Close a tab that got left open
Why a table can show as occupied with nobody on it, how forgotten tabs clean themselves up, and how to close the rest from the portal.
Sometimes a tab gets started and forgotten — a table opened during a busy shift that nobody paid out, or an order that was abandoned halfway. The tab stays open, so the till keeps showing that table as occupied even though nobody is sitting there, and staff can't start a fresh tab on it.
Two things keep this tidy:
Empty tabs close themselves
A tab with nothing on it (no items, no payment) that sits untouched for more than 24 hours is closed automatically. Nothing is recorded as a sale — the tab is simply voided, and the table frees up on the till. You don't need to do anything.
Tabs with items wait for you on the Tables page
A forgotten tab that has items on it is never closed automatically — those items could be a real unfinished bill, so a person decides. When any tab has been open for more than 12 hours, an amber panel appears at the top of Table Management → Tables listing each one: the table (or bar tab/takeaway), how long it's been open, and what's on it.
Press Close tab on a row to void it. Closing records no sale — if the customer actually paid, that payment was already recorded when it happened; closing the leftover tab just clears it off the floor.
Note
If a payment is in progress on the tab right now — a terminal is mid-way through taking it, or a split bill has unpaid shares — the portal refuses to close it. Finish or cancel the payment on the till first.
If you don't see the amber panel, there's nothing stale — it only appears when at least one tab has been open too long.
On the till
Staff can also clear a forgotten tab on the till itself: open the table, and an empty tab offers Close tab directly — including when the till is offline. The closure is saved on the device and sent up when the connection returns, so staff are never blocked and never asked to try again. Every closure — automatic, portal, or till — is recorded in your account's audit trail with who (or what) closed it, and a till closure now also records whether a member of staff pressed the button or the till tidied up an empty walk-up tab by itself.