Leasing a POS system

[RichM]

We are thinking of getting a POS system. I understand the benefits but was wondering about the cost. Anyone have any advice for me?

 

[bodegahwy]

The good thing about a lease is that if you are going to be borrowing the money for the POS anyway, a lease allows you to do so without using up your other credit facilities. The number you need to find out is the effective interest rate on the lease.

Most of the time you are going to be looking at a lease for a reasonabe period like 3 years with a $1 buy out at the end of the lease. You do not want to go longer. A good lease rate is going to be between 6% and 9% depending on what you are leasing, the company you dea with and your credit. The lease also allows you to decuct the payments rather than depreciate the equipment.

Most POS suppliers have a leasing company they work with. Some are good, some are not so good. There are other choices. Ask your banker.

You do not have to buy they wholle thing from the supplier to do a lease. For example, you can save a lot of money by sourcing your touch screens yourself.

 

[GT1]

if you are starting out with a new POS go with Point of Success. You can pick up new computers at Staples, or Best Buy, or whatever, and get POS printer s from POSworld.com, then get the software from Point of Success. This can all be done for under $2500. I would not suggest buying more than you need. Some companies charge $12,000 to $18,000 for this set up. Basically what they are doing is charging crazy money for the hardware that you can get yourself. The people at Poimt of Success are also very helpful and can help you through it. They are very accessable and Jeff Ward frequents this board.

 

[Deacon_V]

Ditto the support for Point of Success. I’ve got my screens, CPU, all the software and I’ve less than $3000 invested.

 

[Piper]

I’ll third the support for Point of Success.

I have a six terminal system with 5 printers running a rather busy full service restaurant - and I was at about $6,000 for the entire package. Keep in mind that included me doing all of the setup and cable runs (over a quarter mile of cabling!)

If you shop for deals on hardware, you may not need to lease at all with Point of Success.

 

[NicksPizza]

I run Point of Success.

My data server died a week ago Saturday, and my wife called the tech support (me). either processor or motherboard fried. No orther equipment on site, so I rebuilt on of thw workstations to be the dataserver and copied the data files over from the god hard drive . . . . took an hour all told.

I went to Microcenter in Atlanta and picked up a refurbished unit for $99 with 90 day warranty (VISA extends another 90 days). that included a license for Windows XP SP 3 for refurbs, 1.6GB processor, 40GB drive, and a box. 45 minutes to install Point of success, drivers for printers, copy current data over to it, aqnd reset workstation to be a workstation. New data server, and will likely go get another one to have for a driver station.

It takes lots of time and energy investment to be my own networking support, hardware support, and helpdesk team. To me, it is worth the autonomy and cost savings. Others have less time, but have the $$$ to invest in the newest hardware and support contracts.

 

[Piper]

NicksPizza:

Windows XP SP 3 for refurbs

I forgot to mention this in my post… If you do anything yourself, make sure you buy boxes with XP! Vista is a joke.

What Nick says is true about being your own support guy. But you can always find somebody local to be your computer and network support people. If you do ever have problems with your system, it is far more likely to be a hardware or networking issue than a Software issue.

And I think tech support for PoS is something like $149 for six months. That’s a steal.