NOTE: After you create or modify a discount, you MUST restart Cloud Retailer for the new discount to take affect.

Overview

   This article will give an explanation of the different discounting engines in Cloud Retailer.  

Procedure

TABLE OF CONTENTS

• Discount Types
  • Define products filter
  • Discount Definition Data
  • Discount Engine Types
    • Percent Off
    • Fixed Price
    • Buy Some - Get Some Cheaper
    • Price Level
    • Cost Plus Percent
    • Fixed Total Discount
    • Dollar Off Each
    • Dollar Off - One Time
    • Product Setting
    • Composite Discount

Discount Types

Product Discounts and Custom Discounts work in a similar way, except Product Discounts are applied automatically when matching products are added to a transaction at the POS. Custom Discounts must be explicitly applied via a Task Pad button, or some other manual or automatic mechanism.

The "Create New Discount" screen is the same for both types of discounts, except Product Discounts do not have the Description field.

Define products filter

Add 1 or more filters to select which products are affected by the discount. For example, "Department equals Wine" AND "Category contains White".

Discount Definition Data

• Start Date / Expiration Date: These fields define the date range within which the discount is active.
• Available on weekdays: The discount is only active on the days of the week selected.
• Start Time / End Time: These fields define the time of day during which the discount is active every day. For example, "Happy Hour".
• Discount Engine Type: This field is only active when the discount is first created. It cannot be changed after the discount is saved for the first time. The Discount Engine Types are explained below.

Discount Engine Types

Generic Discount Engine Settings

The following settings apply to all or most discount engines:

• Required Quantity:
• Allow double-dipping:
• Allow discount in related items:
• 
  

Percent Off

• Percent off: The percentage discount taken from the Discount Price source.
• Required Quantity: The minimum number of units that must be purchased for the discount to be active.
• Quantity Basis:
  • Units: The discount is applied when the number of product units reaches the Required Quantity (e.g.; 12 bottles of wine for a case discount).
  • Size: The Required Quantity is the total of the container sizes of the matching products (e.g.; 9000 ml of wine for a case discount). The container size is defined in the Size definition that has been applied to the product.
• Require Identical Items:
  • No: Will only apply a discount if all matching products in all matching line items have a combined quantity higher than the required quantity.
  • Same Product: Will only apply a discount if all matching line items with the same product have a combined quantity higher than the required quantity
  • Same Line Item:  Will only apply a discount to the single line item if the required quantity is higher than the required quantity.
• Apply To Odd Items Too: If this option is checked then any additional items past the Required Quantity receive the discount (e.g.; with a buy 3 and get 10% off sale, the 4th item also gets 10% off). If this option is not checked, then any additional items past the Required Quantity do not receive the discount until a multiple of the Required Quantity is reached again. (e.g.; with a buy 3 and get 10% off sale, the 4th and 5th items do not qualify for the 10% off until there is a 6th item).
• Allow discount in related items? This only works with $ off single and % off single
  • Depending on related item: 
    • If the "Apply Parent Item Discount" is enabled on both Parent and Tagalong items, The discount will apply on both items. 
    • If it's enabled only in Tagalong item, The discount will still apply on both items.  
    • If it's only enabled in Parent item, The Discount will only apply to Parent item and not to Tagalong item.
    • You can navigate to Product Basic Data page and scroll down and look for Product Settings, then you can check the "Apply Parent Discount" to enable.
  • Always: Allow Discount to Parent item and Tagalong item.
  • Never: Discount will not apply to Tagalong item.
• Allow double-dipping?
  • Never (not even with strong double-dipped): Never allow this discount if another discount has been applied to this item.
  • No: Never allow this discount if another discount has been applied to this item, unless the other discount is set to Strong double-dipping.
  • Regular (only with other double-dipped discounts): Allow this discount if there are other discounts of type Regular or Strong already applied to this line item.
  • Strong (also with non double-dipped discounts): Always allow this discount when there are other discounts applied to this line item.
• Apply also to 'POS non-discountable' products?: If this option is checked, then the discount can be applied even if the product has the option Do not allow discounts at POS enabled in its product definition screen.
• Apply only once? Apply the discount to just one time in the transaction.
• Discount Price source: Select which price level is used as the basis for calculating this discount (e.g.; setting this to Regular Price will always use the product's regular price to calculate the discount, even if the product is currently on sale). 
  1. Current Price Regular price + any applicable discounts already applied (Mainly utilized when you want to "Double Dip" a discount)
  2. Base Price is a Price set at the POS when you alter an item after ringing it up.
  3. OriginalPrice would be the price something originally scanned in at even if you change the price manually
  4. Regular Price Retail Price with no discounting applied
  5. Sale Price Sale price is used if the product is sold between the sale start and end dates
  6. Sale Price (off time limit) Sale price is used regardless of date sold
  7. Price A Price A is used
  8. Price B Price B is used
  9. Price C Price C is used
  10. Lower Bounds Price Lower bounds price is used
  11. Upper Bounds Price Upper bounds price is used
  12. Cost Cost is based on the average cost calculated by the system
• Ignore Lower Bounds: If this option is enabled, the discounted price can be lower than the Low bounds price defined in the product's definition screen.
• Priority (highest first): This number defines the order in which discounts are applied if multiple discounts can apply to the same product. The highest numbers are applied first.
• PLEASE NOTE SOME OF THE SETTINGS ABOVE APPLY TO ALL DISCOUNT ENGINE TYPES.

Fixed Price

This discount sets the unit price of the line items to a set amount when the Required Quantity is reached.

• Fixed Price (Unit): This is the price for a single unit of the product after the Required Quantity is reached.
  It is possible to enter a decimal value to the n^th decimal place. In doing so, you will need to adjust the "Discount rounding scale".
• Discount rounding scale: This is set to 2 decimal places by default.
  If you choose to use a more precise fixed price, this value would need to match how my decimal places are used.
  Example: I have a fixed price of 0.595238. I am using a precision of six decimal places. My discount rounding scale would equal six.

Buy Some - Get Some Cheaper

This discount applies to a number of line items after the Buy Amount is reached.

• Buy Amount: This is the number of items that must be bought before the discount goes into effect. These items will not receive a discount.
• Get Amount: This is the number of items that will receive the discount.
• Percent off: This is the percentage discount applied to the Get Amount items. If this value is zero, then the Unit Price value will be used instead.
• Unit price (if percent off = 0): This is the discount unit price that will be applied to the Get Amount items if the Percent off value is zero.
• Require Identical Items:  This will determine whether the discount requires identical items to be eligible for the Get Amount.  
  • NOTE: If you are using the Buy Some - Get Some Cheaper engine as a Custom discount to be applied via a task pad button, the range MUST be set to All otherwise the Require Identical Items parameter may not be applied correctly.
  • Please see our article on Creating Discount Buttons for additional information
    

Price Level

This discount sets the price level of line items after the Required Quantity is reached.

• Price Level: This is the price level the line items will use after the Required Quantity is reached.

Cost Plus Percent

This discount sets the price of line items to a percentage over the product's cost after the Required Quantity is reached.

• Price Level: This is the percent (profit margin) that will be added to the product cost to calculate the discount price after the Required Quantity is reached.

Fixed Total Discount

This discount sets the extended price of each applicable line item to the value of Fixed Total, no matter what the quantity of that line item is.

• Fixed Total: This value sets the extended price of the line item.
  It is possible to enter a decimal value to the n^th decimal place. In doing so, you will need to adjust the "Discount rounding scale".
• Discount rounding scale: This is set to 2 decimal places by default.
  If you choose to use a more precise fixed price, this value would need to match how my decimal places are used.
  Example: I have a fixed price of 0.595238. I am using the precision of six decimal places. My discount rounding scale would equal to six.

Dollar Off Each

This discount will apply a fixed dollar amount discount to the unit price of each line item if the Required Quantity is reached.

• Dollars off each: This is the amount that will be discounted from the unit price of each applicable line item after the Required Quantity is reached.

Dollar Off - One Time

This discount subtracts a fixed amount from the extended price of a line item.

• Dollar off: This value sets the discount to the extended price of the line item.

Product Setting

This discount is similar to the Price Level discount, but it uses the value set in a Product Entity Setting for the unit price.

• Entity Setting Name for Price: The name of the Product Entity Setting that holds the unit price value.
• Default price: The unit price to use if the Entity Setting Name for Price is not found.

Composite Discount

This discount will combine multiple discounts so they will act as one. This is useful when a single discount is used but multiple are wanted. For example:

Using a single button to activate multiple discounts. A Military Discount could have three different discounts. Veterans get 10% off beer, 5% off Liquor, and $1 tobacco products. Using a composite discount, all three discounts can be activated at the press of a button.

Or

Giving loyalty members discounts for being a part of the program. Such as buy 11 bottles of wine get the 12th free and 5% off 24 packs of beer. With a composite discount, a single discount is added to the loyalty program. When a customer is added to the program they automatically receive both discounts.

• Discount definitions: This is a comma-separated list of the discounts included in the composite discount. All discounts must be of the same type, product, or custom discount. If you are creating a composite custom discount, the discounts you are adding to the composite discount must also be a custom discount. Likewise if you are making a composite product discount, all discounts in this list must be a product discount.

Here is a video showing how to create discounts in Cloud Retailer:

References

• The selected discount cannot be applied because of time filters