Receipt Printers Page

The POS Cafe Receipt printers page is where you add and manage the receipt printers at one location. It shows how each printer is doing, which prep areas are covered, and how many tickets are waiting to print, and it lets you pause, resume, re-sync or remove a printer.

Open the Receipt printers page

1. In your Shopify admin, go to Apps → POS Cafe → Locations.
2. Select your location.
3. In the Devices section, click Receipt Printers (Set up and manage receipt printers for this location).

Every change on this page is saved straight away. There’s no save bar and no Save changes button.

Captured September 2026.

Location summary

The card at the top of the page shows the location’s name, address and time zone, plus four figures:

Figure	What it shows
Printers	How many printers this location has, with how many are paused or need attention.
Tickets waiting	Tickets queued on the print server that haven’t printed yet, across all printers.
Prep areas covered	How many of your prep areas have an active printer or Fresh KDS screen here, for example 2 of 3.
KDS screens	How many Fresh KDS screens are set up at this location.

Use the refresh button to check printer status again, and click POS devices to open the location’s registered POS devices (see Registering POS Devices). If the location has Fresh KDS screens, they’re listed under the figures with a KDS settings link.

Some items won’t print at this location

If a prep area has nothing to print it, the card shows a Some items won’t print at this location warning that lists each prep area and the reason:

Reason shown	What it means	What to do
[printer] is paused	The only printer for this prep area is paused.	Resume the printer when you’re ready, or add the prep area to another printer or KDS screen.
only a Shopify POS printer, for its own orders	Only a Shopify POS Printer serves this prep area, so it prints only orders taken on its own POS device.	Add the prep area to an Epson or Star printer, or a Fresh KDS screen, if other orders need it.
used by your menu, but no printer or KDS here serves it	Items in your menu use this prep area, but no printer or KDS screen at this location has it.	Edit a printer and tick the prep area under Prep Areas, or add it to a Fresh KDS screen.
no active printer or KDS	No active printer or KDS screen at this location serves this prep area.	Add the prep area to an active printer or KDS screen.
Items without a prep area: no active printer here	POS Cafe items with no prep area normally print on every active Epson or Star printer, and there isn’t one.	Resume or add a printer, or give those items a prep area.

If POS Cafe can’t reach the print server, you’ll see “Couldn’t reach the print server, so live printer status isn’t shown. Printing isn’t affected.”

The Printers list

Each printer shows its name, its type, one status badge and up to four of its prep areas. The type appears under the name as Epson · print server, Star · print server or Shopify POS · prints on this POS. Click a printer to expand it, or use Expand all and Collapse all. The … button on each printer opens its actions: Edit, Pause or Resume, Clear waiting tickets, Re-sync with print server and Remove.

Printer status badges

Badge	What it means	What to do
Online	The printer is checking in with the print server and printing normally.	Nothing.
Ready	A Shopify POS printer. It prints on the POS device it’s paired with, and its status is shown in Shopify POS.	Nothing. See Shopify POS Printer.
Paused or Paused · 3 waiting	You’ve paused the printer. New tickets aren’t printed on it. The number is how many earlier tickets are waiting.	Resume it when you’re ready (see Pause and resume a printer).
Offline	The printer hasn’t checked in recently.	Check that it’s switched on and connected to the internet. Waiting tickets print when it reconnects.
Not connected yet	The printer has never connected to the print server.	Enter the Setup details in the printer’s own settings. See Epson Server Direct Print or Star CloudPRNT.
Not on print server	The print server doesn’t know about this printer, so it can’t print.	Click Re-sync.
Out of sync	The print server has a different paused or active setting from the one in POS Cafe.	Click Re-sync.
Inactive	The printer is inactive and doesn’t print.	Contact POS Cafe support if you weren’t expecting this.
Status unavailable	POS Cafe couldn’t reach the print server to check this printer.	Try again shortly with the refresh button. Printing isn’t affected.
Checking…	The page is still loading the printer’s status.	Wait a moment.

Printer details

When you expand a printer you’ll see its actions (Edit, Pause or Resume, Re-sync and Remove) and three sections:

Section	What it shows
Status	What’s going on with the printer and what to do, for example “Printing normally. Last checked in 2 min ago.” If tickets can be cleared, a Clear 3 waiting tickets button appears here.
What it prints	Which prep areas it prints and from which POS devices, for example Coffee and Food items from all POS devices, then the copies and ticket layout, for example 1 copy · one ticket per order.
Setup details	For Epson and Star printers: the Server URL, Username and Password to enter in the printer’s settings. Each has a copy button, and the password has a show button. Shopify POS printers have nothing to enter.

Add or edit a printer

Click Add printer at the top of the page to open the Add new printer window. To change a printer, click Edit in its details or in its … menu.

Field	What it does
Printer Name	A name you’ll recognise, such as Barista Printer. For a Shopify POS printer this field is called Printer name in Shopify POS.
Printer Type	Epson, Star or Shopify POS (Printing API). Choose the type that matches your printer: Epson and Star printers each get their own Server URL.
Copies	How many copies of each ticket to print, from 1 to 3.
Print Individual Receipts (optional)	Prints one item per ticket. Ideal if you use sticker labels that go on individual cups.
Prep Areas	The prep areas this printer prints. At least one is required.
Device Source	Epson and Star printers only. Print from all POS devices (recommended), or Print from specific POS devices only (advanced) to choose registered POS devices and POSCafe Online (Web) orders. See Registering POS Devices.

Click Add printer (or Save when editing). The window closes once the printer is saved, and you’ll see Printer added or Printer saved.

Changing the Printer Type

If you change an Epson printer to Star (or the other way round), its Server URL changes. Copy the new Server URL into the printer’s settings. Editing a paused printer keeps it paused.

Note

A location can have only one Shopify POS printer. If you try to add a second one, you’ll see “This change would leave the location’s printers invalid (for example, a second Shopify POS printer)”.

Pause and resume a printer

Pausing a printer stops it receiving new tickets, for example while it’s being repaired or a station is closed. Other printers and Fresh KDS screens keep working.

1. Click Pause in the printer’s details or its … menu.
2. Read the Pause printer? window, then click Pause printer.

While a printer is paused:

• Tickets for new orders aren’t printed on it. They are not saved for later: orders taken while it’s paused won’t print on this printer when you resume.
• Tickets that were already waiting are kept. They print when you resume, as long as that’s within 24 hours of each order.
• Send to prep skips the paused printer. See Send to Prep.

Caution

If no other printer or KDS screen at the location serves one of the printer’s prep areas, the Pause printer? window warns you: “No other printer or KDS here serves [prep area]. Tickets for those items won’t print anywhere while this printer is paused.”

To resume, click Resume, then Resume printer. If tickets are waiting, tick I understand these 3 tickets will print when this printer resumes. first. You can clear the waiting tickets instead (see below) if you don’t want them to print.

Clear waiting tickets

Epson and Star printers can have tickets waiting on the print server. To remove them, click Clear waiting tickets in the printer’s … menu (or the Clear 3 waiting tickets button in its Status section). The Waiting tickets window shows how many there are.

1. Click Clear waiting tickets.
2. Check the count, then click Clear 3 tickets, or Keep them to leave them.

Cleared tickets won’t print, and this can’t be undone. What gets cleared depends on the printer:

Printer	What is cleared
Paused	Every waiting ticket.
Active	Only tickets not yet sent to the printer. A ticket printing right now finishes.

If every waiting ticket has already been sent to an active printer, you’ll see “Every waiting ticket has already been sent to the printer, so there’s nothing to clear here. Pause the printer to clear its whole queue.”

Re-sync with print server

Re-sync with print server sends the printer’s current setting (active or paused) to the print server again. Use it when the printer shows Out of sync or Not on print server. It doesn’t change the setting or clear waiting tickets. Click Re-sync, then Re-sync in the window. You’ll see Printer re-synced.

If you save a printer and the print server isn’t updated, the page shows Saved, but the print server hasn’t been updated yet with a Retry button. Your change is saved; click Retry to send it to the print server.

Remove a printer

Click Remove, then Remove printer. The printer stops printing straight away, and tickets waiting for it won’t print. You can add it again later, but it will have new setup details, so you’ll need to enter them in the printer again.