New Store Opening Checklist: Set Up Your POS Right the First Time

Opening a second location — or your very first store — is the moment your POS setup either pays off or punishes you. Get the foundation right before the doors open and every day after is easier. Rush it, and you'll be fixing tax rates and reprinting labels while customers wait.

Build the catalog before you touch hardware

Start with your items, not your terminals. Import the full menu or product catalog with real prices, variants, modifiers, and SKUs, then walk it end to end: ring every category, apply a discount, split a check, refund one line. A catalog error found at your desk costs minutes; the same error on opening day costs a line of customers. Decide tax rules per item type now — dine-in vs takeout, taxable vs exempt — so the register never has to guess.

Stage hardware and network a week early

Unbox and test every terminal, reader, printer, scanner, and cash drawer in the actual store, on the actual wifi, at least a week before opening. Run a full day of test sales including offline mode: unplug the internet for fifteen minutes and confirm transactions queue and sync. Label chargers, stash a spare reader and receipt rolls, and post the wifi password and support numbers where any cashier can find them.

Set roles, permissions, and cash handling on day one

Create a role for every job — cashier, shift lead, manager — with the minimum access each needs. Cashiers ring sales and take payments; only leads void lines or open the drawer without a sale. Set drawer starting banks, define who counts in and who counts out, and rehearse the handover once before opening. Clean cash habits are nearly impossible to retrofit after bad ones form.

Test every way money moves

Run a real transaction through each payment path you'll accept on day one: chip, tap, swipe, gift card, split tender, and refund back to each. Settle a batch and confirm the deposit matches. If you take online or phone orders, place one yourself and watch it flow to the kitchen or packing station. Payments are the one thing that must work perfectly at 9am on day one — there is no "we'll fix it live" for money.

Rehearse with a soft opening

Invite friends, family, or just staff acting as customers for a half-day soft open at real pace. Time the line, watch where orders stall, and log every friction point — a confusing modifier screen, a printer nobody hears, a refund flow nobody remembers. Fix the top three before the grand opening and keep the rest of the list for week two. The stores that look effortless on opening day almost always had a messy rehearsal first.