In July and August, the Paseo Marítimo WiFi has the same problem as the car park: it’s full. Two hundred diners with their phones connected to the venue’s WiFi are competing for the same router your waiter’s tablet needs to send orders to the kitchen. The result is usually orders that arrive late, duplicated, or don’t arrive at all.

The usual fix is “install a better router”. The correct fix is making sure the order never touches the router in the first place.

Bouzon TPV uses kitchen printers with Bluetooth SPP (Serial Port Profile): the waiter’s tablet talks directly to the kitchen printer over Bluetooth, the same way wireless headphones pair with a phone, with no network in between. For Costa del Sol chiringuitos and terraces working right on the seafront, that’s the difference between a slick service and August chaos.

What Bluetooth SPP is and how it works

Bluetooth SPP is the Bluetooth profile that emulates a serial port (as if there were a USB cable, but without the cable). When the waiter’s tablet sends an order, the signal goes straight to the paired kitchen printer, without passing through any router or WiFi network.

The full flow is:

The waiter takes the order on the tablet or phone.
The order goes to the cloud server over mobile data (the waiter’s phone’s 4G).
The server processes the order, generates the ticket and sends it back over the same mobile-data channel.
The kitchen ticket is sent to the printer via Bluetooth SPP, directly, without touching the venue’s WiFi.

There are three independent channels: mobile data (for the cloud and Verifactu), Bluetooth (for the kitchen printer). The venue’s WiFi isn’t involved in either. If the router goes down, orders still reach the kitchen and Verifactu tickets keep getting signed.

The effective range of Bluetooth SPP is about 10 metres with line of sight, enough for any Costa del Sol chiringuito or terrace: it covers everything from the bar to the espeto grill or the kitchen in an average-sized venue.

Which printers are compatible

Not every thermal printer has Bluetooth SPP. The ones that work with Bouzon TPV are those using the ESC/POS protocol with a Bluetooth Classic adaptor (not Bluetooth LE). The most common models on the Costa del Sol:

Model	Type	Approx. price
Sunmi NT311	Built into a Sunmi device	Included with the hardware
Epson TM-T20III BT	Desktop printer	€150-200
Star TSP143III BT	Desktop printer	€180-220
Epson TM-T88VII BT	High-speed printer	€250-350

The Sunmi NT311 is the most compact option: it’s the printer built into Sunmi devices (such as the Sunmi T2 or the V2 Pro), with no extra cables. For chiringuitos that prefer a separate device, the Epson TM-T20III or the Star TSP143 offer a straightforward setup at contained cost.

The investment in the printer pays for itself in the first week if it stops even one or two dishes going to the wrong table.

Setup: from box to working in 5 minutes

No IT, no network configuration, no calling a supplier.

Turn on the printer and switch on Bluetooth.
Pair it from the tablet or phone (in the device’s Bluetooth settings), the same way you’d pair a pair of headphones.
In Bouzon TPV, go to Settings → Printers → New printer → select “Bluetooth SPP” and choose the paired printer.
Run a test ticket. If the order prints, it’s ready.

The whole process takes under five minutes. If you have two zones (bar and kitchen), each zone has its own printer paired with a separate device.

Why this matters especially on the Costa del Sol

The problem of saturated WiFi isn’t unique to the Costa del Sol, but it’s worse here for a few reasons:

Right on the beach: a chiringuito’s WiFi competes with neighbouring terraces, sunbed-rental huts, hotels and dozens of summer diners’ own devices.
A concentrated season: 70% of the year’s activity happens in 3-4 months. There’s no time to tolerate printing problems.
Tables far from the bar: at a beach chiringuito with 20 tables on the sand, the kitchen printing point can be 8-10 metres from the bar. A USB cable won’t reach; WiFi can fail; Bluetooth gets there without a problem.

The Costa del Sol spots where Bluetooth SPP matters most:

La Carihuela (Torremolinos): Spain’s best-known strip of chiringuitos, with maximum WiFi saturation in July and August.
Los Boliches and Paseo Marítimo (Fuengirola): seafront chiringuitos on shared WiFi.
La Cala de Mijas (Mijas Costa): a fishing village with a high concentration of foreign tourism and unstable coastal WiFi.
Playa de la Rada (Estepona): 2.7km of chiringuitos and terraces right on the seafront.
Calahonda (Mijas Costa): a British community with restaurants geared towards foreign tourism.
Carvajal and Los Boliches (Benalmádena): beaches 3km from Bouzon Digital’s office, where in-person support is immediate.
El Palo and Pedregalejo (Málaga): the two most iconic strips of chiringuitos in the capital, with unstable coastal WiFi in season.

The full stack: WiFi for the cloud, Bluetooth for the kitchen

What makes the system robust isn’t using only Bluetooth or only WiFi — it’s assigning each task to the most reliable channel:

The waiter’s mobile data (4G) → connection to the cloud, Verifactu signing, catalogue sync. 4G coverage on the Costa del Sol seafront is solid even where the local WiFi fails.
Bluetooth SPP → kitchen printing. A direct channel, no network in between, no router latency.

If the venue’s WiFi is working fine, the tablet uses it automatically. If it goes down, only the WiFi goes down — not the orders.

This is the stack Bouzon TPV uses in restaurants and chiringuitos across the Costa del Sol. No proprietary hardware, no lock-in contract, no paying for the POS during the low-season months.

Frequently asked questions

What happens if Bluetooth drops mid-service? The waiter’s tablet stores the order locally and retries sending it as soon as the Bluetooth connection is restored. A typical disconnection (something briefly blocking the signal) lasts milliseconds and the user doesn’t notice it. A prolonged Bluetooth loss — rare at distances of 5-10m — shows an error on the tablet so the waiter can resend it manually.

How many Bluetooth printers can I have? As many as you need: one at the bar, one in the kitchen, one on the terrace. Each tablet pairs with its zone’s printer. The catalogue defines which product categories route to which printer (drinks → bar; hot dishes → kitchen).

Does it work with the waiter’s phone as well as a tablet? Yes. Any Android or iOS device can be used as a waiter terminal with Bouzon TPV. Bluetooth pairing works the same way as with a tablet.

Does Verifactu still work without WiFi? Yes. Verifactu runs on the waiter’s device’s mobile data (or any internet connection), completely independent of the local WiFi. If the device has 4G coverage (which is usually good right on the beachfront), Verifactu keeps signing tickets even if the venue’s WiFi is down.

How much does it cost to switch from a wired system to Bluetooth SPP? The main cost is the Bluetooth printer: between €80 and €200 depending on the model. There are no installation or network-configuration costs. If you already have a thermal ESC/POS printer without Bluetooth, some models let you add an external Bluetooth adaptor (~€30-40) instead of replacing the whole printer.

Does it work outdoors in strong sun? The Bluetooth signal isn’t affected by sunlight or heat. The only limiting factor outdoors is distance and physical obstacles (walls, large metal structures). On an open beach terrace, the signal reaches 10-12 metres without any problem.