If you run into the red error screen seen below, this usually happens when KioskBuddy is unable to contact the printer, or if there are network issues/slowdowns for any reason. For example, the printer might be busy printing another order or something.
There are a few things you can try to get around this:
The recommended way to get around this issue is to use the beta version for the next major version of KioskBuddy that is currently being beta tested. You can read about all of the benefits and details here, but essentially there's a new feature to send orders to a Square POS device for automatic printing. The nice thing about this is Square POS is pretty robust in handling print jobs when the printer is busy - it'll keep attempting to print for some time. We've talked to a few users who had similar network printer issues and they had no problem setting up this new feature (it's super easy to set up and is similar to Square Online Ordering if you're already familiar with that). You can read more about the new feature to send orders to Square POS here.
Quite a few users are using the beta version on a daily basis, probably around 40% of kiosk usage. So it's relatively stable and is our top priority to get released since it has so many benefits. If you're interested, just follow these steps to download the beta version.
Increase the printer retry setting in KioskBuddy. KioskBuddy attempts to print to your printer a specific number of times before showing that error. You can increase the number of times in order for KioskBuddy to get in contact with your printer. To find this setting, go to the kiosk configuration screen and push the SETTINGS button next to your desired printer:
A popup will appear, and you'll see the setting below in red for Number of Retries. This is the setting you'll want to increase to give KioskBuddy more time to connect to the printer. Note that the larger the number, the longer KioskBuddy will wait at the "Just a sec, sending in your order..." screen, so there's a bit of a balance to it. Try bumping this up a bit to see if it helps.
Use KioskBuddy's KDS (kitchen display system) mode as a source for printing receipts. You'll need a separate iPad running the START KDS MODE button on the kiosk configuration screen, and you'll set up that iPad to connect to your printers just like you normally would in KioskBuddy. The nice thing about this is that you'll have a screen where you can see which print jobs fail, and a way to re-print directly from the KDS if needed. It looks something like this for a failed printout: