A central portion of brick and mortar business is the till, but there is more than 1 kind: cash registers and POS systems.
Cash registers used to control modest stores, but electronic points of sale (EPOS), or POS systems as we will call them , are actually more cost-effective oftentimes. That having been said, a shop that mostly accepts cash payments might prefer a cash register.
Let us look at the key differences between a POS system and cash register, end with our take on who must choose what.
As its name suggests, a cash register is a piece of gear for registering money payments. A cash register just handles payment operations in the till. It’s not connected to a computerised EPOS system, and it’s limited what other until hardware it can integrate with straight.
Though the built-in money drawer clearly makes it perfect as an all-in-one solution for money payments, it is possible to enter card transactions too by simply pushing the appropriate button, once you have processed the card transaction on an independent card machine. Receipts, also, are printed from the cash register.
To sum up key attributes:
- Contains a cash drawer
- Normally electronic with a screen for seeing what you have entered
- Occasionally with customer-facing display
- Integrations with additional hardware and features restricted
A POS system is a lot wider in characteristics than a cash register. Instead of being a till system with inbuilt cash drawer and printer, a POS system consists of different hardware components which are connected up. For this to work, you need EPOS software which operates in conjunction with your preferred equipment.
While the principal purpose is to process payments, a POS system can also be a system of company features connected with your till transactions. This includes stock library with inventory levels that automatically update when you market goods, real time reports available from a remote computer, staff timesheets and client library with loyalty attributes.
Quite simply, it can help you to manage your business better, meaning less manual work and more resources to analyse the way to sell more. These are the key characteristics of POS systems:
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- Gear and POS applications that form a till system
- Characteristics help you manage your business, not just procedure sales
- Until buttons are on a touchscreen
- Software runs on a pc, tablet computer or mobile device
- Includes backend management functions obtained on a computer or in an Internet browser
Typically comprised of different till display, cash drawer, receipt printer, barcode scanner and card system
Gear, software and costs
The most evident differences between cash registers and POS systems would be the costs and hardware parts. What are the physical differences between both till systems?
A cash register has the cheapest start-up cost.
Want to learn more about prices?
Here Is What a POS system costs including everything
Cash registers do not want electronic point of sale (EPOS) applications, as the digital functions are built into the system. You do not pay for that on a continuous basis — but then, you do not become continuing customer support if you don’t pay for that support. By comparison, POS systems located in the cloud (many small-business POS now ) are subscription-based, including ongoing customer care.
Finally, card payments are an excess cost in both cases. Some POS systems comprise card processing via their card readers, but others ask you to establish a card approval contract from elsewhere. In the latter case, you might have the ability to integrate your preferred card terminal to the system if it’s a compatible payment firm, or only use the card system independently and manually enroll successful card transactions in the EPOS system.
Cash registers do not integrate with card machines, so you are free to select both a card machine and card processing and use that next to the cash register. When you then input a purchase, you select card as payment method and might place a duplicate copy of this card machine receipt to the till drawer to demonstrate the payment went through.
A means to differentiate cash registers from POS systems is always to find out what they can do in the till point.
A cash register can do the most crucial till functions a merchant would need. It takes cash, card and cheques payments, and if you get one with a barcode scanner, you can also scan the barcodes of merchandise that you have stored on the cash register.
POS systems typically permit you to save unlimited products, categories, options (e.g. size, color ) and pictures to show on the POS screen. This is a lot more adaptable as it can be altered any time in the display, as opposed to a cash register which needs you to save everything on an SD card. It is possible to use worker IDs on a cash register, but POS systems let you set individual permissions for each staff account and monitor shifts and sales by worker also.
Cashing-up reports with sales totals by department and tender — known as Z reports — could be published on cash registers, as can anytime earnings reports called X reports. Receipts can be customised on a cash register, but just portions of the text could be edited. You can usually add company logo on a POS system receipt, and any text you desire.
What job do POS systems and cash registers play in the grand scheme of company operations? In the former instance: rather a lot.
You can pretty much esteem a cash register as different from inventory monitoring, vendor management, accounting, customer loyalty initiatives, online shop and whatever else you’ve got to do in order to run a shop. POS systems can do all of those things (to varying degrees, based on preferred applications ), whether from the prior display, remote computer or mobile device if using a cloud-based POS system.
If you are running a restaurant, the cash register will not do you many favours. A POS system with hospitality EPOS, on the other hand, will have tableside ordering connected to transactions, fixing tracking, table bookings and much more.
Some POS systems even have invoicing and telephone payments contained in their offering — not to mention the extra tools it is possible to incorporate with or upgrade to, depending on service provider.
What should you pick?
Now you know the key differences, what should you choose to go for: cash register or POS system?
All these are reasons to go to get a cash register:
- Your net is not reliable, so need a system that operates offline
- You are a retail store with less than 2000 products
- You take more money than cards
- You simply want one machine to register transactions and save coins, bank notes and Tiny documents
- You do not mind managing businesses operations like staff and inventory management manually
- You Need a future-proof till system that is highly customisable
- You are running a complex business like a restaurant with table service or inventory-heavy retail shop
- You Need to automate business processes, finally spend less time on manual work
- You Need to eliminate human errors by allowing the system monitor sales and stock for you
- Your net is secure (for cloud POS), or you can afford setup in your premises (for onsite POS)