The 5 Best Point-of-Sale Systems for Small Businesses

What does a POS system do? The best POS systems combine payment processing, inventory and customer management, payroll and accounting, and other services into powerful POS hardware and software packages.

But if you’ve done any online searches for POS systems yourself, you’ve likely discovered something overwhelming: there’s a staggering pile of POS system software to choose from. Search no more. Instead, let us recommend the best POS for small businesses.

Square POS doesn’t have a monthly fee, and the company keeps its transaction fees pretty simple (for the most part):

• Tapped, dipped, and swiped payments: 2.6% + 10¢
• Keyed-in and card-on-file payments: 3.5% + 15¢
• Square Register (purchased before 8/20/19) payments: 2.5% + 10¢

That being said, Square offers other plans geared for certain types of businesses. With Square for Restaurants, for example, you get POS software that’s geared specifically for restaurant use. The downside? The plan costs $60 per month for each of your locations, plus an extra $40 per month for each additional POS system you use.

Square for Retail plans have the same monthly fees as the Square for Restaurants plan, but they come with discounted transaction fees (2.5% + 10¢ for in-person payments). And if your business is more service-oriented and has multiple employees, Square Appointments plans offer lower transaction rates (2.5% + 10¢) and flexible monthly pricing. Specifically, businesses with two to five employees pay $50 per month, while businesses with six to ten employees pay $90 per month.

Vend offers a comprehensive and customizable point-of-sale suite solution for retail business. Vendo isn’t quite as fully featured as Square and doesn’t offer a free subscription. But with plans that start at $99 per month, you get in-depth inventory, customer, and accounting management in a professional and impressive package.

Features on the basic plan include two employee accounts, a custom domain and website, shipping label printing, security and fraud tools, and 24/7 customer service. Shopify also provides integrated inventory control and order shipping tools, plus moderate discounts on shipping rates through partnerships with the US Postal Service, UPS, and DHL.

Unfortunately, you have few reporting options with the Basic Shopify plan. So for more advanced analytics, lower processing fees, marketing automation, and better discounts, you’ll need to upgrade to the more expensive plans.

Still, for retail businesses that want a straightforward POS system for online and in-person sales, Shopify packs a potent punch.

Springboard Retail recently merged with Heartland retail and is now called Heartland Retail. According to Heartland’s website, “with this cloud-based Retail Point of Sale solution becoming part of Heartland, we can continue to scale and support the outstanding product Springboard Retail has built, and continue to grow our customer family of more than 100,000 retail customers.”2

Heartland Retail has packages that start at $80 a month and include multi-location support, customer management, and advanced inventory and purchasing features. It’s a point-of-sale system designed specifically with retail in mind, giving it an edge over more general offerings.

It’s true that the prices are a bit complicated. But if you’re a QuickBooks user for accounting and payroll, you can’t find a better solution for integrating those services into your POS system. And with QuickBooks hardware and software, you can take any type of payment from just about any device—barcode scanner, touch screen terminal, iPad, or mobile reader.

QuickBooks locks a lot of its services into the higher-priced plans—a definite downside. Integrated inventory and employee management, customer loyalty programs, and multi-store management all require purchasing the more expensive plans.

Using Intuit’s accounting software but with a different iPad POS solution? TouchBistro—an iPad-based POS system tailored to restaurants, bars, and breweries—partners with Shogo to provide integrated QuickBooks accounting services. TouchBistro also provides unique floor plan, table, and menu management, as well as CRM features.

There are dozens more POS system options for businesses to choose from. While the ones above represent our favorites, we like three more that are worth mentioning:

A point-of-sale, or POS, system is the hardware and software that allows a business to process customer payments for products and services. Specifically, point-of-sale refers to the physical place where the transaction happens.

Traditionally, POS systems were physical cash registers that accepted only cash, checks, and credit cards. The term also includes receipt printers, cash drawers, barcode scanners, and other devices.

Modern mobile point-of-sale (mPOS) software and credit card readers let businesses use mobile devices, like iPads, to process customer payments from almost anywhere. And many POS systems are capable of accepting almost any type of payment, including contactless payments like Apple Pay and Google Pay.

POS systems now do more than just process payments. Many products, including the ones we have reviewed here, serve as essential business hubs that handle everything from inventory, customer, and employee management to accounting, payroll, and shipping services.

Modern POS systems include a variety of features that help you manage your day-to-day business operations. Features vary by product, but here are some of the most common POS system features:

• Payment processing: This is the hardware and software required to accept customer payments. Your POS system may include terminals, credit card readers, barcode scanners, cash drawers, and online ecommerce platforms.
• Accounting and payroll: Your POS system may include accounting services or integrate with third-party software like QuickBooks. Manage your costs, revenues, invoices, and payroll to keep track of your business and find opportunities to improve profits.
• Inventory management: Many POS systems help you keep track of your product inventory, allowing you to enter specific details about each item you sell and track your product receiving, sales, and shipping.
• Employee management: Employees can clock in, process payments, and enter product and customer information with these features. And you can track staff schedules, productivity, sales activity, and more.
• Reporting and analytics: Gain valuable insights into your business with reporting and analytic features. Dashboards give you a bird’s-eye look at important information, including sales, inventory, and revenue data. Or dive into the details with sales summaries and historical comparisons with more advanced, real-time reporting features.
• Customer relationship management (CRM): CRM features let you store information about customers to understand them better. Manage customer loyalty programs, offer discounts and gift cards, or create promotional campaigns to turn one-time customers into advocates for your business.

If you’re setting up your first POS system or considering switching to a new product, ask yourself the following questions to help make your decision.

Many POS systems are tailor-made and marketed to specific types of businesses, especially full-service restaurants or retail. For example, ShopKeep and TouchBistro build their systems around food and beverage businesses like quick-service restaurants, bars, and coffee shops. So these POS systems have powerful tools for quickly taking orders in the front of the house and keeping up with the hectic operations and inventory needs in the back.

In contrast, VendHQ and Flint mostly target small businesses in the service industry, like contractors, designers, and trainers. These businesses should look for features like invoicing, ecommerce, and CRM.

What’s more, if you manage multiple employees, you’ll want a POS solution to help you. Many systems let you individually track employee details, shifts, payroll, and more and then send that data to accounting software. Anything that helps you streamline staff management—and potentially lower labor costs—is a plus.

Traditional POS or mPOS? That is the question. Consider how you or your staff will be taking payments from your customers. Will patrons come to you at a counter or cash register? If so, a traditional, stationary POS system may make sense.

But if you need to take payments on the go—from customers wandering around the floor or coming up to a roving truck—you’ll need a mobile POS and card reader system that accepts payments. Fortunately, most modern POS systems either include their own mPOS technology or work with existing products you can buy. Square Point of Sale, our pick for best overall POS system, has an excellent all-in-one solution for taking payments through stationary or mobile devices.

Also, make sure you know what hardware and software works with brands you’re considering. Some POS systems are built just for Android devices while others work with only Apple’s iPad. If you have existing hardware, you may want to choose a POS system that works with what you already have.

Some less expensive POS systems and plans are built primarily for payment processing. But what if you’re running a restaurant or retail business with hundreds of products, ingredients, or parts to keep track of? In that case, you’ll want to consider a POS system that includes or integrates with a robust inventory control system.

For newer, smaller businesses, you may not need advanced and expensive POS system reporting features. But if you’re looking for deeper insights into details like profits, labor costs, and historical comparisons, look for retail POS systems that offer advanced real-time reporting.

In a world driven by technology, how are customers paying for stuff? Can your business survive with a cash-only approach, or do you need to jump into e-payments to keep up?

We used Pollfish to survey 500 Americans about their payment habits. We asked about payment methods, including which ones they used most commonly and which ones they thought were the safest and most convenient.

In our survey, 34.8% of Americans use credit cards and 36.2% use debit cards, which gives us a total of 71% of Americans using cards. And unsurprisingly, 71% of Americans think that a credit or debit card is the most convenient payment method.

It turns out that convenience is king, which ultimately means that cards are king. Most people pay with cards these days, followed by cash. Very few people (only 5.2%) pay with either checks or RFID mobile payments (sometimes called contactless payments).

Furthermore, even though over 71% of Americans use cards the most, only 42.8% feel using a card is the safest payment method.

Only 16% of respondents said swiping a card is safest. But Americans have more confidence in chip readers: 29.8% said a card with an RFID chip is the safest way to pay.

When it comes to safety, cash still feels like the safest way to pay. Almost half of our respondents said cash is the safest, but only 23.8% said they use it the most.

So if you’re a business, you need to make it as easy as possible for people to pay for your products and services. That means you need to accept both debit and credit cards. A cash-only plan isn’t viable anymore.

Although you should consider your business’s unique POS system needs, we think Square offers the best overall package to fit most small businesses, from restaurants to retail shops.

Square’s simple and affordable POS hardware and software let you take payments anywhere your customers can meet you. And with a zero-cost starter plan and a competitive processing fee, Square is an affordable solution for building a solid point-of-sale base.

Did you know a POS system can help streamline your accounting? To get started, pair your POS software with one of our top inventory management software options.

Disclaimer

At zhulitouzi.com, our research is meant to offer general product and service recommendations. We don't guarantee that our suggestions will work best for each individual or business, so consider your unique needs when choosing products and services.