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Restaurant POS Systems: Innovation Can Help Enhance Profit – Do It NOW!
Restaurant POS Systems: Enhance Profit Through Innovation – Start it NOW!
Restaurant and hospitality operators these days have become much more more tech proficient compared to the recent years, no wonder they’re really good in sourcing out POS software. Not only are they more comfortable choosing new POS systems, but they’re also demanding a bigger bang for their buck when it comes to their restaurant POS software choices. If you’re thinking about upgrading your POS systems, here’s a simple 2009 POS guide for you.
Not so long ago when hospitality operators were so excited in using the first restaurant POS systems available in the market. Can you still remember what your first restaurant POS system was? You had a neat looking keypad, a little black plastic “key” and a manual of PLU codes to memorize. You punched in your food and beverage orders, and miraculously, your beverage orders are printed out out at the bar while the food orders are printed at the same time in the kitchen. It was sleek and revolutionary, everything was so exciting to do with a POS system
Since then, the world of restaurant POS systems have evolved to meet the needs of people. Today’s hospitality operators are much more knowledgable in today’s technologies than they’ve ever been, and the POS industry is slowly responding. The big players in Point of Sale software systems are still active, but there has been a fast growing number of smaller companies have emerged in recent years, and the big guys could see their portion of the POS pie gobbled up quickly if they don’t give what today’s hospitality operators are demanding. So if you’re looking to invest on a new POS system this year, here’s what you should be looking for.
Data Reporting -
The top two issues every hospitality-based business wants to get a handle on are food cost, and labor costs. You can always keep those things in check, and your chances of succeeding in such a competitive market are remarkably increased. A modern POS will be able to help you handle these profit killers properly by allowing your managers to access important data with ease and in real time. A POS system with state of the art data reporting capabilities will allow you to forecast business volumes, which gives managers the information they need to handle scheduling and avoid unneeded expenses on labor. Time and attendance can be precisely monitored. Real time and instant access to data also allows managers to and make snap decisions to address discrepancies in cash flow and adjust inventory levels. The POS system will pay for itself many times over if it can help you get a handle on these two issues alone.
Back Office Management & Integration -
With all your POS terminals linked together, combined with the ability to run reports, make menu and pricing changes on the fly, check inventory levels and consolidate payroll at one central location is crucial to running a business efficiently and profitably. A modern POS system will allow you to do this quickly and easily, all from the back office. Integration and back office management capability should be at the top of your shopping list.
Management of Customer Relationship -
Effective promotions can can boost up your profit for as long as it can make your customers happy. Making sure your coupon or gift card programs are working perfectly is a difficult task. If your POS system can quickly help you evaluate which promotions are performing well and which are not, you’ll be able to save time and money. Having a POS system that can keep track of customer histories, their likes and dislikes, comments, suggestions, etc. can give you valuable insight into what future promotions to put in effect, and which ones should bite the dust. Having an effective loyalty and points program can keep your customers coming back. When it comes to Customer Relationship Management, you can entrust most of the thinking to your POS system.
Wireless Technology: Mobile Computing & Hand Held Devices -
Wireless point of sale systems plays a very important role for businesses that operate outside of traditional, brick and mortar locations. Venues such as ski resorts, fairs or even stadiums can greatly benefit from a wireless point of sale system (a portable concession stand or use in a private suite). In a more traditional environment, such as a restaurant, you can get great benefits from wireless hand held devices.
With wireless hand held units, your staff can save time taking orders with out having to line up to get access to the POS terminal, and therefore are much more productive. And Because the order is transmitted instantly, at tables, the serving staff are able to roam around taking orders. Managers can lower staffing levels by scheduling just a few skilled employees, give them larger sections, and make their primary focus at greeting customers, taking orders and up-selling. Non-serving staff can then be hired (at significant payroll savings) for dispatching food and clean sections. When your serving staff are able to remain on the floor, the result is a high quality customer service experience for your regular customers and greatly increase sales though up-selling and faster table turns. Also, wasted food decreases because taking orders directly at tables greatly reduces errors.
Another great feature of wireless hand held devices is that it sends evenly spaced orders to the kitchen, so your kitchen can prepare the orders more properly by not overwhelming it with too many orders at once. By this, efficiency is greatly increased in your kitchen and further decreases waste. The wireless hand held technology has been greatly enhanced though the years, with increased battery life for hand held units and improved ease of use for staff. The time indeed has come to embrace wireless POS technology.
Secure Payment -
Payment security is crucial in today’s marketplace. With the incidence of fraud and identity theft reaching epidemic proportions, keeping your client’s credit card data safely is very important. You may visit PCI Security Standards Council, the open global forum for the ongoing development, enhancement, storage, dissemination and implementation of security standards for account data protection. Is your POS system secure and can comply with PCI standards? If it isn’t, it needs to be.
Self Service Technology -
Self-service technology have been the talk of the town in recent years. Having moved beyond kiosks, the self-service option gave business owners in the food-service the ability to delegate the food ordering process to customers themselves. Touch screen POS terminals are now intuitive and easy to use, and offer add on/up sell items instantaneously, which boosts the average check totals. The traditional “Server” can be replaced by food runners, or counter staff, who can also do quality checks. Even the payment process can be taken care of by the customer, allowing for quicker table turns and increased cover counts.
Self-service terminals may not be appealing for patrons who wants to experience fine dining, but it certainly is attractive for fast food chains or quick service restaurants. Remanco certainly didn’t offer all these features!
For Enterprise & Multi Unit -
If you are running large and multi-venue operations, you may still be able to choose for the right POS systems easily. Because to logistics and a host of other hurdles, businesses with multiple locations were forced to seek alternatives in how they organize the collection of cash and data. With this kind of business, you may need enterprise wide systems that has features such as client recognition capabilities, hospitality and retail sales, as well as quick and easy debit and credit options and many more. It may also require a system that has the ability to get around cabling and network issues, and preserve precious data in case of a system failure. If your company fits in this category, a reliable and flexible enterprise POS solution would be the best way to go.
With the above list in mind, you might think that it would be challenging to find the right POS system that offers all of the above and more. Even so, there’s still one POS system that consistently stands out and is without peer in the POS industry. The state of the art POS system, the modern and flexible Toronto based Volante POS Systems. The Volante seemingly posses all these features and more. It’s also fully PCI compliant. Volante first appeared on the scene in 1993, and is cross platform compatible, so it will run whether you use Windows, Linux or Unix. Linux POS solutions are very attractive these days, since they allow business owners to cut costs by saving on Windows licensing fees, and are easy to use.
With the above shopping list in hand, as a retail business owner you should feel prepared when looking for a new POS system to replace your old one. If the POS software you’re looking at doesn’t offer the features mentioned above, move on. But in today’s economy.
If you seek more information or for an online resource?
Go to POS-For-Restaurants.com
The of this article author is the Vice-President of Customer Relations at POS-For-Restaurants with over 20 years of experience helping restaurants of all types become more efficient and profitable throughout the U.S.
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