Taps

If you sell beer directly from a production batch's tank, bypassing packaging (e.g. the brewery's own on-trade sales), and the tap is fitted with a flow meter, you can keep track of consumption with the tap feature. BrewOS calculates consumption from the meter readings you enter, and the consumption is recorded on the tax account with separate tax events.

Beer sold from a tap is not packaged into products and does not pass through the warehouse, so tap consumption does not show in stock balances.

Opening a tap

A tap is always opened through a production batch:

1. Open the production batch from whose tank the beer is sold.
2. Choose the Taps tab.
3. Fill in the form Add new tap:
   • Meter reading: the consumption meter's starting reading in litres. Enter the reading to the precision your meter shows (at most three decimals).
   • Date/time: the date and time the reading was taken (by default the current moment)
   • Product: the beer sold from the tap. The options are the beverages of the production batch's recipe. The beer and its alcohol content are used in the excise duty calculation and in reporting to the authorities.
4. Press Add tap.

The tap gets a running number within the production batch (tap 1, tap 2 …) and a page of its own. Several taps can be opened in the same production batch, and the batch's Taps tab shows all of the batch's taps with their consumption. Opening a tap is recorded in the event log.

Open taps are also shown on the front page under Open taps. The front page section Unreported taps lists the taps for which more consumption has been recorded than has been recorded on the tax account. Clicking a tap takes you to its page.

Entering meter readings

Record a meter reading at least once a day, for example at the end of each serving day. This leaves a clear trail of consumption for a possible inspection.

1. Open the tap's page (from the production batch's Taps tab or from the front page).
2. In the form below the table Consumption meter readings, enter the date, time and meter reading in litres.
3. Press Add reading.

The tap's Consumption is calculated as the difference between the highest and the lowest reading, i.e. normally between the opening reading and the latest reading.

If you entered a wrong reading, you can delete it with the link delete reading as long as

• the tap is open, and
• the reading has not yet been recorded in a tax event.

Readings already recorded on the tax account are shown in grey and cannot be deleted.

Tax account entries

Meter readings are not recorded on the tax account automatically. You make one or more tax account entries for the consumption as it accumulates. The form Record tax event is shown on the tap's page when the tap has unreported readings.

1. Record starts is prefilled: it is the tap's opening reading or the last reading of the previous tax account entry.
2. From the Record ends menu, choose the reading up to which the consumption is recorded. The default is the latest reading, i.e. all unreported consumption.
3. Litres is calculated automatically from the difference between the chosen readings.
4. Fill in Licence number: the alcohol licence number of the retailer (on-trade licensee).
5. Fill in EAN code: the EAN code or product code to be reported to Valvira.
6. Fill in Price: the total sales price in euros of the quantity consumed, to be reported to Valvira (not the price per litre or the wholesale price).
7. Press Record tax event. The button becomes active only once the licence number, EAN code and price have been filled in.

The tax event's time is the time of the last chosen meter reading. The tap's tax events are also entered in the small brewery ledger by this time, so they increase the year's production in the same way as packaging (see Excise duty). After the entry, the readings it covers are locked, and the event is shown in the list Tax events on the tap's page. Clicking the row opens the event in the tax event report, where it can be reviewed and corrected if needed (see Correcting errors).

The tap's tax events are taken into account in

• the excise duty return to the Finnish Tax Administration (Vero) (as taxable own production), and
• the packaging report to Valvira.

Note that the tap's tax events are not included in Valvira's delivery report or in the beverage packaging tax return.

Closing and reopening a tap

The tap's status (Enabled or Closed) is shown next to the heading of the tap's page. When the tap is no longer in use, close it with the button Close tap at the top of the tap's page. New readings cannot be entered for a closed tap, nor old ones deleted. Unreported consumption can, however, also be recorded on the tax account from a closed tap.

A closed tap can be reopened with the button Reopen tap if it was closed by mistake or sales continue.

The tap's beer cannot be changed afterwards. If you want to change the beer, close the tap and open a new tap with the correct beer.

Closing and reopening, adding and deleting readings, and tax account entries are saved in the event log.

Tap report

The Tap deliveries report on the reports page shows the consumption readings of the last 50 taps grouped by beer. See also Reporting.