What is a Restaurant POS?
A restaurant point-of-sale system is the technology used by food and beverage companies to track their everyday tasks. A restaurant POS is a computer system that processes sales and orders and records daily activities in the food and beverage industries. This means that the restaurant POS is a primary record for how transactions are completed and how to operate a restaurant efficiently.
You can find a restaurant's POS system in any type of business, including cafés, convenience stores, restaurants, bars, or even food trucks that serve food.
How a restaurant POS is used?
The POS system is used throughout a restaurant's service cycle. Staff use the POS to take and modify orders, send tickets to the kitchen, & process customer payments. Depending on how your restaurants are set up, servers/cashiers can pick orders directly from the POS, and customers can pick them through a self-service ordering system or through an online ordering system.
Management & owners use the POS to track sales on a daily basis, monitor how well specific menu items are selling, and collect operational data for review purposes. Additionally, because all of the information is captured & stored within the POS system, you can generally access various reports, allowing you to recognise any trends & resolve any issues much more quickly in real-time.
What is included in a restaurant POS system?
While functionality varies by provider, a restaurant POS system typically includes a combination of software and hardware designed specifically for hospitality operations.
Some common components of a Restaurant POS system are-
- Order Management - Record & manage customer orders.
- Payment Processing - Allows and supports many payment methods.
- Menu setup- Allows the configuration of Item, Price, and Modifier types.
- Kitchen Communication - Send orders to Kitchen Printers and Display screens.
- Reporting Tools - Provide Sales Reports, Peak Time, and Menu Item Performance.
- Staff Controls - Manage user access, type, and activity.
Some POS systems will offer additional functions, such as inventory management, client databases, and integration with accounting or delivery services.
Why restaurants use POS systems?
The goal of a restaurant's POS system is to increase accuracy, speed, and uniformity during service. Automating the order entry process and then the payment process, which helps to reduce human error, improves communication between the front of the house and the back of the house.
From a management perspective, the restaurant's POS system will also provide valuable business performance visibility. Having access to sales data, item popularity, and operational metrics allows restaurant owners to make informed decisions about staffing, pricing, and menu design.
Types of restaurant POS setups
Restaurant POS systems can be customised to meet the needs of different types of service. A quick-service restaurant focuses on taking orders and high-volume sales, while a full-service establishment may have priorities of table management, split bill, and tipping.
Most modern systems are cloud-based, so that you can access your restaurant's data from anywhere and update the system without interrupting day-to-day operations.