34 replies to this topic

[Tom]

I would like to purchase a POS system/ Retail software combo for my mart. Do you have any suggestions? Most of the transactions will be selling goods and some of them will be inventory control. My shop is not a chain , am not looking for immediate expansion.

Also any nice merchant services, some of them i have read about paymenttech and merchant connect.

[Plump_and_Juicy]

Welcome to the site Tom. I don't have an answer for you, but I hope someone else does.

[kamind]

Hi Tom

I'll drop you an email off list with my contact info.

There are a bunch of different Point of Sale solutions, but the Microsoft one I think is one of the better systems on the market (we have used a few over the years), and it is rock solid (less support calls:-)). I'm a local Microsoft reseller in the portland area (www.kamind.net) .

The Microsoft link is: http://www.microsoft...em/Default.mspx


Matt Katzer
http://www.kamind.net

[PDXWine]

I'm no expert and am not making a recommendation, but at http://www.remotemgr.com you can check out some software that supposedly streamlines all the needs of a small food service business. I am not connected with them in any way. Just one more piece of information.

[Sabra]

I too am interested in the Point of Sale system and any other alternatives. I'll check out the sites given and am sure I'll be in touch. A question, someone suggested it is practical (when have a small retail situtation) to rent a POS vs. buy it.

Any comments?

Sabra

[superdog]

Dear Sabra and Tom,
For us, which POS depends on how much entering into my PC that we want to do. The fancy POS system that can link up with a PC, with some window base software that can "suck" the info from the POS and automagically "spit" out a nice report cost a few grand. We decided on a Samsung system my husband used to own and know how to program it. It is usually more efficient to hire someone to program your cash register, and it usually cost about $200-$300 dollars. Consolidated Business machine inc has a lot of selection of POS, and they have programmers for some of the POS. Here is their website:
http://www.cbmpos.com/html/home.html

We bought our POS on Ebay, and it can be a good way to go if you know what you want.

Hope this helps!

Ellen

[Sabra]

Thank you, Ellen, for the info. I will ponder it .

And, thanks for your earlier recommendation regarding insurance. I just spoke with Brad at Nielson and will be getting a quote from him. Seems like a nice and knowledgeable guy.

Sabra

[Tom]

Thank you all for your suggestions. I have visited the recommended sites and now I am confused if the recommendation is to use a embedded system or a regular PC.

[Tom]

Sams club has Quick books POS v 6.0, with HW & SW for < 1400$. But why does Quick book say POS is not good for grocery store, also why is the HW given by sams club, not good.

https://www.samsclub.......&pCatg=5843

any comments welcome, that will help me make the right decision

anyone using this for a grocery or convenience store

[jenn@cheftucker's]

Hmm... Have any of you heard of POSitive technoligies?? If so, I would like to know what you know about them!

[kamind]

When you take the hardware away, there are two solutions for retail and restaurant that we use. In the retail space, you want to look at something like Microsoft RMS POS. In the restaurant space, you will want to look at something like Dinnerware POS.

Retail POS are not designed for a server/bank model, but are designed for inventory. Restaurant POS are designed for a server/bank model but not designed for inventory (both do inventory but different concepts in how you handle inventory).


The MS RMS POS is about $1400 (www.kamind.net) a lane, Dinerware (www.dinerware.com) runs about $900 a station. Intuit runs about $800 a lane. there is a singel lane MSsolution called MS POS (~695).

ON top of the software you add the hardware cost and what other IT stuff you want to add. The cost is pretty much the same for any implementation.


For restaurant POS, we have been using paneltech for our customers, since there is a 3 year deport return/replacement for the units. Retail stores, we use Dell equipment (sometimes panel tech) with a 3 yr next day business service. Back office systems are fault tolerant workstations (or server) so you do not lose your data.

Matt
www.kamind.net

[The Horse Radish]

Shortly I will be opening a cheese (retail) and wine bar . . . and it has been suggested that I lease a POS system . . . does your company do that too?

[ExtraMSG]

The other POS thread focused mainly on retail. I'm going to decide on a POS system for us here very soon. The three leading candidates are:

Micros
Dinerware
Aldello

Micros is one of the accepted industry leaders, but seems expensive and locks you into using their hardware and support, I think. Also, I'm not sure their backend is transparent meaning I'm stuck with their reporting, etc. No demo to try out and very little online info. I'm mainly considering this based on a rec.

Dineware and Aldelo seem about the same. I've downloaded each of their demos and used them a bit. I don't see one as being easier to use or better than the other. If my sources are correct, though, Dinerware is about twice the cost of Aldelo. Both of these though would be a SIGNIFICANT savings over Micros. A system for either of these two would be under $10k complete, from what I've gathered, wheras with Micros it sounds like it would cost over twice that. I know Fenouil uses Dinerware and Siam Society uses Aldelo.

So, any opinions? Anyone used these or others and love/hate them? Anything to watch out for? For something so many businesses and people use, there sure is little information on them.

Some other restaurant POS systems that I haven't looked into too much:

Squirrel
Aloha
Digital Dining
Rest-Ez
QuickPOS
Restaurant PRO
Maitre'D
Sunsoft
PindePOS
SelbySoft

[RR & SP]

Aldelo is easy to use. There support gets back on time.

One feature I didn't like - the way they calculate Tips at EOD , makes it so difficult to account. I don't know if this is the same with other softwares. In Aldelo, Total Sales shown is = Total Sales - Tips. After paying the tips (both card and cash ), the balance petty cash shown is negative. I have not still figured out how it works.

[Joisey]

At my last gig we decided to go with Squirrel, it seemed pretty user friendly. If you want a demo, I can put you in touch with the sales rep.

[ExtraMSG]

Thanks for the input, all of you.

More important than a demo, I'd be interested to hear what annoyances came up or if there was a feature you especially liked about it -- stuff I wouldn't really notice until I used it for weeks.

[Friends @CM]

I don think Adelo is more expensive, its certainly not that expensive. the SW is around $375 and support for a year is about the same. Its typically very easy to setup and use, it also has built in inventory system as well which can use auto depleation features to help you with ordering when you are selling stuff automatically.

You can get any system off the shelf, you dont get locked into any hw/sw solution. The most difficult part was to setup the EPSON TmIII thermal printer and the U220 kitchen printers. Their setup is not intutive and have not kept up with normal advances with drivers from microsoft..

All you need is
- A decent PC, 2G ram (if you need to run wireless handheld) i was looking at it, need Server SW in that case and would add more to cost as well.
- Pole display
- thermal printer
- kitchen printer.

if you need another station, you only need a computer and pole, printers could be network shared, but you might think you need a thermal for receipts separate.

The other annoances i found are:

- Cant get a summary by day of week sales figures. Although since its built on MS access database, there are others who can help with this. I posted this question to their user forum, and some consultant volunteered to get this number. It wasnt priced to my liking, so i ignored :-)

- Credit card processing, you would need to use verifone PC Charge (which they now claim they dont support). if you use NOVA, you can still use PC charge, it works without any kinks)

They have their own EDC support, but i dont think it supports very many vendors at the moment and you dont want to pick someone whose rates you dont like.

- Their sw dont have a Debit card button (there is one, but never dare to use it), it just assume you are using an external authorization, but doesnt submit charges to CC company. So even if your vendor offers a lower % for debit, all CC get same rate, which sucks. (We lost some money since employees didnt know about this that they need to run as normal credit card even if its a debit), but there is an option to remove the button which is what i did eventually.


Verifone PC CHarge for CC processing.

Another archane sw from the old times.. the worst part is submitting batches every night is not automatic. There is an utility they give you, it works for the most part, but doenst work like a normal systray application. if it ever pops up my mistake, and someone using it kills by clicking on the X to remove the window, it will completely disappear instead of running in the systray. I have complained enough, but they seem reluctant.

Biggest issue is if you forget to submit batches the same day, Nova charges everthing as unqualified rate, hence increasing your % you pay for them.

(another one you may not know.. when customers submit reward cards, you merchant pay the price for their rewards :-), its typically .25c per transaction and ~3.35% on top. that really sucks).

Good luck,

Post your experiences, or consolidated one when you get close.

[Joisey]

Spoke to my wife about Squirrel, she says absolutely do not go with them. Mostly customer service and tech support issues, but also they pretty much hold you hostage to one CC processing company.

[ExtraMSG]

Thanks.