With the internet, the way in which we do business has
immensely changed. From retail stores, we came towards online trading and
marketing. Shopping online has become the buzz of the day with many new
companies opening up or shifting to e-commerce. Since then, technology has only
gone forward, improving the accuracy and time taken to do business online.
Today, on an average, every 11 hour a new technology is cropping up in
different parts of the world.
The improvement in connectivity across systems has
helped us to go paperless in almost everything that we do. Sales also has transformed
itself into its new avatar- that of POS. It is the new buzz in restaurants and
other places where the idea is to go for less manpower and at the same time,
more accuracy and a faster speed. The POS or ‘point of sale’ system, as it is
elaborately known as, makes it possible for the vendor to go up to the client
and place the order on the spot, allowing for last minute editing and deleting.
This saves the valuable time of waiting, since the vendor does not have to take
the order, come back and make the bill, followed by the order going to the
kitchen. In POS, the order once finalized is immediately update to the kitchen
as well as the bill counter.
Since it is a new system, the employees need to be
trained on the use of different hardware systems that together make up an
efficient POS system. Connectivity among the POS hardware systems is of utmost necessity, as the efficiency of
the system depends on this only. A break in connectivity can not only oppose
the very objective of POS system, but also lead to complexity.
The collection of POS
hardware essentially includes the following items:-
(i)
POS terminal, which may be touchscreen
(ii)
Receipt scanner
(iii)
Receipt paper
(iv)
Barcode scanner
(v)
Cash drawer
(vi)
Credit card reader
(vii)
Customer display
(viii)
Payment terminal
The above are the basic essentials that have to be
connected through a wire or wireless connectivity system using a server. The
intranet system, thus developed, maintains the sequencing of events on the
different terminals, thus enforcing cohesiveness among the stakeholders. It is,
however an easy thing to control. After initial installation, a short training
can make the employees get used to the intranet and server system, and items and
functions can be edited, added or deleted by an employee only. The master
control can be with the manager or employer.
Besides the above listed POS hardware systems, there can be certain more equipment that may
be added to make it faster and efficient. These are basically required for
bigger enterprises where a large floor area is to be covered or the number of
employees and clients are huge at a particular time of the day. Large retail
stores, jewelry and boutique houses generally employ these like signature
capture pad, MICR check reader, and scale or POS cash register system. With
growing demand, these equipment are getting cheaper and cheaper in order for
the small and medium enterprises to go for them.
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