For the longest time, most restaurant owners thought of their point of sale system as a fancy cash register. Now technology has become more advance and slowly becoming a necessity in the retail systems, many innovations have become standard features within the POS industry.

1. Wireless Hand Held POS Devices. The newest generation of wireless restaurant hand held POS devices allow your servers greater freedom to take orders as well as collect payment without leaving the customer. Servers can present your daily specials to your customers on the spot, easily process credit cards while walking to the next table, send a quick bread requests to the kitchen, and also the ability to add walk-ins to the waiting list – right from the handheld device. Your servers are able to spend more time interacting with more customers keeping them happy and keeping them coming back.

2. “Sticky” Paper Printers. Another one of the newest and most brilliant innovations in POS systems are the printers that uses “sticky” paper. This kind of printer uses paper similar to a Post-It which allows you to reposition the receipt to different locations over and over again. You can print the paper to whatever length is required, and then stuck to almost any surface where it will stay unless you remove and/or plan to stick it elsewhere. With this type of printer, the paper can stay with the order through the entire order process. The new paper is also liner-free which eliminates the need to manage non-recyclable waste and can be easily removed and restuck to a different surface – again and again, whenever you want. Use the paper for all orders, instant and special orders, as bag tags or any combination.

3. Digital Menu Board or Signage. Your POS system can be used to deliver media rich content, using video, audio and pictures. Several POS packages have fully integrated and seamless digital menu board software that can be used to create content using the same database. Menu titles, pages, menu items, and prices can all be interlaced with high-quality multimedia to give your restaurant menu board that can give both a dramatic and interactive display without having to spend extra money for addtional items.

With digital menu boards, content is sent to the displays from the store database in real-time, so the menu board continually updates throughout the day with menu changes, scheduled price changes, daily specials and so on.

4. Self-Service Kiosk. Ever thought about getting a customer self-service kiosk for your business’ restaurant POS solutions? A self-service kiosk or interactive kiosk, first came to prominence with the photo kiosk machines from Kodak — from wikipedia. Later on adopted by consumers who mixed it with advanced technologies such as touch-screens monitors. This very useful piece of device, a self-service hardware combined with a self-service software, can be used to cut down on labor costs and speed up the ordering process. Aside from that, most POS packages can enhance the customer’s user experience even further, using sound and motion graphics, to engage your customer.

5. Cell Phone Paging. Some restaurants are opting to take a more modern approach by paging customers’ personal cell phones. This can be done by simply taking your guest’s cell phone number and inputs it into the cell phone paging system keypad. And when their table is ready, the paging system calls the cell phone with an automated voice message to notify the guest to report to the front of the restaurant to be seated. This is a very convenient way for guests who want to roam around farther than common pagers will allow and there is no fear of the customer walking away with your pager.

This small list is just the appetizer when it comes to restaurant technology. Loads more to come…

The author Michael Tash is VP of Customer Relations of POS-for-Restaurants.com. With over 20 years of restaurant experience, POS-for-Restaurants.com helps retail business owners use their technology to be more efficient and more profitable.

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