There are two ways you can operate Bookstore

With credit cards

If you enable credit cards as an online payment method, then you can...

• Sell items through both the Point of Sale and the online shopping cart
• Use all of these payment methods: cash, check, credit/debit card, and charge-to-student-account

Without credit cards

If you do not enable credit cards, then you can...

• Sell items through Bookstore only via the Point of Sale
• Use these two payment methods: cash and check

The Bookstore setup process

1. If you're going to accept credit cards, start by going through the online payments setup process.
2. You fill in the required Bookstore settings. (Even if you're not taking credit cards, you'll still need to go to Financial > Settings > Online Payments and fill in the Refund and Privacy Policy settings.)
3. Your Populi account administrator goes to Account > Customizations and checks Yes to enable Bookstore (only after Step 1 is completed).
4. You add items and test out a few sales processes to get started; afterwards, you start taking orders!

Step 1: Set up online payments

If you wish to accept credit cards and use Bookstore's shopping cart features, a Financial Admin user must complete the online payments setup process in Financial > Settings > Online Payments.

If you wish to only use Point of Sale and accept cash and checks, you need only fill out the Refund Policy and Privacy Policy fields in online payments; afterwards, you can move on to Step 2.

Step 2: Fill in Bookstore settings

Getting into Bookstore to set it up

You start setting up Bookstore by going to Bookstore Settings. There are two ways to get there:

• Enter https://yourschool.populiweb.com/router/bookstore/settings (replace "yourschool" with your school's unique Populi site abbreviation) directly into your browser.
• If you're a Populi Account Adminstrator:
  1. Click Account in the upper right corner of the screen.
  2. In the left column, click Account Settings and then Customizations.
  3. Scroll down to the Enable Bookstore setting; click the Bookstore link.
  4. Click Admin in the upper right of the screen.
  5. Click either Go to Bookstore settings (under the "Bookstore disabled" message) or Settings (in the left column under Setup).

Payment methods (Required)

Check the payment methods you wish to accept for bookstore purchases. Credit Cards will be automatically selected after you've set up one or more payment gateways in Financial > Settings. If you're not taking credit cards, then your shoppers will not be able to use your online shopping cart—but you'll be able to make sales through Bookstore > Point of Sale.

Apply tax to shipping

Several US states require the merchant to pay sales tax on the total order amount, including shipping. Look into your state regulations and check this box if you are required to do so.

Bookstore greeting

Your customers will see this message on the Home tab of your Bookstore. You can use text formatting in the greeting.

Default income account (Required)

Enter the income account number (from your Chart of Accounts) that you wish bookstore purchases to affect by default (this can be overridden for individual items).

Sales tax payable account

Enter the liability account number (from your Chart of Accounts) in which you wish sales tax charges to be recorded. If set, sales tax will be automatically split out from actual Bookstore purchase income. If blank or invalid, the entire amount of all purchases will be recorded as income in the default income account.

Inventory cost flow

Does your accountant use the first-in, first-out (FIFO) method, or last-in, first-out (LIFO) method for calculating the value of bookstore inventory?

Inventory asset account

Select the asset account in which you will track the value of your unsold inventory. The balance of this account will be calculated according to the method you choose in the Inventory cost flow setting.

Inventory purchases account

Select the asset account in which you will track the value of inventory purchases.

Inventory shrinkage account

Select the expense account in which you will track the value of inventory shrinkage. The balance of this account will be calculated according to the method you choose in the Inventory cost flow setting.

Cost of goods sold account

Select the expense account in which you will track the cost of goods sold. The balance of this account will be calculated according to the method you choose in the Inventory cost flow setting.

Send order notification emails to:

If you wish (for what it's worth, we strongly recommend this!), enter an email address (or multiple addresses, separated by commas) to receive order notifications. If you use a third-party fulfillment service, enter that email address here.

Shipping income account

Enter the income account number (from your Chart of Accounts) in which you wish bookstore shipping charges to be recorded. If set, shipping charges will be automatically split out from actual Bookstore purchase income. If blank or invalid, the entire amount of all purchases will be recorded as income in the default income account.

Shipping on account fee

Select a fee to which Bookstore can pin any shipping charges on an order that a student charges to his account. We heartily recommend setting up a unique fee for this purpose ("Bookstore Shipping", f'rinstance).

Start Point of Sale in scanning mode

This is helpful if you have a barcode scanner or credit card reader attached to your computer.

Student Charge to Account Limit

Enter the maximum amount (in dollars) that students may charge to their accounts (that is, to roll their Bookstore purchase amounts into their regular Populi invoices). Only fill out this option if you're using credit cards as a payment option!

Tax Rate

What is your state sales tax (or Canadian VAT) rate?

Tax on account fee

Select a fee to which Bookstore can pin any Sales Tax charges on a Bookstore order that a student charges to his account. We heartily recommend setting up a unique fee for this purpose ("Bookstore Tax", f'rinstance).

Tax State

List all states in which your institution has a physical presence. Enter the standard State abbreviations (TX, MN, IA, etc.), and if more than one, separate them with commas. Customers with billing addresses in the states listed will be required to pay sales tax on their purchases. Leave this field blank to make tax apply to all states.

Tax by ZIP code

Some states allow local governments (city, county) to impose additional sales taxes for online purchases shipped to those ZIP codes ( North Carolina, for example).

1. Enter the ZIP code and additional sales tax percentage.
2. Additional fields will appear. If you don't need to enter any more ZIP codes, leave the last one blank.
3. Click X to delete a ZIP code from the list.

Step 3. Get Bookstore ready for customers

Getting your Bookstore ready for your customers involves setting up items like shipping, discount codes, return reasons, and, of course, adding items to your inventory (so you have something to sell!).

• This article covers shipping, discount codes, and other such things.
• This article covers items and inventory.

Step 4. Enable Bookstore

Your school's Populi account admin must go to Account > Customizations to check this setting. Once checked, your Bookstore is active and ready to accept orders. Until you do this, your Bookstore will not accept any orders.

Now that it's all live...

After logging back in, Populi will do a few new things.

Getting to bookstore

Anyone can navigate to your your Bookstore via https://yourschool.populiweb.com/router/bookstore. You can make it easy on everyone by linking to it from your school's website. Users will also be able to navigate to the Bookstore within Populi:

• The top-level navigation (College Management & Financial) now also shows the Bookstore link:
  
• ISBN's establish links between courses and your Bookstore. If course instructor includes the ISBN in his reading list entry, and you've entered the same ISBN for a bookstore item, students can link directly to the Bookstore from the course and find those reading list items for purchase: