What is a POS Terminal’s role in the sales process?
What is a POS terminal? POS stands for “point of sale” and the “terminal” is like a digital cash register that processes and logs transactions. Some POS terminals can monitor inventory and trends. Others, like the OTT Pay POS terminal, open up a World of PaymentsTM to merchants whose customers want to pay with their digital wallet.
What is a POS Terminal’s mechanism to accept payment?
Traditionally, it has been a card swiper for credit cards, debit cards and gift cards. But digital wallets are growing in popularity that require either an RFID reader or a QR Code reader.
Apple Pay and Google Pay are the most popular digital wallets in North America. If you do business in North America, your POS terminal probably already lets you accept both in-store and online, with your online store also accepting common forms of digital payments in North America like PayPal and Venmo.
But if neither your in-store nor online POS terminals accept international digital wallets, you may be leaving money on the table from global travelers or new immigrants who have money but want to pay their way. For example, Alipay and WeChat Pay are Chinese digital wallets with over a billion users each, including over 4 million users in the US. Rupay and Paytm are the go-to technologies in India, and GCash triumphs in the Philippines.
Depending on the industry you’re in, your POS terminal may also provide your customer an opportunity to leave a tip on top of their payment. And, when necessary, your POS terminal can also reverse charges or process refunds.
What is a POS Terminal’s optimum positioning in a store?
This would depend on the store, but it’s becoming more common for store employees to carry around mobile POS terminals they can bring to customers. The Apple Store was among the first retail environments to normalize this practice, and many have followed suit to (a) make the shopping experience faster (b) discourage waiting to pay so customers don’t have time to second-guess their intent to buy, and (c) avoid long lines cutting through the retail environment.
What is a POS Terminal’s method of security?
The EMV chip on credit cards combined with Near Field Communication (NFC) technology on the POS terminal keep fraud at bay by detecting counterfeit cards and flagging cards associated with NSF funds to cover the purchase. On the consumer side of security, these same systems ensure the card data isn’t stored in the merchant’s system.
What is a POS Terminal’s added value?
The right POS terminal can track inventory so you’re never out of what your customers want. It can also track and analyze customer spending habits so you know what to order more of and where to raise or lower prices.
As POS terminal technology evolves, customers are being introduced to ideas like POS terminals on shopping carts at grocery stores so consumers can pay for their purchases as they shop and never have to wait in line.
What is a POS Terminal’s to a vendor?
Over and above a way to get the money for goods and services sold, a POS terminal facilitates the last interaction a customer will have with a vendor in that particular transaction, which means it’s responsible for leaving the best impression.
If the purchasing process is slow or arduous or incomplete — meaning that the payment option a customer wanted is not offered — that customer will take that feeling with them and it could inform whether or not they come back. And given that half of consumers would abandon a purchase if they couldn’t use their preferred payment methods, it would make sense to invest in a POS terminal that offers more than settling for a POS terminal that does less.
What is a POS Terminal worth considering?
If you want to reduce abandoned orders and draw more customers to your front door or website, OTT Pay would be your best bet — especially because our solution automatically converts your customer’s payment into American or Canadian dollars.
We can provide you with a POS terminal and eCommerce solutions to accept all kinds of payment methods using an all-in-one World of Payments™ solution.
Unlock new markets with a POS terminal that opens the world to you and your business.