping in website layaways (on to start): a new website layaway that ships includes your normal shipping charge. Layaways started at the counter never include shipping. Sales tax is always included in a new layaway: the billing state's rate on the website, your counter rate at the POS. Layaways started before this change keep their totals.

6. Dropship sources (optional)

Switch on a distributor only if you will order the item to your store once the deposit is paid. The distributor does not hold the item for you until then. Your own stock is not listed here; it follows the switch at the top.

Note: Customers pay the deposit when the layaway starts. After that they can pay online (if you allow it), or you take payments on the

Layaways

screen. See

Manage layaways

.