# Cash Variance Thresholds
> Source: https://development.fuze-store.com/docs/store/cash-variance-thresholds

# Cash Variance Thresholds

A cash variance — the gap between what your drawer should hold and what's actually there at close — is a normal part of running a store. What matters is how big the gap is, whether it's growing, and what your store does about it. Variance thresholds let you set policy so the response is automatic.

## The three thresholds

| Threshold       | Default (PHP) | What happens when variance crosses it                                                                                |
| --------------- | ------------- | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| **Minor**       | ₱50           | Below this, no warning shows on the close screen. Treated as routine.                                                |
| **Review**      | ₱500          | Orange banner on close. Cashier must pick a **variance reason** from a dropdown before they can finalize the close.  |
| **Escalation** | ₱5,000        | Red banner. Reason is required, plus a free-text **explanation**. Manager and store owner are notified automatically. |

These thresholds are **soft** — closing is never blocked. The thresholds drive the warning level, the prompts, and the notification, not whether you can close.

## Setting per-store thresholds

Sign in as the store owner (or an org owner / admin). Sidebar → **Configurations** → **Preferences** → **Store**.

Scroll to the **Cash Variance** card.

Enter your **Minor**, **Review**, and **Escalation** thresholds in your store's currency. They should be in ascending order — Fuze Store will warn if not.

Save the preference. New thresholds apply to the next session close.

## How to pick the right thresholds

There's no universal answer — it depends on your average ticket size and how much cash flows through your drawer per shift.

A reasonable starting point:

- **Minor** = roughly 0.1–0.2% of a typical day's cash sales. Small enough to be ignored, big enough to flag a counting issue.
- **Review** = roughly 1% of a typical day's cash sales. Big enough to deserve an explanation; small enough to expect routinely.
- **Escalation** = roughly 5% of a typical day's cash sales OR a single high-denomination loss (e.g. ₱5,000 / ₱10,000). Big enough that you want a manager looking at it before the next shift.

Tighten over time. If your store consistently runs near zero variance, drop **Minor** to ₱20 — you'll catch issues earlier. If you're routinely over the **Review** threshold from genuine miscounts, raise it temporarily and invest in counting training.

## Variance reasons

When a cashier crosses **Review**, they pick from this list:

- **Wrong change given** — most common cause of small variance.
- **Counterfeit bill** — a rejected or lost bill.
- **Drawer skim** — cash removed from the drawer, flagged for management review.
- **Miscount** — drawer was counted incorrectly at open or close.
- **Bank deposit** — cash pulled from the drawer for a bank deposit.
- **Other** — requires a free-text explanation.

The reason gets persisted with the closed session and shows on the Z-report.

## Who gets notified on escalation

When variance crosses the **Escalation** threshold:

- The store owner receives a notification through Fuze Store's real-time channel.
- Any staff with the **Hub Admin** permission also get notified (via the Reverb event `store.session.variance_escalated`).
- The closed session is flagged in **Session History** so a manager can drill in later.

Email notification on escalation is on the roadmap; today the notification is in-app only.

## Tips

- **Don't react to a single bad shift.** A ₱600 variance once a month is noise. A ₱200 variance every weekend on the same staff is a pattern worth investigating.
- **Pair this with [Staff Performance](/docs/store/reports/staff-performance-report)** — variance per cashier is a different signal than variance per shift.
- **Document the policy.** When you set the thresholds, write down what they mean operationally ("over Review, the cashier signs the close sheet alongside the closing manager"). Otherwise the prompt becomes meaningless paperwork.

## Related guides

- [Using Store Sessions](/docs/store/using-store-session)
- [Closing the Day with the Z-Report](/docs/store/closing-end-of-day)
- [Cash Drawer Movements](/docs/store/cash-drawer-movements)
- [Cash Variance Report](/docs/store/reports/overview)
- [Staff Performance Report](/docs/store/reports/staff-performance-report)