Running your retail operation is no mean feat. From taking care of your inventory to paying attention to merchandising, marketing your business to delivering exceptional customer service, you have your work cut out for you.
This is why, whenever you can get a chance to make your job easier, you are more than likely to take advantage of the opportunity. Following this approach, most retail business owners try to find a Point-of-Sale (POS) system for retail businesses that can make their operations more efficient, manageable, and cost-effective.
If you are looking for a modern or integrated payment platform for your retail business that can do all this and more, then you need to keep a few essential points in mind. By being aware of these factors, you can make sure that your payment services platform can fulfill all your expectations without any issues.
Understand the Problems of Conventional POS Systems
One of the most significant issues with accepting retail payments is the end-of-day processing. No matter the kind of business you run, you have to go through grueling and redundant data-entry tasks to manage your payments.
This gets all the more applicable if you process your credit card payments through a conventional POS system for retail businesses. Reconciling your receipts can take a lot out of you. Allocating employee resources for manual data entry, accounting for additional time at the end of every day, and looking for human errors all become a part of the equation.
Who wants to go through the same process again and again, especially after your customers have made their transactions? Not you. Not your employees.
If you use a traditional POS solution, you have no choice but to go through these grueling activities to receive your earnings in your merchant account. That’s just how the old process is designed.
These services can also bring about the following issues:
- Longer processing times
- Haphazard management
- Unnecessary procedures
- Erratic cash flow
- Higher costs
Here’s How Modern Payment Systems Can Help
By using modern services for POS, you can finally steer clear of tiresome processes.
As a direct answer to common issues found in a traditional POS system, you need modern POS system solutions that can resolve them, as well as provide additional benefits such as:
- The flexibility to add on a variety of payment solutions. A modern solution should not limit you to a set number of payment types due to an inability to add a new capability. This opens more doors for less bulky systems like tablets, and smaller touch-ready devices to accept payments from customers on-the-go.
- The ability to integrate with other platforms to build a better payment structure between the card/no card payment option.
- Seamless management of Catalog and Inventory Items.
An integrated payment platform also lets you reconcile batched payments with your deposits.
As a result, you can ensure no transactions have been dropped or were missing from the batch.
You’ll not only benefit from seamless cash flow, but you’ll also reduce the costs that come with redundant data entry.
Keeping this in mind, make sure that you look for modern merchant services that follow the same approach in their payment processes.
What to Look for in a Modern POS System?
When shopping around for a modern POS system for retail businesses, you should be mindful of a few critical requirements. This helps you steer clear of the issues that come with legacy POS systems and lets you make the most out of your new POS solution.
Reduced Processing Times
Your first and foremost requirement with modern POS is to find reduced processing times.
An integrated payment platform automatically meets this need and saves you from redundant data entry as well as erratic cash flow problems. But you should still take your time to study through the offerings of each merchant services provider to understand what kind of processes they offer to manage your payments.
This helps you pick the best option for your business in terms of efficiency, and lets you claim your payments in a reduced timeframe.
Easy to Use Interface
Not every modern POS system for retail businesses can improve efficiency. In fact, if it utilizes a difficult-to-use interface, then it doesn’t do much for improving your payment management.
Make sure to look for a modern POS system that comes with an intuitive user interface. Utilizing an easy-to-use payment system helps you cut training times, improves your process flow, and reduces the chance of errors.
This helps you and your employees process your payment more efficiently, and lets you negate unnecessary payment processing issues.
Hardware and Software Compatibility
See to it that your point of sale software works well with your payment equipment, including your credit card terminals, barcode scanners, and receipt printers.
Effectively ringing up sales requires the different components of your POS and payments systems to “play nice” with each other. A disjointed setup can lead to technical errors and a poor checkout experience.
The best way to ensure hardware and software compatibility is to consult your POS vendor and ask about their preferred hardware partners. Some companies offer “all-in-one” point of sale solutions that bundle up hardware and software.
Clover, for example, enables retailers to purchase their hardware along with their POS subscriptions. Clover also provides payment processing services, although its fees are slightly higher than processors like Stax.
As such, if you’re leaning towards an all-in-one POS provider like Clover, see if you’re able to choose a payment processor that offers more favorable rates.
Manageable Costs
In addition to looking for an integrated payment platform, you should also go for a POS system for retail businesses that has the promise of reduced payment processing costs.
Some modern solutions come with sky-high costs for their solutions. But they are often not justified and use a higher markup for their services than necessary. At the same time, other merchants price their offerings in a way that makes them affordable for business owners without compromising on the quality of their solutions.
By shopping around and comparing the prices offered by different solutions, you can ensure to find the best value without having to let go of crucial features. This is an essential step in finding the right POS system for your needs.
At Stax, we make sure to provide retail businesses the kind of payment solutions they need to improve their processes and grow their business. No matter the size of your operation, our Stax integrated payment platform, mobile payment solutions, and virtual terminals for payment card processing can all fit your needs perfectly.
To learn more about our services at Stax, reach out to us today. We will be happy to answer your questions and help you benefit from our modern payment solutions.
