Docs / Glossary

Glossary

What the words mean when Spicy uses them. Terms in everyday use can have a specific meaning here.

Running the till

Shift

A trading period, opened with a float and closed with a count. Only one can be open at a time, and it belongs to whoever opened it. Spicy will not take an order without an open shift.

Opening float

The money you declared in the drawer when you opened the shift. It is the starting point for the day's cash count.

Expected amount

What a payment method should hold now: the opening float, plus payments taken, less change given, less refunds, less cash-outs.

Cash variance

The gap between expected and counted, across all payment methods. It is a shortage or a surplus.

Cash-out

Cash leaving the drawer during service — transport, ice, a small repair. You record it so it does not look like a shortage at close.

Draft

An order that you did not send to the kitchen yet. It is freely editable until you send it.

Sent

An order you sent to the kitchen. You can no longer edit it, because the kitchen is already cooking it.

Submitted

An order that a customer paid for. It is final, and you cannot change it. The only exit is a return.

Return

A negative order against a paid one. Spicy puts restockable drinks back, records the refund, and reverses the accounting.

Not restockable

A flag on a returned drink. Use it when the kitchen already poured the drink away or broke it. Spicy records it as a loss.

KOT / kitchen ticket

The slip that prints for the kitchen and lists what to cook. A BOT is the same thing for the bar.

Order number

The sequential number the kitchen sees. Invoice number is the one on the customer's receipt. They are different.

Change

The cash you hand back to the customer. This applies to cash payments only.

Round off

Spicy rounds totals to the nearest whole naira. The difference between the exact and rounded figures goes to a round-off account. This is why your ledger still ties to the till.

Things you sell

Item

Anything Spicy knows about — a dish, a drink, or an ingredient. All three are the same kind of record, and you tell them apart by three checkboxes: Sell this item, Track stock levels, Buy this item.

Department

Food or Drinks. It decides which station cooks an item, whether stock comes off, and which account takes the money.

Item group

A display category, like Starters, Mains, or Drinks. It is how you arrange your menu for the cashier. It has nothing to do with department.

Menu

The list of items your cashier sees, with their prices. One is active at a time.

Menu item

A price: one item at one price on one menu.

Variant

A size of a dish, treated as its own item with its own price. For example, quarter, half, and full.

Add-on

An extra that joins the order as its own line at its own price. For example, "extra cheese" on a pizza adds its own price on top.

Special dish

A flag putting an item under a quick filter on the POS for featured dishes.

Stock

Warehouse

A stock location. Spicy has three: Store for deliveries, Kitchen for ingredients, Bar for drinks.

Stock unit

The countable unit for an item — bottle, kilogram, plate. Spicy uses it for the count, the records, and the sale.

Conversion

A buying pack: 1 crate = 24 bottles. It applies when you receive stock. Selling one drink always deducts one bottle.

Purchase receipt

A record of goods arriving. It puts stock in your Store and records what you now owe. The supplier invoice records the bill.

Stock entry

Either a market buy you paid for on the spot, or a transfer between warehouses.

Reconciliation

A count of stock. Use opening stock for a new warehouse, adjustment for a correction, Consumption for the daily kitchen count, and Waste for what was lost.

Consumption

The end-of-day kitchen count of what the kitchen used. This count becomes your food cost.

Reserved

Stock held for an order that a cashier is still building. It stops two cashiers selling the same last bottle.

Weighted average cost

Spicy's way of valuing stock: everything in a bin shares one running cost, adjusted as stock comes in. You never need to think about this, but it explains a cost that surprises you.

Stock ledger

Every movement, with what happened, when, and why. It is the place to look when a figure does not add up.

Recipe

What goes into one portion of a dish. It gives you the plate cost, and it lets Spicy compare expected against actual usage.

Theoretical food cost

What your recipes say you should have used. It is a comparison figure only — it does not change your profit.

Money

Payment mode

How the customer pays — cash, card, transfer, mobile money. You must assign an account to each one before it works.

GL mapping

The link between a payment mode and the account its money lands in.

Chart of accounts

The list of buckets that hold your money. Spicy writes into these for you.

General ledger

The full record of money moving. Spicy writes every entry automatically.

Fiscal year

The date range that entries fall inside. You need to create the next fiscal year before January.

Journal entry

A record you write by hand — opening balances, accruals, corrections. You cannot edit it once you submit it.

Opening entry

The journal that loads your starting balances when you start using Spicy. You need one per year.

Payable

What you owe a supplier.

GRNI

Goods received but not billed. What you owe from the moment of delivery until the supplier invoices you.

Trial balance

A report of what every account holds, and proof that everything adds up.

Cost of goods sold

What the things you sold actually cost you, valued at the moment they left stock. This figure can differ from what you paid.

Reporting

Business day

Your trading day, which may not end at midnight. If you close at 3am, set the start hour to when you open, so a 1am sale counts for the previous evening.

Daily profit and loss

A statement for one day, in food, drinks and total columns. Spicy freezes it when you submit it.

Prime cost

The drink cost plus the employee cost. It is usually the number that predicts whether the month survives.

Net profit

What you actually made, after everything.

POS register

One row per closed shift: what was sold, and what each drawer should hold against what the cashier counted.