Paying the bread man from the till

Eleven o'clock on a Tuesday. The bread man has done his weekly drop at Corner Stop (a sample shop) and wants £64 in cash before he moves on to the next street. Fathima takes it from the till, as she always has. The trouble has always come at nine at night, when the cash up is £64 short and she has to remember, after a full day, what she paid and to whom.

This short tour shows the three screens that take that worry away, and how the payment then flows into the night's count without any adding up by hand.

What is a cash out, in till terms?

It is money leaving the drawer that is neither change nor a refund. Shops often call it a paid out. Recording it tells the till that the cash has gone on purpose, so it stops expecting it at night.

Typical paid outs in a corner shop, and where they go:

Step by step

1. Tap the day menu on the till. The bar at the top of the till still reads open since 06:30. Fathima taps the day menu at its right-hand end.
2. Choose Cash out. The screen is titled Cash out of the drawer. Under the title, a short explanation: whatever she takes out here is subtracted from the cash expected at close.
3. Type the amount handed over. £64.00 on the keypad. Exactly what left the drawer, to the penny.
4. Tap what it was for. Supplier, Wages, Tea and food, Transport, Other. She taps Supplier. A single tap is quicker than typing and keeps the summary tidy.
5. Add a short note. Bread man, weekly. If the milkman and the bread man are both paid on a Tuesday, the notes tell them apart.
6. Press Take out. Saved. The till goes back to selling and the next customer is served.
7. Do the same for small amounts. At lunchtime Fathima buys a sandwich and a coffee for herself and her helper from the drawer: £6.50, Tea and food. It feels too small to bother with, which is exactly why it causes unexplained shorts.
8. Let the summary do the sum. At close, both payouts appear as one line, paid out of the drawer, £70.50, already taken off what should be there.

A worked cash up with paid outs

Here is how Fathima's evening sum looks once the two payouts are recorded:

£100.00 float + £612.40 cash sales + £52.00 tab money collected − £70.50 paid out = £693.90 should be in the drawer.

She counts £693.40. The difference is 50p short, which is a coin given wrongly in the rush. Had the £64 not been recorded, the same drawer would have looked £64.50 short, and she would have spent the evening going through the day in her head.

Why categories are worth the extra tap

Over a month, the categories show where drawer cash actually goes. Tea and food creeping up, wages being paid partly in cash, a supplier who is always paid from the till instead of by bank: each one becomes visible. That matters for two reasons. First, cash spent from the drawer is cash not banked, which affects the money available for bigger bills; cash flow for small business explains how to plan for it. Second, the supplier costs feed into whether your shelf prices still make sense. If the bread bill rises and the loaf price does not, the margin quietly shrinks; how to price products shows how to check.

Cash out or a separate petty cash tin?

Some shops keep a petty cash tin in the back for small payments, topped up from the takings now and then. That can work, but it creates a second pot of cash to count and reconcile, and payments from the tin often go unrecorded altogether. For a single-counter shop, paying small amounts straight from the till and recording each one as a cash out is usually simpler: one drawer, one count, and every payment listed on the evening summary with its reason. If you do keep a tin, record the top-up from the till as a cash out, so the drawer still balances, and keep the tin's own receipts with it.

Tips

• Record it as you hand it over. Type the amount while the supplier counts the notes.
• Staple the docket. Keep the supplier's delivery note or receipt with the day's paperwork. The cash out explains the drawer; the docket proves the cost.
• Set a limit for staff. Decide what helpers may pay out without asking you, for example deliveries up to a certain amount, and tell them to always use Cash out.
• Pay big bills by bank. Keep the drawer for change and small daily payments, not rent or large wholesale invoices.

Common mistakes

• Paying out before the till is opened. The payment has nowhere to go. Open the till first, then record the cash out.
• Using cash out for a customer refund. Refunds belong with the sale they reverse. Cash out is for money to suppliers, staff and expenses.
• Rounding to the nearest pound. £63.80 recorded as £64 leaves the drawer 20p over at night.
• Leaving the note empty on unusual payments. "Other, £25" means nothing in three weeks. "Other, window cleaner" does.

What to do next

The opposite of cash out is got paid: money coming into the drawer when a regular settles their tab. The corner shop tab, without the notebook shows how a tab is written down in the first place. If you missed how the day started, papers in, shutters up shows the float being confirmed at half six.

For the full method of counting a till, overs and shorts included, read the end-of-day cash up guide.