POS (Point of Sale) Systems

When we talk about the point of sale or POS, we refer to the moment that a customer checks out and gets ready to pay for a product or a service that they purchased. In the past, POS systems only consisted of cash registers and pen-and-paper inventories.

Over time, this grew to include cash registers and POS hardware like barcode scanners. Most modern-day businesses depend on a POS system that comprises these. In order to consolidate their sales data with their inventory management and accounting, entrepreneurs from these businesses usually use individual spreadsheets from separate programs.

But given how quickly the consumer industry has evolved, it’s high time for companies to evolve their current POS systems as well. If you work in the retail industry, the hospitality industry, the food and beverage industry, or any other sector that sees a fast pace of consumer activity, you may have acknowledged the need for change. Your current POS system may be outdated, and your means of accounting for all the items you’ve sold may be slow, difficult, and prone to inaccuracy.

What can you do for your business if you want to improve the way you manage your sales, inventory, and accounting? One viable solution is to upgrade to a new POS system. An integrated solution may be better at serving the needs of your business. It’s just a matter of finding a POS that’s both cost-effective and perfectly tailor-fit to your business requirements.

Learn more about POS systems, the ideal features on a POS solution, and how a modern-day POS can improve your revenues. Enlist a POS vendor like ANSI Information Systems to implement a solution that’s just right for your business!

What Is a POS System?

In simple terms, a POS system consists of a mix of hardware and software that helps your business complete sales activities. When a customer buys an item from you, the POS system calculates the item’s price. Next, the transaction is finalized upon the customer’s payment for their item.

This may sound rather straightforward in theory. But in practice, it gets harder to manage payments, keep track of inventory, and align sales data with company finances the more intricate the business environment is. This especially applies in the digital era now that more businesses are taking advantage of omnichannel sales opportunities. These businesses need POS systems that are capable of streamlining their sales, inventory, and accounting numbers all in one place. Luckily, most modern-day POS systems have strong digital components and are capable of doing much more than their older counterparts.

A digital POS system allows a customer to check out and purchase an item any time that the POS itself is available. And in the case of transactions done via mobile app or ecommerce website, purchases can be completed on a 24/7 basis. As you can imagine, the POS system’s round-the-clock availability and seamless integration with your store’s inventory, sales, and accounting data will open a lot of doors for you. You’ll be able to close sales from multiple channels, and it will be much easier for you and your staff to manage the numbers.

To run a digital POS system with all-in-one functionality, all your business needs is the following:

The POS software itself;
Additional POS hardware like a cash drawer, barcode scanner, credit card reader, and receipt printer, and;
Internet-enabled devices, such as computers, laptops, tablets, or mobile phones.

The definition for what constitutes a POS system has definitely changed over the years. You’ll benefit the most from an up-to-date solution that can accommodate your evolving needs.

Key Features of a POS System

Though there are different types of POS system, most solutions have several things in common. Key features that you want in your own POS include the following:

Payment Processing Feature

The payment processing feature is one of the most important features on a POS. This feature is responsible for facilitating transactions and managing various types of payment. You’ll want a POS system that can process cash, credit card, debit card, contactless payments, and the other types of payments that you accept in your store. Fast, smooth, and reliable payment processing is the hallmark of a great POS system.

Inventory Management Feature

The second key feature on a POS system is its inventory management feature. Every time a sale is made, this feature is responsible for scanning products, doing a digital count of them, and updating the store’s inventory in real-time. The inventory management feature should also enable the POS to perform advanced inventory-related tasks, such as sorting items by size, shape, flavor, or color. It would also be good if your POS system’s inventory management feature can notify you when certain items are running low, thus allowing you to stock popular items in a timely manner.

Reporting Feature

Another handy feature that you can find on a modern-day POS system is its reporting feature. This allows the POS to generate sales reports that tell you about your business’s financial health and how much money you’re making on a day-to-day basis. Thanks to a feature like this one, there will be no need for you and your staff to calculate the numbers manually or to cull the data from separate program files. The POS system will be able to consolidate the numbers for every channel you use to make sales.

Receipt Management Feature

Some POS systems also come with a receipt management feature. This feature creates digital paper trails for each transaction, and it comes in handy whenever the store needs to issue refunds to customers.

Promotions Management Feature

POS systems can grant businesses added flexibility when it comes to pricing specific products and creating promotional deals for their customers. When certain products aren’t selling as well as others, it’s possible to set custom prices to entice customers into buying these discounted items. This feature even allows you to create special promotional packages that comprises various products at a set price.

Customer Relationship Management Feature

Yet another feature that can appear on a POS system is a customer relationship management (CRM) feature. The CRM feature on a POS system will allow you to keep data on customer profiles, thus providing you with valuable information like which items the customer buys often and when they tend to make high-value purchases. As a result, your business will be able to use the data to implement more customized marketing approaches. Some examples of these are offering birthday promos to specific customers or inviting loyal customers to participate in rewards points programs.

Employee Management Feature

It’s also not uncommon for modern POS systems to have an employee management feature. This can help the business’s management committee perform human resources-related functions, like logging employee shift hours as the basis for their payroll. It’s also possible to use the POS system to incentivize excellent sales performances. Your POS system can identify which employees were on shift when you made the highest sales for the month, and you can boost company morale by rewarding these hard workers.

Types of POS Systems

There are different types of POS system available in the market, and you will need to find out which kind is best suited for your business. Some examples of the POS types you can choose are the following:

Terminal POS Systems

Terminal POS systems are what most people envision when the term “POS” comes to mind. These are run from individual counters and utilize traditional POS hardware like barcode scanners. Nowadays, most terminal POS systems have access to the internet. It’s also possible to operate high-tech cloud solutions from these simple terminals.

Tablet POS Systems

As the term indicates, these POS systems can be run from tablets using mobile operating systems like Android. They can also be integrated with external POS hardware such as cash drawers. One very useful thing about tablet POS systems is that they can be operated either from a tablet stand or carried around by personnel. That’s why it’s common to see these in food and beverage establishments like restaurants, cafes, juice bars, ice cream shops, and the like.

Mobile POS Systems

It’s also quite possible to run a POS from a device as small as a smartphone. These mobile POS systems are great for entrepreneurs that need to be on their feet while making sales. They can be used at pop-up events, fairs, farmer’s markets, and other similar situations. They’re best suited for businesses that don’t have a lot of inventory to handle.

Online POS Systems

There’s also the option to pursue an entirely online POS system with no hardware involved. Businesses that deal exclusively in ecommerce will benefit from these solutions for their simplicity and low start-up costs.

Self-Service Kiosk POS Systems

One type of POS technology that’s recently become popular in the Philippines is the self-service kiosk. These self-service kiosks house POS systems that can attend to customer orders even if the person isn’t directly in front of business staff. Some kiosks even allow you to scan products you wish to buy and pay for them from a self-service checkout terminal. You may have already seen these kiosks in operation in quick service restaurants, and in other countries, they’re used to sell items like tickets.

Multi-Channel POS Systems

Lastly, there are POS systems that can seamlessly integrate sales, inventory, and accounting data from multiple channels. Whether you’re making sales from a physical storefront or from your online store, this POS will consolidate the numbers for you in real-time. If your business has gone the route of omnichannel sales, a POS that can streamline all your sales per channel is an absolute must-have.

The Benefits of Using a POS System

One of the best things you can do for your company is to upgrade your current setup to a more modern POS system. A trustworthy vendor like ANSI Information Systems will help you roll out a new POS system and thus allow you to enjoy the following benefits:

Greater Mastery Over Your Sales Data

The most important thing that a POS system will grant for you is a bird’s eye view over your sales data. That means that you don’t have to waste any time simply getting your sales, inventory, and accounting numbers to match up. They’ll be consolidated for you on a daily basis, and you’ll be able to use this complete set of sales data to make key decisions for your company. You won’t have as hard a time when you’re strategizing about how to increase your revenues and how to make your business even more valuable.

Better Management of Your Inventory in Real-Time

Another key benefit of a POS system is that it will allow you to monitor and manage your store’s inventory quickly and efficiently. Entrepreneurs know how difficult inventory management is, especially when there are a lot of items to account for. A POS system will take the hassle out of doing manual inventory and enable you and your staff to do fast and accurate digital counts. With greater control over your stock, you’ll be able to replenish your items in a timely manner and stock up on items that have become popular. Any slower moving stocks can also be identified and placed on sale or on a promotional deal to help move them.

Greater Clarity Over Your Financial Situation

A modern-day POS system also offers you the chance to gather up-to-date business intelligence. Its report generation feature will give you an instant glimpse of your business’s day-to-day financial health. Since you don’t have to wait long to get accurate updates on your money matters, you can move faster when it comes to deciding on important financial interventions.

Lower Costs of Doing Business

Though a POS system upgrade may seem expensive at first, it will definitely lower the cost of doing business for you in the long run. For one, you and your staff will be spending much less time on separate accounting or inventory management tasks. Your hands will be free to attend to other tasks, like customer service or marketing. In addition, with a POS system that can crunch the numbers accurately for you, you’ll end up with fewer costs due to human error. More money will flow into your business coffers because you and your staff will be even better at your job than before.

More Coordination and More Flexibility Over Your Sales Channels

Lastly, a modern POS system will increase your flexibility when selling from different channels. It will allow you to accept various types of payment and make round-the-clock sales from wherever your customers are. With a dedicated POS system, you can ensure that your sales performances across your website, app, and physical store are all in sync.

Industries That Use POS Systems

Several industries depend on their POS systems for their day-to-day business activities. Here are some examples of the kinds of businesses we serve at ANSI:

The Retail Industry

Retail stores are heavily reliant on their POS systems. The bigger the retail establishment is, the more dependent it is on the functions of a robust POS system. The POS system integrates sales and inventory data and ensures that these two mutually linked items are always aligned and up to date. If you’re part of the retail industry, purchase a scalable POS solution from ANSI that fits the size and operations of your business.

The Restaurant Industry

Another industry that cannot do without POS systems is the restaurant industry. Aside from helping restaurant personnel with sales and inventory, POS systems can also assist them in managing orders and keeping tabs. If you are a restaurateur, you can look through ANSI’s offerings for POS systems that are tailor-made for your industry.

The Hospitality and Personal Care Industries

The hospitality and personal care industries have also been transformed by the evolution of the POS system. This includes hotels, resorts, beauty salons, nail parlors, and spas. For establishments like these, POS systems help them account for the sale of accommodations or specialty services. If you have business interests in either the hospitality or the personal care industry, you will want to check out the POS systems available at ANSI.

Pharmacy Industry

Managing a pharmacy or a drug store can be a big challenge with all of the different prescription medicines that are being sold and accounted for on a daily basis. The inventory levels of each medication need to be carefully monitored so that the pharmacy doesn’t run out at any given time. Having a POS system, like those provided by ANSI, to manage all of this inventory can be a huge boon those managing the establishment.

Hardware Industry

Similar to the retail industry, hardware products and components involve the movement of large amounts of inventory. Businesses that deal in hardware seek to fulfill orders from other companies and will need an extensive POS system to help them manage all of these orders. ANSI can provide a comprehensive POS system that can match your hardware business’s needs.

Why Do Philippine Businesses Need POS Systems?

Simply put, the way Filipino companies are doing business is changing. Many businesses have expanded their operations to include both brick-and-mortar and online sales. A good number have also invested in ecommerce websites and mobile apps in a bid to reach more customers.

That said, Filipino businesses need up-to-the-minute solutions for streamlining their sales, accounting, and inventory-related data all in one place. A dedicated POS system fulfills that need. It also allows a Filipino entrepreneur to have better clarity and insight on their business operations. If the POS system can give them an accurate glimpse of their sales, they will be more empowered to make critical decisions about inventory management, sales strategies, and customer relationship management.

At ANSI Information Systems, we believe that this technology shouldn’t be exclusive to big businesses. In fact, POS systems would be most advantageous to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) that want to increase their agility and their potential for expansion.

ANSI’s current repertoire of solutions includes self-order kiosks, mobile POS systems, POS systems that are safe for use in gas stations, POS systems for restaurants, and POS systems dedicated to retail management (inclusive of hardware). Simply let us know what business you’re involved in, and we’ll help you choose which one to implement!

Let ANSI Transform Your Business Using a POS System

Your choice of vendor can matter just as much as your choice of POS system. The vendor is responsible for onboarding the solution and integrating it with the rest of your business hardware and software. If implementation is done in a haphazard manner, it can be extremely costly and tiresome on your company. As such, you’ll want the services of a vendor you can trust.

For exceptional service, extensive support, and broad knowledge of how to implement different POS solutions for different business types, choose ANSI Information Systems as your vendor. Over the last 30 years that we’re been in operation, we’ve developed a custom approach to rolling out POS systems for our customers. We have a knack for determining what businesses need, and we help them use their new POS technology to realize their individual business goals.

ANSI’s recent achievements include SAP Gold Partner distinctions from 2014 to 2017, Epson TOP BSSI Platinum Partner awards from 2015 to 2017, and a Toshiba Solution Developer award in 2015. But we are proudest of our reputation for being user-friendly, for being good at aligning our solutions with client requirements, and for providing the kind of support that our customers look for.

We can promise you the same approach if you choose us for your POS implementation. Whether you need a fixed POS system or an online platform that integrates with your existing POS and sell products remotely, we’ll impart our technical expertise regarding the solution. We’ll make also sure that you and your staff are comfortable with the new technology by providing proper training and documentation in its use. Eventually, you’ll be able to use your new POS technology to grow your revenues and to future-proof your business for the modern era.

Get to know the products on our website, and schedule an appointment with us to discuss the particulars of its implementation. Let ANSI transform your business for the better using up-to-the-minute POS solutions!

Interested? Send us an email.

"*" indicates required fields