3 Features Of An Ideal POS System
Commercial point of sale (POS) systems are common fixtures in the modern hospitality industry. POS systems are often preferred over traditional-style cash registers thanks to their advanced features.
Because POS systems are often not cheap, it is important for players in the hospitality industry to ensure that they get value for their money when they decide to invest in a POS system. Here are three features that a restaurant owner should not sacrifice when shopping for a commercial point of sale system.
Customer Support
The importance of the "customer support" feature in a POS system should not be taken to imply that the system is destined to fail. Perhaps this reasoning explains the common misconception that a more advanced point of sale system is one that would not need as much customer support.
POS system manufacturers recognize and appreciate that the average restaurant owner is not likely to be an IT guru. Customer support is their way of making it easy and convenient (as it should be) for the owner to use the manufacturer's product.
A large number of restaurants operate late into the night and others operate throughout the night. Before investing in a POS system, it is important for a restaurant owner to confirm that he or she will get technical help in the event of technical problems at midnight (for example) on a busy week night.
Compliance With The PCI DSS
PCI DSS is an abbreviation for Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard. The PCI DSS is a set of minimum requirements spelt out for commercial entities that allow their clients to pay for goods and/or services using their credit cards.
The objective of enforcing these requirements is to guarantee the security of financial information that individuals share whenever they use their credit cards for payment transactions.
The use of non-compliant POS systems in a restaurant would leave customers exposed to the risk of identity theft and that of credit card fraud.
The Cloud
Cloud-based systems are perhaps the future of POS systems. A cloud-based point of sale system offers significant advantages over the conventional hardwired system. These advantages include, but they're not limited to, the following:
- 24 hour access to sales data so long as there's an active internet connection
- Reduced threat of data loss due to technical problems with the system. Cloud-based POS systems store data online as opposed to using hard-drives for data storage
- The possibility of centralized data management for multiple establishments (restaurants) located in different geographical areas.
Keep these options in mind when looking at point of sale equipment for your restaurant.