POS Software Overview: Finding The Right Restaurant POS System
Overview: Restaurant POS Software
Compare the best point of sales systems and learn about online restaurant management software: for payment processing, order tracking, staff monitoring and more
Restaurant owners would do perfectly well a good restaurant POS system, but between the confusion of your restaurant software, hardware and peripherals, that old cash register brings relief to all.
Take note of this; that relief can even cause restaurant owners thousands and even more than the what it costs them on a POS system every month. Imagine having one central computer system that can track staff schedule, inventory, the orders, manages reservations system and can even accept orders from your website.
Restaurant POS hardware and Point of Sale Software
Your restaurant POS software, whether it’s an Aldelo, Aloha, FuturePOS or Micros, is the program that you run and not the touch-screen monitor, keyboards, mouse, printers and hand held devices. For high end purchase, you may want to investigate further before sealing a deal on the spot. You may find several vendors who offers very low prices for their POS software, disregarding to inform you that it will only work with their super expensive computers.
Note that a company that really works hard to provide good quality programs does not need to make a business of vending computer components. Or worse, lease computer components at high rates. When closing a deal, you need to investigate how much exactly it costs to pay for each component. Sure, that computer may only cost a month but after a year, it’s likely paid off at 0 and the client will still be paying for that lease after another year, so while technology changes the outdated equipment is still being charged as if it were new.
Managing Your Restaurant Online
If you can remotely access your system from another computer, wouldn’t that be a nice feature? Just imaging, watching the sunset on a beautiful beach resort with your laptop right beside you, watching your restaurant via a security camera. Click a few keys and check that labor percentage, pop off an email to the bar manager to remind him about the celebration party tonight.
Check the logs and see that the new server is online, too. She’s at home studying for her training exam. Well that’s good, they’re training during their off-hours. It is such a relief! Close that laptop and don’t worry too much, just sit back and enjoy the rest of your vacation.
Programming a Restaurant POS System
There are POS systems that are specifically designed to be programmed by the end user, which can really be intimidating at first. Check to see if their company has a list of consultants or other help for programming to help you out. A lot of companies that develops POS software work with the restaurant owner to make sure each menu item is entered carefully, tax rates are imported and that the staff is trained to use the system.
It would be a wise decision to search for these companies that offers this kind of service for free as you get started with your business. Charging for a refresher course after a year later really isn’t out of line but charging for initial training isn’t a requirement for every company.
Finding The Best POS System for your Restaurant
Every restaurant has different needs. A drive through ice cream shop will be needing less options compared to a family style restaurants. A restaurant bar and grill requires different features than of a coffee shop. Every restaurant differ when it comes to their needs. So it is best to send away for every information packet. Is there a warranty or guarantee? How about a trial period? Will it be able to work with your current credit card processor, or it or it needs a different one? Can you export sales data to your Quickbooks or other accounting software?
Weighing all of the hardware and software options before making a decision can save a restaurant owner from the stress and headache of ending up with a restaurant POS system that doesn’t fit the bill. Listen to every salesman’s 15 minute offer and review them carefully. And finally, you might want to consider the perspectives of other restaurant owners before deciding on which point of sale system you’re going to have.
The author of this article writes for POS-For-Restaurants.com – a VP of Customer Relations with over 20 years experience in the restaurant point of sale industry.
You can visit www.POS-For-Restaurants.com anytime for more information or advice about this topic, a Restaurant POS professional serving your area will be willing to answer your questions.
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