The LizzyKate Card program

What is it?

The LizzyKate Card program provides you a contact-less way to pay for your drink(s) when placing drink orders.

How does it work?

First, you need to log in…

Go to https://app.lizzykate.com in a modern browser on your computer, laptop, tablet or phone.

If you have a Drink Rewards account (perhaps set up by us in the shop) but don’t have a login or don’t remember it, just put in your email address and hit “Sign in”. This will produce an unsuccessful login prompt, but it will also produce the “Reset Password” link. Click on that, re-verify your email address, and we will send you an email to reset your password. Following the link sent in email will pre-fill your email and the temporary password assigned - just hit "Sign in". The system will require that you change your password right away. You will also need to accept our terms of use.

If you don’t have an account yet, it is easy to set up – just click “Sign Up Here!” It’s free and easy.

I’m logged in, now what do I do?

You start by either adding funds to your LizzyKate Card in “My Account”, or you can do it on the fly by placing a drink order. If you were already a Drinks Rewards member, your order history will be there and you can reorder from that, or start a new drink from scratch. We also highly recommend making favorites from your order history – that will make it easier to add drinks. Have fun and experiment!

When it comes time to fund your LizzyKate Card…

You can add funds to your virtual LizzyKate Card with a credit card in $5 increments (minimum $10, maximum $100) and those funds are placed into your LizzyKate Card balance. When initially loading funds, you will be asked if you want to auto-refill future funds on that card. Selecting "Don't auto refill" means that your card will not be stored by our credit card processor for future use.

Drink purchases reduce the LizzyKate Card balance.

If the current purchase exceeds the LizzyKate Card account balance, you will either be asked if you want to replenish your balance with the credit card on file, or to provide a new credit card.

If you have a card on file, that card will be charged for the "Auto Refill" amount (which, combined with the current balance must exceed the current drink order's value). If using a new card, then you will be able to load an initial amount (again, which must exceed the current drink order's value when combined with the current balance) and determine if you'd like to save that card for future auto-refills.

This replenishes the LizzyKate Card account balance and then the amount of the current drink order is deducted from that balance.

Once the LizzyKate Card balance transaction(s) are complete, the drink order will be placed. The LizzyKate team will be notified, and we will start making your drink in the order it was received.

Upon arrival in the shop, just identify yourself and your drink(s) to claim them.

You can also remove your card on file or change it, as well as load/reload your LizzyKate Card in "My Account".

Do I have to use this???

We hope you will and that you'll find it relatively easy to use, but in the end, no, you don't have to. You can select to pay for this in the shop. However, be warned that we've changed our policy and that drinks don't go into our order prep queue until they have been paid for.

You can also still come into the shop and order drinks there. We love and miss our customers so a big part of us wants this to be the only option, but it's simply not the smart and safe method to encourage in this age of Coronavirus. We appreciate your understanding!

Why did we do this?

We wanted to build a system that accomplished several things:

• Enables contact-less ordering for the convenience and safety of our customers and staff
• Uses our existing drink-ordering platform, but enabled credit card payments in a thoughtful and secure way
• Maintains and integrates our Drink Rewards program
• Preserves features and functions that customers and staff have become familiar with
• Is fast, responsive and scalable
• Maintains credit-card data security in a seamless way
• Minimizes costs

When will this new system be ready?

The short answer: tomorrow (May, 29, 2020)! 

The long answer: I thought it would take a couple of weeks to get this system built and deployed, so I promised Amy four weeks. Boy, was four optimistic! Mostly, there was a steeper learning curve and more complexity than I originally thought. I only discovered this as I walked through the various scenarios as I started to lay this out.

The obvious thing to do was to build it on top of our existing drink ordering system. Because that system is fairly complex, this had to be handled carefully so as to not disrupt the flow I had worked so hard to build. I also had multiple scenarios I had to deal with that I didn’t have to address before (like taxes [ugh] – that used to all be handled by our Point of Sale system and I could blithely ignore it – not anymore!).

I also had to dive into working with the systems provided by our credit card processor. I had done similar things years ago, so I was familiar with all of the concepts, but that is a different kettle of fish than actually implementing something to handle real money from real (and highly valued!) customers. So it took lots of testing and experimentation to get things working how we wanted.

I must give thanks to Amy. She patiently listened to me babble on and on about functions and arrays and ajax calls and managed to feign interest. Her input into “how things should work” was, of course, invaluable. Any mistakes or problems with the system or the flow are mine and not hers.

So, seven weeks later (I laugh now when thinking of two) we are ready to launch. Does that mean it does everything I want it to? That is looks and feels exactly as I want? That it is a high-gloss system? Hardly! What it will do is work. It should be fast. It should be secure. Hopefully it is intuitive enough.

Of course, if it doesn’t, please let us know right away at expert@lizzykate.com and we will do our very best to make it right. We also welcome suggestions and constructive criticism (bearing in mind that some things are harder to change than others).

In the end, we hope you find it a useful tool.

Happy Sipping!