Do I need new hardware?+
No. Any TV with a browser works — Fire TV, Roku, LG, Samsung, Apple TV, Chromecast. If it loads a webpage, it loads Tapcast. Want plug-and-play? Order a pre-paired Tapcast HDMI stick from the Hardware Store: it ships already paired to your venue and boots into your channel. Already own a Raspberry Pi, mini-PC or Android stick? Our one-line installer sets it up.
How do card payments work, and whose Stripe is it?+
Yours. Connect your own Stripe account once under Settings → Payments (about 10 minutes). From then on TapIn, TapPour, tickets, tables, the shop, tab pay and TapPOS cards all check out inline — no redirect to another site — and the money lands in your account. Tapcast keeps a small platform fee on card sales; the subscription covers everything else.
Can I see it before I sign up?+
Yes. There are guided demos of every feature — what you do, what the TV shows, what patrons see on their phones. Enter your name, email and mobile once and they all unlock. No sales call required, though we're happy to do one.
What if my internet drops?+
Each screen caches its current channel locally. Brief outages are invisible. When the connection comes back, the screen syncs to the latest version.
Do my screens auto-update when I change a card?+
Yes — saves push to TVs in roughly one second. No deploys, no manual refresh, no waiting on a CDN.
How does the Bingo module work?+
Standard 75-ball bingo with a B-I-N-G-O column layout, FREE square in the middle. Pick a win pattern (any line, four corners, plus, X, or full-card blackout) when you create the game; you can change it between rounds. Patrons scan a QR to get a randomly-generated card on their phone — no paper, no shuffling. The host calls numbers from the admin console (manually one-click, or with an auto-call timer at whatever cadence you want). Patrons see the called number on the TV and on their card, which auto-daubs. When someone yells BINGO, they tap the BINGO! button on their phone and the SERVER verifies the pattern using the called numbers + their card — no client-side cheating possible. Verified winners earn the loyalty bonus you set in /admin/loyalty (default 100 points); everyone who joins earns the per-game bonus (default 5).
How does the Trivia module work?+
Pick categories (sports, movies, music, history, food/drink, 80s/90s, local, more), pick difficulty (easy/medium/hard/mixed), pick how many rounds and questions. Our proprietary engine builds the entire question set in seconds. Patrons scan a QR, name their team, answer on their phone. Live leaderboard renders on the TV. Auto-play advances questions with host-style reveals between each (first-correct bonus + who got it right); the host can pause or skip from the caller console any time.
How does Karaoke work?+
Open a karaoke session, share the QR. Patrons search for their song from a music catalog — we auto-attach a karaoke version with synced lyrics. When their turn comes, the TV plays the karaoke video FULL-SCREEN with the lyrics scrolling on cue. The DJ runs everything from one screen: Start the show, End + start next, Stop for a break, Send-up a singer out of order. No karaoke laptop, no extra hardware, no DJ rig — just your existing TVs.
What does Live Stream Control do?+
Phone-friendly remote that pushes any card — drumroll, last-call, drink special, birthday shout-out, trivia winner — to one TV or every TV at the venue in real time. The override auto-expires after the duration you set, then normal channel rotation resumes. Quick presets cover the common moments; custom messages take seconds.
How does the Fundraiser module work?+
Create a campaign with a goal, a beneficiary, and a description. Patrons scan the QR (or scan it on the TV thermometer card) and donate via secure online checkout — pick a suggested amount or enter a custom one. The TV thermometer ticks live as donations come in, and the donor wall shows the top givers. Optionally tie a percentage of every Queen of Hearts ticket to the campaign — the dashboard tracks the running total so you know exactly how much to transfer at the end of each game. Cash dropped in a physical bucket can be recorded manually so the thermometer reflects the true total.
How does the in-bar ordering work?+
You set up your inventory in /admin/inventory (categories, prices, photos, in-stock toggle). Print or display the order QR — patrons scan from their table, tap items, hit Send. Orders flow into the bartender console in real time. Bartender clicks 'Push to POS' (one tap) or 'Mark sent to POS' (manual entry). Patrons see live status: placed → making → ready → delivered. When marked delivered, the patron earns loyalty points based on the per-dollar rate you set in /admin/loyalty. Without a POS connection the workflow still works — bartender just enters it on the POS by hand.
Does Tapcast integrate with my POS?+
Yes. In /admin/orders/settings paste your POS credentials and Tapcast will push every order placed from a patron QR with one tap from the bartender console. Inventory items can carry a POS SKU so the line item maps to your existing catalog. There's also a one-click 'Sync from POS' button that pulls your existing menu into Tapcast so you don't re-type. Multiple major POS systems are supported via the same adapter pattern; ask us about yours.
Tell me about the merch shop+
Catalog of apparel, hats, drinkware, accessories, gift cards. Each product has a retail price and an optional points cost — patrons can pay with secure checkout OR redeem with loyalty points. Orders route to our turnkey printing and fulfillment pipeline automatically. The Merch Showcase TV card cycles your products with a scannable QR for in-the-moment buying.
Is Queen of Hearts legal?+
Queen of Hearts is regulated charitable gaming in most US states. Your venue is responsible for holding the appropriate license (Ohio Bingo License, Michigan Charitable Gaming License, etc.) — Tapcast is a tracking + display tool, not a license issuer. Confirm with your state regulator before activating a paid game.
How does the SMS marketing work?+
Each venue activates their own SMS account (we never touch billing). Patrons opt in at sale time with TCPA-compliant disclosure. Drawing-result texts go out automatically; recurring campaigns and triggered automations (birthday, lapsed, post-visit survey) fire on the schedule you set. Every send is logged for compliance.
What about email marketing?+
Same model: each venue verifies their own sending domain. Branded HTML emails go out from your address, not ours. The same audience segments that drive SMS campaigns drive email.
How does the loyalty program work?+
Patrons auto-earn points on every paid sale (default $1 = 1 point — fully tunable). Lifetime points drive Bronze → Silver → Gold tiers. You build a per-venue reward catalog (Free draft, Free app, $10 off, etc.). Bartender redeems from the CRM in two taps; ledger logs everything.
What's the referral program?+
Every patron auto-gets a friendly referral code. They share it with a friend, friend visits /refer/[code], gets walked through how to sign up. On the friend's first paid sale, both parties earn bonus points. Counter shown on your top-patrons leaderboard.
Can I import my existing customer list?+
Yes — paste or upload a CSV in the Patron CRM. Required column is `phone`. Optional columns: `name`, `email`, `birthday` (mm/dd), `marketing_opt_in`. Existing patrons with matching phones are updated; their points + tier are preserved.
Can patrons interact with the screens?+
Yes. Public QR pages exist for: ticket purchase (/qoh/[slug]), birthday spotlight submission (/birthday/[slug]), specials list (/specials/[slug]), community partners (/partners/[slug]), and referral signup (/refer/[code]). All phone-friendly, all branded to your venue.
What about ads?+
Free venues see a sponsor card every few rotations — that's how we keep the free plan free. Starter venues can add a small fee to suppress ads. Pro includes ads-off.
Do the modules work standalone?+
Yes. Run only Queen of Hearts if that's all you need. Or only the loyalty + SMS marketing for a non-gaming venue. Or only the digital signage. Each module is independently activatable from the admin sidebar — pay for what you use.
How does Euchre at the Table work?+
Real 4-player euchre on phones at a physical table. A patron starts a game from /patron/[venue]/euchre/atable — they get a 6-character join code + a shareable QR. Friends scan, type their name, claim N / E / S / W. The bidding + bowers + card-play + scoring all run on the server (clients can't play illegal cards). Right + left bowers, follow-suit rules, alone-go scoring (1 / 2 / 4 points), races to 10. If you're solo or short a player, the host can drop AI bots into empty seats — the bots play credible heuristic euchre (count trump, lead bowers, follow suit). Bartender oversight at /admin/atable-euchre lists every active game at the venue.
What's the Euchre League Manager?+
Season-long 2-person partnership euchre league. Operator creates a league (weeks, format, entry fee, target points, payouts), opens signup, adds teams, marks them paid in cash. Auto round-robin schedule (with multi-game-per-night support — e.g., 'play 2 teams × 3 games each' for 6 games/team/night). Both captains can enter scores from /me; the OTHER captain confirms or disputes. Standings sort by W → point diff → total points. Top-N teams seed into a single-elim tournament. Payouts can be fixed dollar amounts or percent-of-pot. Includes a progressive variant where partners rotate every round (solo signups, random shuffle into 4-per-table groups).
What's the Volleyball League Manager?+
Season-long volleyball league with the things real leagues need: multiple courts in parallel, time-slot waves (3 slots × 3 courts = 9 match slots/night), multi-set scoring (best-of-3 / best-of-5 / time-capped / 2-fixed), team rosters with 4-12 players + captain/co-captain roles, optional season-ending tournament for the top-N teams. The schedule generator round-robins teams across (week × slot × court) avoiding double-bookings. Captain dual-confirm score entry per set. Ref team auto-derives from 'next slot, same court' with operator override. TV preview rotates Standings → Tonight → Bracket every 12s and auto-refreshes every 30s.
How does Last Number Standing (bar keno) work?+
Any /me-authenticated patron starts their own game from /patron/[venue]/games/last-number-standing — they're the host, they get a join QR + 6-char code, they run the table. Joiners scan, type a first name, tap a number on the 80-grid, ante up in cash at the table. The host draws 20 numbers (auto with a ball-by-ball reveal animation, or manual entry of cage balls). A single hit takes the pot. Multi-hit or no-hit = the pot rolls over. Multiple concurrent games per venue. Bartender override available from /admin/last-number-standing — they can step in to draw / advance / close any game.
Tell me about Meat Raffle+
Multi-round meat-prize raffle, often charity-tied (KC, VFW, VFD Saturday nights). Operator sets up the rounds with prizes + ticket prices, sells tickets at the bar, draws winners (auto or manual cage-ball entry). Optional charity-split tracking. TV cards announce the prize each round + show ticket count remaining. Cash-only — no Stripe.
Tell me about TapX (TapIn / TapPour / TapTable / TapTix)+
TapX is a family of pre-paid SKUs that share one Tapcast pass + Stripe checkout. TapIn = pre-paid entry (cover charge, line skip, VIP) — QR scan at the door. TapPour = pre-paid drink packages ('5 drinks for $25') — QR redeem at the bar with 21+ age-gate enforcement. TapTable = reservations + bottle service with a visual floor-plan designer and per-table QR. TapTix = event ticketing — sell tickets to your own shows + scan at the door. All four cross-promote — book a band → TapTix ticket page auto-created; reservation tied to a TapTix event auto-shows on the table card.
Can I use Tapcast as my POS?+
Yes. TapPOS is the built-in point of sale. Rings drinks + food, takes cash + card (Stripe Terminal — WisePOS E for chip + tap), prints to kitchen + bar via Star CloudPRNT, pops the cash drawer with a relay, tracks shifts with end-of-day Z-reports, voids + comps with manager-PIN gating, full + partial refunds. Liquor pour-tracking computes 32-shot-per-bottle math + flags over-pour variance per bartender. Bartender app at /pos; admin at /admin/pos. If you'd rather keep your existing POS, TapPOS can run alongside as overflow / events-only.
How does staff scheduling work?+
Week-grid calendar at /admin/schedule. Tap any cell to add a shift — role + section + start/end + notes. Status lifecycle (scheduled → called-out / no-show / worked) so payroll knows what actually happened. Recurring templates auto-publish 4 weeks forward — set 'Bartender · Fri 5pm-2am' once and it materializes weekly. Shift swap requests: bartender taps a shift → 'request swap' to a specific colleague or open-to-anyone with a message; manager approves and ownership flips atomically. Bartenders see their own upcoming 2 weeks at /pos/my-schedule.
Can different users have different access levels?+
Yes. Five built-in roles (owner / manager / bartender / server / view-only) plus custom roles per venue. The capability matrix has ~30 toggleable permissions across daily ops, admin, TapX, and games. Bartender role gets POS + inventory + recipes by default. Manager gets everything except billing. View-only gets read-only dashboards. You can also override per-user on top of the role default — e.g., a senior bartender gets manager-PIN privileges for voids. Magic-link email invites tie a login to a role + venue at signup.
Do you have a recipe library for bartenders?+
Yes. /admin/recipes is a 190+ cocktail catalog with search by drink name / ingredient and filter pills by spirit (vodka / gin / rum / tequila / whiskey / liqueur / mocktail / no-alcohol) + category (Classics / Highballs / Sours / Tropical / Tiki / Frozen / Hot / Shots / Beer / Mocktails). Tap a recipe to one-import — generic ingredients wire to your inventory automatically (well-liquor preference; mixer name match) and pour quantities convert oz → shots / dash / splash to whatever tracking unit you use. Bartenders can pull this up on the POS when a guest orders something they don't know.
Can I run a roster sub-request flow?+
Yes — for both euchre + volleyball leagues. Operator (or captain) posts 'Need a sub for next Tuesday's match' from the league dashboard with optional reason. The request shows up in every patron's /me Anytime feed at the venue and on a public /subs page. Logged-in patrons tap Claim — their name + phone gets stamped onto the request, and the team captain sees who's filling in. Operator marks 'fulfilled' after the night for audit (league standings are independent — the sub is a temporary stand-in, not a roster swap).
