Use courses to keep later food from reaching the kitchen until the correct service moment. Course assignment, kitchen start timing, and KDS auto-completion are separate controls.
Assign and hold a course at POS
- Add an item and choose Course / hold on the order line.
- Set a course number and name, such as
2andMains. - Choose Hold course when the work must not reach the kitchen yet, then save the course.
- Send the order. A held course remains labeled Held and has not reached KDS.
- Reopen the course control and choose Fire Mains when production should begin.
A sent held course must be fired before payment. If payment says Fire held courses before payment, return to the order and fire each named course rather than recreating the items or starting a second check. Once sent and fired, the course identity is locked as kitchen history.
Configure kitchen start timing
In POS settings, open Kitchen start timing. Enabled turns on the start queue for scheduled or staged work. Start lead time (minutes) determines how early preparation begins relative to the configured timing target. Station spacing (minutes) offsets stations so every routed segment does not start at exactly the same moment.
These settings do not fire a manually held course. The POS Fire action is still required for held work. After changing timing, test a staged order that reaches more than one station and compare the fired time on each KDS ticket.
Understand KDS course tickets
KDS keeps different courses as separate production work. A course fire can therefore appear as a later ticket for the same order. Match the order number, course name, and fired time before treating it as a duplicate.
The expanded Kitchen status panel shows whether course timing is on, its lead time, station spacing, and the current auto-complete policy. This is a status summary, not a control for firing a held course.
Use auto-complete cautiously
Auto-complete after fire is off when Minutes after fire is 0. A positive value lets eligible tickets complete automatically after the configured interval. Skip all-items-ready check allows that automatic action to bypass the normal line-ready gate.
Auto-complete can hide unfinished work if the interval or bypass option does not match the kitchen process. Start with it off, prove item-ready and bump behavior at each station, then enable it only with a measured service test. The Live ticket window hides older open tickets from the live board but does not cancel or delete them; review those orders with an earlier date range instead of firing them again.
Recover a course mistake
If a completed course was bumped too early, use the immediate Undo action or Completed > Recall. Use Remake only when the kitchen must produce new work. Record the order number, course, station, fired time, and setting values before escalation.