When offline mode kicks in
Two ways to go offline:
- Automatic — Wemu POS detects a network timeout or connection error on a sale and auto-flips to offline. You see a yellow banner; sales keep working.
- Manual — Settings → Work offline toggle. Forces every order into the local queue even if the wifi is up (useful for a known-flaky venue where you don't want half-committed orders).
What works offline
- Ringing sales (cash, card* — see below)
- Receipt printing over Bluetooth or LAN
- Adding / removing items, applying discounts and tips
- Cash drawer movements
- Table service and saved tabs
- Barcode scanning
- Viewing cached products, categories, and team list
What doesn't work offline
- Stripe card payments requiring live authorisation (Tap to Pay, inserted chip, manual card entry) — the card network needs internet for each transaction
- Fetching new catalog changes made on the web
- Online orders (obviously — no internet, no storefront orders arrive)
Workaround for card: accept cash for the moment, or use a secondary method like QR if the customer's phone has a different network.
The offline queue
Every order you ring while offline lands in a local queue stored on the device. The Settings → Offline mode tile shows the count ("3 queued orders").
Optimistic stock decrement still happens — your on-device product grid shows the right remaining stock so you don't over-sell the same item to the next customer.
Syncing when you're back online
When connection returns:
- Auto-sync — the queue drains in the background every time the app regains network
- Manual sync — Settings → Offline mode → tap Sync N queued orders
- Each queued order POSTs to the server in the order it was rung
- Successfully synced orders move to your normal History — the queue count drops to 0
If an order fails during sync (e.g. stock ran out from a different till), it stays in the queue with a red banner. Tap to see the error, fix it, and retry.
Cash drawer persistence
The cash drawer auto-persists every movement to local storage. App crash, tablet reboot, forced refresh — the drawer state is still there when you reopen. No lost floats, no lost movements.
Returning to online mode
If you used the manual Work Offline toggle, turn it off in Settings — the queue drains automatically. If you went offline automatically due to a timeout, the app flips back on its own as soon as the next request succeeds.