Point of Sale (POS) can be called a modern cashier application that is software used by stores to help transactions like cash register machines at retail stores. But its use is more sophisticated than a cash register, a POS system is used to record sales, record orders for goods, help calculate profits per item sold, record goods receipts, stock calculations, and so forth.
At present, there are many choices of POS cashier applications for those of you who run retail or store businesses. Starting from the cashier system that is offline, online, can be adjusted to your business / customize, or already available on the Cloud.
Read : Recommended 13 Free Cashier Android Applications
A point of sale, or POS, is the time and place where a retail transaction is completed. Your customer makes a payment for products or services at your store. Simply put, every time a customer makes a purchase at your store, they’re completing a point of sale transaction.
- What is the Function of the POS Cashier Application?
- What are the Benefits of using the Point of Sale Application?
- Who are the Point of Sale System Users?
- Minimarket Retail Stores, Grocery Shops
- Coffee shops, Bakeries, Fast Food Restaurants, Culinary Counters, Culinary Franchises
- Fashion Retail Stores, Clothing Stores, Shoes, Eyewear and other Fashion
- Barbershop, Salon, Clinic, and Beauty Services
- Full Service Restaurants
- Professional services such as photographer services, digital marketing services
- A Brief History of the POS System
What is the Function of the POS Cashier Application?
- Recording Sales transactions and store sales returns, dan print sales invoice.
- Recording transaction movements of goods entering and leaving the store
- Recording other expenses incurred in the store.
- Recording customer transactions customer relationship module (CRM).
- Record the performance of the store sales team
- Automatic reports can be directly available to help Analyse store activity. Starting from the sales report, inventory, gross profit per item, store expenses, to store net profit.
- The ability to run sales transaction Offline, especially for the Cloud (Online) based POS system, should be a concern that the Point of Sale must be able to continue running in Offline conditions. This is to make sure store operational is not disrupted when internet connection is interrupted.
Read : More about the different Online vs. Offline Cashier Applications, and which one suits me
What are the Benefits of using the Point of Sale Application?
- Simplify sales and inventory recording and tracking with POS system
- Increase store control using point of sale system
- Standardize product code for sales, return, and receiving from Vendor
- Automatic sales price / standardize pricing
- Automatic reconciliation from sales transaction to stock
- Easier payment reconciliation by means of payment
- Reduce mistakes
- Customer Service
- Minimize fraud and increase customer confident.
- Recording specific customer transaction history for future loyalty program
- Online reports from POS system can be immediately analysed for timely decisions for sales, determine selling prices, and stock analysis.
- POS system reports analysis will increase sales, and make efficient stock of goods, increase the stock of goods sold and reduce the stock of goods, especially those that slow-moving items.
Who are the Point of Sale System Users?
The following are various type of retail stores that use cashier applications and special functions needed in each type of retail store.
1. Minimarket Retail Stores, Grocery Shops
For retail stalls and mini markets that must be a concern is the number of master product that can be handled by the cashier system offered. In addition to the number of types of goods that must be a concern is the number of transactions given that transactions in retail stores and small shops can be very large with generally small transaction values.
The ability of the POS system to use a barcode reader (barcode scanner) is a must so that transactions can run quickly and not make customers wait.
Read : Sell quickly with a barcode scanner using the IREAP POS Lite and Pro cash register application
2. Coffee shops, Bakeries, Fast Food Restaurants, Culinary Counters, Culinary Franchises
Coffee shop business that continues to grow very quickly by opening many stores makes you need control of these shops easily, quickly, and accurately. An important consideration for choosing a POS application for this type is how the cashier system can consolidate all transaction reports. Monitor the growth of each store from sales, stock of raw materials, to the gross profit and net profit of each store and in total business becomes very important for decision making. These reports must be available online and can be accessed anytime, anywhere, for an immediate decision to open a new store, or to decide on an unproductive shop.
The culinary or food retail business also requires a Point of Sale application that can calculate the use of raw materials and calculate the cost of the purchase price automatically based on recipes or formulas. Thus you can analyze the remaining stock of raw materials as well as get profit information for each food product sold.
In the culinary franchise business, this is becoming increasingly important. Considering that as a franchise seller you need to monitor the franchisee’s shop, and provide improvement inputs based on transaction data that occurs. Thus your franchisee buyer will have a thriving business, and automatically as a franchisor, you will enjoy the results.
3. Fashion Retail Stores, Clothing Stores, Shoes, Eyewear and other Fashion
At fashion retail stores such as shoes, clothes, eyewear, sports equipment, and others, attention must be paid to the number of master items that can be handled by the POS system offered. This is because fashion retail stores have the characteristics of goods that are always new to follow trends, it is not surprising that the number of types of goods for this type of shop can reach tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, even in our experience to number millions of types of goods.
The ability to use a barcode reader (barcode scanner) is a must so that transactions can run quickly and not make customers wait. Barcode scanners also help you not to make a mistake in recording sales so your stock is always accurate.
Read: IREAP POS Lite and Pro support your fashion retail store using your android device
4. Barbershop, Salon, Clinic, and Beauty Services
Cashier application is very necessary for the type of service business/service such as barbershop, salon, beauty SPA business. Especially in the function of recording team members who perform services. For example, in the salon business, you need to record the name of the team that provides services for haircuts, or hair dye on each transaction, this is necessary so that you can analyze the performance of each of your team members in providing services.
This data is also needed to calculate the distribution of commissions or fees to the team according to the performance carried out.
5. Full Service Restaurants
If you have a full-service restaurant, functions for setting orders,
Management of order integration, order separation and payment is very important. Also the ability to print orders for multiple sheets for the needs of the bill and the needs of the food process in the kitchen.
6. Professional services such as photographer services, digital marketing services
Of the various types of retail businesses, this professional service business is the type that is still lagging behind in recording using the system. This is because the transactions that occur not often and the services provided are not too diverse. However, this type of business has challenges because in general indirect payments are made when the order is received. What happens is the customer will give a down payment, then after the work is complete, the remaining payment will be made. Thus, you need a system that helps to remind you about the time to make a bill, or when your bill is due. So that it can help your cash flow better.
Read: Use IREAP INVOICE to help you create invoice bills, and remind you when bills are due in your hands
So are some of the main functions of the Point of Sale application needed in accordance with the type of retail store or your business.
A Brief History of the POS System
This is the main reason a cashier system originally created, whether it uses a cash register machine or use application/software which aims to help record sales.
During the period 1888 to 1915 the cash register, clothed in fancy cast-metal. At this time the cash register was really only intended for recording sales transactions, so to this day the term Point of Sale/cash register system is still being used.
NCR Corporation, previously called the National Cash Register, is a company that pioneered cash register machines and cashier systems, since 1888 until today the company is more than 130 years old. More complete about the history of the NCR company in creating a cash register machine to become a Point of Sale application
Before the 1980s, the development of cashier and accounting applications continued to grow, but with the limitation that proprietary applications only ran for certain machines, this was also in line with developments in hardware and operating system.
The development of personal computers in the period 1990 to 2000 gave access to computers more affordable because it became cheaper and easier to use. The personal computer era brings convenience and opens up opportunities for many application development companies to develop cashier applications that are with more features, smarter, and inexpensive. So that various cashier applications are available with many choices and make the use of cashier systems in retail businesses a necessity or no longer a luxury item.
Entering the 21st century until now, with the development of the world that has been connected through the internet, and 2010 marks the beginning of the evolution of computer devices becoming smaller and in our hands/mobile using android or ios platforms.
This again gives new changes to the POS / Point of Sale application industry.
Currently, there are so many cash register applications that can run on mobile devices. Very simple to use, can be downloaded directly from your android device Google Play or Apple Store. Applications available from full free without any cost, a monthly fee at a low price so you do not need to invest at the beginning, as was the case in previous periods which required expensive special equipment costs.
Once the variety of cashier applications that exist today makes you able to choose according to your needs, do you only need the cashier application to record yourself as the owner and only need an offline cashier? Or you manage many stores up to hundreds of stores so you need an online function that can support consolidated reports from many stores automatically and in real-time.
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