Mobile POS has been on the scene for a while now. It’s a straightforward concept – instead of running POS as a fixed asset in a fixed space in a store or restaurant, you use a tablet loaded with POS software to take point of sale wherever you want it to go.
Just like your standard iPad or Samsung Galaxy Tab makes computing mobile, so a mobile POS device uncouples point of sale from the need to be hooked up to wires and sat on a desk.
It’s an ultra flexible solution that lets businesses take service to the customer, rather than expecting them to come and line up every time for the privilege of handing over their dollars.
Mobile POS is making a big splash in the restaurant trade, as it is right across hospitality and beyond. Here are five ways mobile POS can make a difference to how your restaurant is run.
Make service more efficient
Imagine how many times the average server walks back and forth between a table, the POS cash register, and the kitchen during the course of a single meal sitting – to fetch a pad to write the order on, to take the order, to pass the order to the kitchen, to get the check, to pass the check to the customer, to get the card reader etc.
Now multiply that by all the journeys made by every server to every table in the course of a day, week, month or year.
Quite simply, mobile POS cuts down how many times servers have to move back and forth to tables. They can take orders, check the menu and send requests through to the kitchen, all on a single visit. They can provide the total owed and take payment in one. All of this adds up to more efficient service, which means faster service, greater throughput, more customers served.
Support innovative, dynamic dining options
The old fixed categories of food service are breaking down. Diners want more choice than ever before, and they want it right there, wherever they happen to be. Mobile POS allows restaurateurs, bar, and cafe owners to innovate in how they reach their customer base. It allows them to take dining to the people, in the form of pop-up cafes, food trucks, street food stalls etc.
With mobile POS, wherever you go, you can process payments and keep offering great service.
Save on counter space
For small cafes and boutique restaurants where counter real estate is at a premium, mobile POS saves valuable space. Why take up a corner with a big POS terminal if you can do everything you need on a tablet?
Improve communication with the kitchen
With mobile POS, every order can be input at the table and instantly sent to a kitchen display system, where it is automatically organized and displayed for the kitchen team to prepare each meal. There’s no gap at all from order being taken to it either being input into the POS or passed on to the kitchen, no time for it to get mixed up with other orders, no chance for something to be misinterpreted or forgotten.
Boost loyalty
In the restaurant trade, loyalty and reward schemes are often activated after the meal when the customer pays, when a member of the serving team asks them if they have a points card or just for their name or email. But at this point, any rewards they might have earned are obsolete until their next visit – they’ve already finished their meal. With mobile POS, the server can go to the customer at the start of their visit, ask their name or for their card, and once the order is input, instantly tell them if they qualify for a discount or some other reward. That makes restaurant loyalty schemes that much more attractive, that element of instant gratification.