Set up kitchen stations
Create a station — name it, pick prep or expo, and get the link to open on the kitchen device.
A station is one kitchen position — a grill, a cold-prep bench, the bar, the pass. Each station either shows tickets on a screen or prints them. Set them up here, then route items to them in Menu routing.
Note
One station is zero-setup. While you have a single station, every item automatically routes to it — no menu routing needed. Adding a second station switches routing to manual: the create form warns you if items would go unrouted. If you run more than one site this is counted per location — one station at each of two sites is still zero-setup at both, and adding a second station at one site only switches that site to manual. An item you don't route goes to no station — like a pint the bar pours straight away — and the rest of the order still reaches the kitchen. See Route menu items to stations for the full behaviour.
You find them under KDS → Stations.
Note
KDS must be switched on for your account. If you don't see it, ask your account manager.
Create a station
- 1
Click New station
A form opens inline on the Stations page.
- 2
Name it
Use the kitchen area's name, e.g. "Wet bar" or "Grill".
- 3
Choose the kind
Prep station shows only the items routed to it. Pass / expo station sees the whole order. Most cooking stations are prep; your pass should be a pass. See Station kinds: prep vs expo.
- 4
Set the pacing alerts
Ready alert, late alert and recall window — all in minutes. Defaults are 10, 15 and 30. If you serve in courses, Times per course underneath lets each course have its own amber and red times (starters 15, mains 20, dessert 15); leave a course blank to use the station's times. See Pacing alerts: ready, late, and recall.
- 5
Add a screen label (optional)
A note for which physical screen this link is for, e.g. "Front kitchen tablet".
- 6
Click Create station
You're shown a QR code and a link. Open that link on the kitchen screen to bring the station live. You can find it again later from the station's page — see Get and manage kitchen screen links.
If you run more than one site, the form also asks which location the station belongs to — preselected to your default site. A station always belongs to exactly one site; the list gains a location filter, and a station's printer picker offers its own site's printers (plus any printer without a site). Menu routing gets the same location picker, and labels every station with the site it belongs to.
What's on a station's page
Open a station and you get four boxes:
- Details — its name, its kind (prep or pass), and its location if you run more than one site.
- Output — screen or printer, and the settings for whichever you pick. They open up inside this same box.
- Which orders come here — which kinds of order this station gets.
- How this station works — its KDS mode, its ticket layout, which other stations show on it, and whether it works in courses.
Note
Changes need Save. Everything on a station's page — its output, its mode, its layout, its alerts — is applied when you click Save in the top bar. Nothing on the page applies as you click it. The one exception is the screen links, which are created and revoked immediately.
Which orders come here
A station can take only some kinds of order. Tick the ones it should get:
- Counter — quick sales rung up and paid at the till, with no tab
- QR — guests ordering from their phone at the table
- Takeaway — click & collect orders
- Dine-in — tabs on a table
- Tab — named tabs with no table, like a bar tab
Everything is ticked to start with, so a new station gets every order. Untick a kind and this station stops getting it. For example, a bar printer set to QR only prints the drinks guests order from their phone, not the ones staff ring in. The dishes still go to any other station they're routed to. If a dish has nowhere else to go, it simply isn't sent to the kitchen; the order still goes through. Nothing ticked means the station gets no orders, and the page warns you before you save.
This is separate from Menu routing, which decides which station makes each item, and from courses.
Choose the output — screen or printer
Open a station and set its Output. A station drives one of two things:
-
KDS screen — its tickets show on a kitchen display. Picking this opens the screen settings underneath: the pacing alerts, and the screen links to open on your kitchen devices.
-
Printer — its tickets print at a registered printer when the order fires. Picking this opens the printer settings in the same place — which printer, which chit design, and how many chits. See Set up printer stations.
Each printer in that list shows how it's reached: an IP address for a network printer, or Cable · prints from its till for one plugged into a till by USB. Both work the same here — pick either.
Screen card layout
A screen station can use a named screen layout or the built-in default. Pick it in How this station works, directly under the KDS mode — the setting is called Screen card layout; build and name screen layouts in Screen editor (see Design a KDS screen layout). A printer station's chit is separate: each printer slot has a Printed ticket layout picker, and the chits themselves are designed in the Ticket editor. Layout changes apply on the next screen load — no restart.
Note
Station or layout first? Either. A screen station with no layout falls back to the default, so it works straight away. A printer station won't print until a layout is set — create it now, come back once the chit is designed.
Does this station do courses?
If you serve in courses, open a station and look in How this station works for the courses tickbox. It's on by default: the station works in courses like the rest of the kitchen, so its items wait until that course is called away.
Turn it off for a station that doesn't work that way — a bar, a coffee station, anything that should just get on with it. That station then receives the whole order at once, as soon as the round is sent, with no courses on it and nothing waiting.
Note
It only changes that one station. Every other station keeps its courses, and when each course is called away is still decided by the mode the till is running — see Set up courses. If a dish is sent to two stations, only the one you turned off gets it uncoursed; the other still holds it for its course.
You'll only see this if course firing is switched on for your account. If you don't see it, ask your account manager.
Looking for course profiles?
They used to be set up on this page. They now have their own Courses page, together with the menus each structure covers and a count of how many of your dishes actually have a course.
Archive a station
Archiving hides a station from the list and stops new tickets being routed to it. Its screen links stop loading the display. You can revoke individual links first if you'd rather keep the station around.