The basics
What is Plink?
Plink is a till app that puts anything on a tab. Somebody taps an NFC tag, whether a wristband, a card or a sticker, and the tap lands as a line against their name. That line can be a sale to settle up later, a serving to keep count of, or a piece of kit signed out. It runs on Android phones and keeps working without a signal.
How much does Plink cost?
Nothing at the moment. Plink is still in testing, and while it is there it is free to use: no subscription, no per-transaction fee and nothing to enter card details into. Your only real costs are the tags, at a few pence each, and phones your staff already carry.
A subscription is planned for when Plink leaves testing. If you are weighing up an event that runs beyond that point, get in touch at hello@plinkapp.co.uk and we will tell you where pricing has got to.
Does Plink take payments or hold money?
Not today. As it stands, Plink records what somebody owes, in the way a paper tab behind a bar always has. There is no balance on a tag, no top-up, and no card or bank details anywhere in the app. Settling up happens outside it, however you already settle up with people. The practical benefit is that you can start without a card machine contract.
Letting customers top a tag up in advance is on the roadmap, but it is a bigger change than it looks, because prepaid credit is money held on somebody's behalf and brings rules with it. Until that lands, tags carry no credit.
Is there an iPhone version?
Not yet. The till app is Android for now, and an iPhone version is being worked on. The web dashboard already opens in any browser on any device, so a manager on iOS can watch trade live today.
Tags and hardware
Which NFC tags work with Plink?
Essentially every 13.56 MHz NFC tag sold, because Plink reads only a tag's hardware identifier and ignores what is stored on it. That covers:
- NTAG213, NTAG215 and NTAG216, which is what most cheap silicone and fabric wristbands use
- MIFARE Classic 1K and 4K, and MIFARE Ultralight
- MIFARE DESFire EV1, EV2 and EV3
- ISO 15693 tags such as ICODE SLIX
- FeliCa
Since only the identifier matters, a tag's memory and capacity are irrelevant: the cheapest NTAG213 wristband works exactly as well as a DESFire one.
Two kinds do not work. The 125 kHz cards sometimes sold as RFID wristbands are a different technology entirely, so check a listing says NFC or 13.56 MHz before ordering. And any chip set to emit a random identifier instead of a fixed one reads as a different person on every tap, which rules out a phone emulating a card and some secure elements.
Do I need to buy special hardware?
No. A till is any Android phone with NFC, which is most of them, plus tags at a few pence each. There is no card terminal to hire, because Plink does not take payments.
If a fixed counter suits better than a phone in a hand, Plink also supports the ACS ACR1252U reader over USB, which needs a phone or tablet with USB OTG and a cable. That is the only external reader supported.
What happens if a customer loses their tag?
Very little, because a tag holds no value and no money. The tab is held against the person, not the tag. Deactivate the lost tag and assign a new one to that same person on the guestlist, and everything they have already run up stays with them.
Assign the new tag to their existing row on the guestlist. Start a second person by mistake and the history stays with the old record, and there is no way to merge the two.
Can tags be reused at the next event?
Yes. A tag is deactivated at the end of an event and assigned to somebody else at the next one. Nothing is written to the tag itself, so there is nothing to wipe and no state to reset; the same bag of wristbands can go round for years.
Running an event
Does Plink work without an internet connection?
Yes. Each sale is written to the phone first and syncs when the connection returns, so staff never wait on a spinner mid-sale. The app header shows how many sales are still queued, and tapping it lists them. Patchy signal is normal at most events, so there is nothing to switch on.
Can several tills run at the same event at once?
Yes, and there is no limit on how many. Each till device gets its own credentials, and an owner or admin decides which events each one can open. A till can also be granted only what it needs beyond selling, with tag lookup, registering tags, menu edits and refunds each switchable individually.
One organisation can run several events, and staff only ever see the events they have been given.
Can I use Plink without prices, just to count things?
Yes. An event setting called Hide prices at the till takes prices off the till screen, the self service screen, the purchase confirmations and the tag lookup, so a tap keeps a count. Prices stay in the reports and the CSV exports, so you can hide them from staff and customers while still costing the event up afterwards.
Ignore prices entirely and a tab reads as a plain log of what somebody had. Several of the uses work exactly that way.
Can I stop staff selling under somebody else's name?
Yes, with the optional till lock, which works like a pub till. Staff unlock with a PIN, with their own staff tag, or with either, and every sale then carries the name of whoever made it. The till can relock after a quiet spell or after every single sale.
Leave the lock off entirely for a one-person stall, in which case sales are recorded against the till alone.
Can I refund a sale?
Yes, in full or in part. A refund is confirmed by tapping the customer's tag, which matches it to the right person without anybody reading a receipt back. Refunds appear separately in the reporting, so net revenue, gross revenue and the amount refunded are all shown separately. Refunds can be switched off for a given till.
Can customers check their own tab?
Not by themselves. Tag lookup sits behind the staff login, so a customer asks at the till and a member of staff taps their tag to see the running tab, the recent purchases and the usual order.
Self service mode lets a customer order for themselves, but it confirms the order and shows no balance, which keeps one person's spending off a screen anybody could be standing in front of.
Data
How do I get my data out?
Four CSV exports cover everything the app records: a transaction summary, the same transactions broken down to every line item, the customer list with contact details, total spend and tag status, and the menu with its variants and prices. Every transaction row carries the till, the operator and the channel.
A guestlist can be imported from CSV too, so returning customers are registered before the doors open.
Where is Plink data stored?
Event data is held in Google Firebase and stored in the European Union. Sign-in accounts for organisers are handled by Google's identity service, which may process them outside the EU; customers never have sign-in accounts. Each account only ever sees its own organisation's data.
Nothing is sold and nothing is shared beyond the organisation that collected it and the hosting provider that stores it. The privacy policy has the detail.
How do I have my details removed?
If you attended an event, ask the organiser first, because the owner of their organisation can delete your record from the app straight away. If you cannot reach them, the account deletion page sets out how to ask us instead, and what is kept afterwards for the organiser's own accounting.