Troubleshooting missing or mismatched credit card tips: 6-Hour Lookback Rule
Why are POS credit card tips missing from my 7shifts reports?
POS credit card tips are missing or don't match your 7shifts reports for a specific employee shift. For example, your POS Payment Details report shows a higher credit card tip total than the 7shifts Worked Hours & Wages report.
Cause
This discrepancy may be caused by the 7shifts 6-hour lookback rule, also known as the grace threshold. This rule connects a sales receipt and its tips to an employee's time punch.
When a sales receipt is generated, 7shifts first tries to match it to a time punch where the receipt timestamp falls exactly within the employee's clocked-in hours. If the receipt falls outside of their exact shift, the system searches for a valid time punch within 6 hours before or after the receipt timestamp - creating a 12-hour grace window.
If a receipt falls outside of this 12-hour grace window, 7shifts can't automatically allocate that receipt to the employee.
Example
The Late Night Bartender had $12 in credit card tips recorded at 3:01 PM:
| Location | Order Date | Server | Amount | Tip | Gratuity | Total | Status |
| Queen West | 5/30/2026 15:01 | Late Night Bartender | 67.05 | 12.00 | 0 | 79.05 | CAPTURED |
The time punch for the Late Night Bartender on May 30 is at 9:13 PM. Since the receipt timestamp (3:01 PM) is more than 6 hours before that punch, 7shifts can't allocate that receipt to the employee.
What To Do
To pull the missing tips into 7shifts, adjust the employee's time punch so it falls within 6 hours of the receipt timestamp.
Important: If the employee has an hourly wage on file, adjusting their time punch will add those hours to your labor cost reporting. If the employee's wage is set to $0, this won't apply.
- Log in to 7shifts.
- In the left navigation bar, select Time Clocking.
- Select Time Punches.
- Locate the employee and the date of the missing tip.
- Adjust or add a time punch for that day so it falls within 6 hours of the receipt timestamp.
- Save the punch.
Tip: Once the updated punch falls within the valid window, 7shifts will pull in the missing credit card tips automatically.
Issue Unresolved
If you've updated the employee's punch to fall within the 6-hour lookback window and the POS tips still don't match your 7shifts reports, this may not be the source of the issue. Contact the 7shifts Support Team with your reporting details for further investigation.