How to choose a POS for your food court, food or drink stall?

Setting up a stall in a food court or thinking of upgrading from your cash register to a POS system? This article is for you. Let’s take a look at some of the key features necessary for a food court stall POS system. 

Speedy Ordering

Speed is the name of the game when running a food court stall. Customers who patronize food court stalls are mostly out to grab a quick meal unlike in restaurants and cafes where their customers are more willing to wait. Hence, getting a customer’s orders fast is crucial.

Your POS system should not be slowing you down. Instead, it should speed you up. A POS system suitable for food court stalls should be designed to allow minimum clicks to complete an order. Common order modifiers(e.g. more rice, less spicy, etc.,) should be easily accessible as shortcut buttons.

Most Secure POS System

MEGAPOS safeguards your data and revenue by keeping sensitive features and data secure through user based access rights, discounts and FOC reports and audit trails.

• User based access rights: MEGAPOS is able to restrict access to sensitive features such as opening of cash drawers without bill tender, cash in/out function, discount and FOC functions, etc. to preclude chances of fraud.
• Security reports. In order to trace suspected fraudulent activity, MEGAPOS provides discount, FOC, deleted item reports and audit trails which records every action performed on the POS system.

Kitchen Printing Solution

To make kitchen flow easier, many choose to have the kitchen docket printed out rather than have it written on a piece of paper. Kitchen staff can easily read and sort out the order and prepare order based on the kitchen dockets and the timestamps. 

Integratable with Kitchen Display Solution(KDS)

For better efficiency in kitchen operation, food court operators may choose to deploy Kitchen Display Solution(KDS) rather than kitchen printer. Similar to MacDonald’s kitchen display solution(KDS), a newer version of a kitchen display solution is tablet based, and displays orders from the POS and allows your kitchen staff to mark it as done with just a tap once the preparation is completed. This way, orders are displayed clearly, and completed orders will not be mixed up with pending ones. 

Traditionally, food court stalls use clips on bowls to indicate a customer’s orders. This method is effective if your staff have been working together for a long time. Even so, it is not foolproof as food preparation staff still get confused at times. 

Using a POS system that is able to integrate to a KDS helps minimize confusion during food preparation, which increases the overall efficiency of your food court stall. 

Integratable with Cashless Payment Terminal

With the development of cashless payment methods, many of your customers will opt for cashless payment. Having a POS system that integrates well with cashless payment terminals helps you remove the step of re-entering bill amounts into the cashless payment terminal, thus, speeding up the ordering process. 

Easy Menu Set Up and Editing

With stiff competition and constant changes in consumer preferences over time, food court menu and prices will need to be adjusted from time to time. Easy menu set up and editing helps ensure smooth operation and capability to timely react to the changes of business pricing strategy. 

Durability and Warranty Periods

Food courts are harsh environments for digital tools and electronics where water damage is unavoidable. A POS system that is suitable for the food court scene should be built with water resistance and should be tough to withstand hard knocks.

Longer warranty coverage for your POS hardware is also a good thing to have, as compared to shorter, 6 months to 1-year warranty coverage. This ensures that your POS system is protected from wear and tear through heavy usage which is to be expected in food courts.

Cloud Based Reports

A POS system with a cloud based reporting system is a handy tool which allows you to gain valuable insights about the performance of your food court store remotely, without being at your store. This is much more important when you are managing multiple food court stores. POS cloud based reports provide you with information from various angles. It normally includes reports such as sales report, best selling items report, GST report, void item/order report, staff clock in/out report, inventory report, etc. This helps you make high level decisions and shortens the response time in order to adjust your business strategies and gain competitive advantages.

Integratable with QR Ordering System / Self Ordering Kiosk 

Food court operators are seeking for ways to remove ordering bottlenecks during peak hours as they found that patrons tend to avoid and leave slow moving queues. The new generation of food court operators are looking to tap on the technology to boost their revenue by choosing a POS system that is integratable with Self Ordering Kiosks. By doing so, their customers can place their orders without having to wait for staff. Cashless payment options can be offered to make ordering intuitive and convenient for customers. 

Self ordering kiosks also open up additional ordering channels to move the queue and spin the wheel of the revenue. 

Getting a POS system for your food court stall

If you are interested in getting a robust and reliable POS system to help you grow your food court stall, drop MEGAPOS your contact below and we will be happy to arrange a free demo on our POS solutions with you!