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Smart Bill - Quickstart Guide

In this guide you will find all needed information to start working with the efsta Smart Bill. The Smart Bill can technically be used without much preparation, but it is highly recommended to follow this guide in order to get the most out of it. Each part of the guide can be done independently and at any time you see fit.

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It is advised to start with the Simple Bill before using the Smart Bill as it is the legally compliant, digital version of a printed receipt and will contain all needed data for a smooth start with the Smart Bill.

Prerequisites before Rollout​

  • The cash register must send all relevant data related to rendering the bill's content (i.e. header information, correct positions, etc.)
  • In addition, the cash register must also be able to transport the Smart Bill to the end customer. There are multiple ways to do so:
    • Displaying a QR code representing the bill-URL which the customer can scan (the easiest and most common way)
    • Using the internal efsta Wallet customer card by scanning-, and sending it correctly as part of the ESR
    • Using the company-specific customer card (similar to the efsta Wallet customer card)
    • Custom solutions of the company, like sending an email with the correct link or adding it to their own customer app
  • The company must have the feature "Smart Bill" enabled. This is required for using the bills in production, not for using the layout designer in the efsta Digital Receipt management. Test EFRs / registers are also excluded form this requirement. Get in contact with your efsta partner manager to get an offer and enable all needed features!
  • Before it can be handed out to end customers, the option to enable the Smart Bill has to be set in the Company Options. This can be done after all other options desired by the person / department in charge of the configuration have been done

The company options view contains new settings related to the Smart Bill. It is possible to disable the Smart Bill from appearing in the end user's experience. This allows the person / department responsible for the configuration of the Smart Bill to work on all imports, configurations and layouting beforehand and prevents unfinished work from showing up in the wallet / bill views of end customers. In addition, drop locations for automatic imports can be configured as well. These will be used in the import process (if set).

Importing Additional Data​

Importing data allows large numbers of additional content to be added and maintained for the Smart Bill. Currently, items and promotions are supported by imports and can be added to enhance the Smart Bill experience. There are multiple ways of executing or configuring these imports:

  • Digital Receipt Management: Using the corresponding view from the management allows a simple file upload (up to 20 MB file size) and will immediately execute the import process, resulting in an overview of the performend operations
  • Nightly imports via drop location: In the company options, it is possible to configure drop locations for both items and promotions. These have to be URLs that will be used to get the needed import files. The imports will be executed automatically once per day starting at 21:00 UTC. Multiple files are supported to allow splitting large number of items or promotions into smaller bits
  • efsta Digital Receipt API: The efsta Wallet and Bill rely on a backend API for all kind of operations. The imports are among them and can be used to automate these import operations on the customer side. This allows for a more effective way of transferring data from your own system to efsta and can be used to change related entities immediately after they have been modified or created in your own software / systems. This requires an API key specifically created for your company (contact your efsta partner manager for this)

In order to get started quickly, it is recommended to start working with the manual import for the first few test cases and then decide which import option is best as soon as you are familiar with your requirements and volume of data. Please check the "Imports" documentation for more details about import, file structure and meaning of the supported content. Example import files are available to download for items and promotions. items and promotions

Items​

Additional item data will be used to provide the Smart Bill with informational texts for the product, optional product links and an item image representing it in the overview of the Smart Bill. It also contains information about recommended items, as well as pricing and rating values. Most of the values are optional and the Smart Bill rendering process will only take advantage of the ones available.

Promotions​

Promotions represent additional marketing options which can be shown under certain conditions on the Smart Bill. Each promotion has a validity range (date values like from which to when it is available / active) and text, as well as image information to display the promotion. Either text or image must be set in order for the promotion to appear. Each promotion appears on every Bill during their validity, regardless of the date the Smart Bill was issued on.

Configuring Layout​

Working on imports beforehand (at least for a certain amount of items used on development transactions or test EFR instances) is recommended before starting with the layouting process as it allows a better experience in the preview. After all necessary and available content was prepared, it is recommended to start working with the layout editor. Similar to the view of the Simple Bill, it allows choosing a dedicated preview source of an existing Bill (highly recommended) or a predefined demo bill.

Each section in the Smart Bills layout can be changed in a similar way to the Simple Bill. After choosing a section to edit, the preview will highlight the corresponding area and making changes to the configuration will automatically be applied there as well. Changing the order is also possible by dragging and dropping the corresponding sections.

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A key difference between Smart Bill and Simple Bill is the way the content of the displayed Bill is composed. While the Simple Bill only relies on the raw data of the corresponding ESR and the CFG values which are valid at the time the transaction has been created, the Smart Bill has different sources like the raw data, as well as items and promotions. As the latter ones might change over time, the Smart Bill may get updated in how it is displayed (e.g. when product images change or promotions get added). However, the basic content of the underlying transaction will of course remain the same.