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Shaw Merchant Group

#1 PayAnywhere PAX E700 Smart POS+

The PayAnywhere Smart POS+ includes everything merchants need to manage, grow and optimize their business, all in a compact point of sale system that’s easy to set up and use. PayAnywhere Smart POS+’ key components include an intuitive touchscreen tablet, EMV/NFC-enabled payment device, and robust software featuring powerful inventory management, reporting and marketing tools.

  • A 12.5” touchscreen with Android software.
  • An EMV chip card, NFC contactless, and magstripe reader.
  • Front and back cameras for easy barcode scanning.
  • A 4.3" customer facing touchscreen.
  • Cash drawer connectivity.
  • Built-in thermal printer with 3.14”-wide receipt paper.
  • Multiple accessory ports.
  • 4G and wifi connectivity.
  • Comes preloaded with the Payanywhere app!
  • Free placement means no upfront cost. (Watch PAX E700 Video)

The Payanywhere Smart POS+ is the ideal solution for merchants who want full POS functionality in a sleek and compact design.

#1 E700 Smart POS+

The PayAnywhere Smart POS+ includes everything merchants need to manage, grow and optimize their business, all in a compact point of sale system that’s easy to set up and use. PayAnywhere Smart POS+’ key components include an intuitive touchscreen tablet, EMV/NFC-enabled payment device, and robust software featuring powerful inventory management, reporting and marketing tools.

Transform your countertop with the space-saving, tablet-based point of sale designed for your storefront.

  • A 12.5” touchscreen with Android software.
  • An EMV chip card, NFC contactless, and magstripe reader.
  • Front and back cameras for easy barcode scanning.
  • A 4.3" customer facing touchscreen.
  • Cash drawer connectivity.
  • Built-in thermal printer with 3.14”-wide receipt paper.
  • Multiple accessory ports.
  • 4G and wifi connectivity.
  • Comes preloaded with the Payanywhere app!
  • Free placement means no upfront cost.

The Payanywhere Smart POS+ is the ideal solution for merchants who want full POS functionality in a sleek and compact design.

Best Free Credit Card Processing Machine Available for Food Trucks
Saturday, April 08 2023

For a lot of people, being self-employed is their ultimate dream. They'd love to throw off the shackles of the office and travel around serving people who share their passion for whatever it is that they're selling. Of course, it helps if what you are selling is part of a booming business, and the food industry is certainly growing. While other markets contracted during recent recessions, both the restaurant and the food truck business have seen a rise in sales, as people have become more and more interested in convenience. This is a great time to be in the business of food trucks!

So, chances are, if you've just started a food truck business, the sales have been rolling in more or less steadily. Hungry customers are flocking around your mobile restaurant, eager to sample your dishes in the middle of whichever random parking lot you're serving today. You hand them the food, and they hand you cold, hard wads of cash in return...except when they don't.

“Oh, I'm sorry,” says one of your customers, her tone apologetic, if a bit nasally. “Do you take cards?”

That is the question, isn't it? Well, do you? Nowadays, cashless is the way, and if you're only relying on the old locked metal cash box with a couple of rolls of coins thrown in, you're probably missing out on a lot of potential sales. Yes, you can just get an old school stand-alone credit card machine and try to keep track of a million sheets of receipt paper (“Merchant's Copy!”) like they did back in the days when people need to swipe their little magnetic strips—but things are a lot different now, and in the complicated society that we live in, you're going to want a point of sale system to keep track of sales—both cash and electronic—and to give you some idea of what kind of inventory you used up. The more volume you expect to sell, the more urgent it is to have a POS.

Now, maybe all of the dirty specifics are what have you procrastinating and leaving that old school “cash only” sign outside your window. Maybe you're just confused. Maybe you don't know which POS to choose for your business. Luckily for you, we're about to clarify things a little; let's take a look at the best POS systems, what they can do, and whether they might work for your business:

Square

This is the most bare-bones, simple solution if you're looking for the function of a POS without having to learn a complicated interface or pay a huge monthly fee. In fact, Square does not charge a monthly fee at all, and instead takes a small percentage of your revenue. It requires minimal hardware as well, and all you need is a small peripheral that you attach to your smart phone, and from there you can use the Square app to take people's credit card payments. This simplicity and low upfront cost is probably why Square is so popular with people who sell food out of trucks or carts. It requires hardly any capital at all to get started.

Though it is an excellent payment processor that is very inexpensive for those who are just starting, keep in mind that it is extremely basic on the POS side of things. It will calculate tax and other factors, keep track of sales, and offer a few nice stats to look at here and there, it is not as extensive as other systems. If you want something more complex and feature-rich, you may want to look elsewhere.

Revel

If you're looking for something that offers better analytics and that can be used to track your inventory as well, you might want to look into Revel. Built specifically with the restaurant business in mind, it won't cost you too much to set it up for a single terminal, and it has a lot of features that other POS systems don't have. For example, it integrates with social media and can be set up to notify your followers of where you are so that they can come find you. In addition, it's a very flexible kind of software that doesn't require any sort of proprietary equipment to use; most kinds of cash registers will do just fine. It may not be the cheapest POS system around, but it is a very high quality choice with a lot of extras.

ShopKeep

If you're looking for value, ShopKeep has it. It's not as cheap as Square, but for the amount of functionality it offers as a fully-functioning POS, you can't really find anything on the market that will beat it. It has everything: The ability to modify tax rates depending on where you are, the ability to print and edit receipts, the ability to create gift cards, among many other features. You can also use it to track your inventory, as you can with Revel, and much of your information is stored on the company's own servers, so you don't need to be tied to a specific machine to view your stats. They're a bit more picky about hardware than Revel, but luckily it can easily integrate with iOS, so that may not actually end up being a problem for you.

Another nice feature of ShopKeep is that it doesn't require you to be constantly connected to the Internet, which is great during those times when you're either far away from WiFi or when your 4G Internet cuts out. Once you are connected again, it simply syncs as you would expect.

Now that you have a basic understanding of three of the most popular POS systems for food trucks, hopefully you can move forward and make an informed decision about what sort of set up is right for you. Sometimes it's best to start small and work your way into a more complex system, but of course this depends on what your goals are as well. Good luck!

PA PAX E700 Smart POS+

Transform your countertop with the space-saving, tablet-based point of sale designed for your storefront.

  • A 12.5” touchscreen with Android software.
  • An EMV chip card, NFC contactless, and magstripe reader.
  • Front and back cameras for easy barcode scanning.
  • A 4.3" customer facing touchscreen.
  • Cash drawer connectivity.
  • Built-in thermal printer with 3.14”-wide receipt paper.
  • 4G and wifi connectivity.
  • Free placement means no upfront cost.

The Payanywhere Smart POS+ is the ideal solution for merchants who want full POS functionality in a sleek and compact design.

Do you know how to read your merchant statement? I mean really read it and understand every charge. Most merchants can’t so don’t feel bad if you can’t either. Worse yet, do you let the bill come and go, paying it without giving it a second glance?

Here’s the problem. There’s a chance you’re paying hidden merchant processing fees or fees you didn’t agree to or know they existed. You could have a higher bottom line and not even know it. While some fees may be easily explained, some are unnecessary and until you identify them, they’ll keep eating at your profits.

What fees should you watch for? Check out our list below.

1. Assessment Fees

All merchant service providers charge assessment fees, but some are more transparent about it than others. The average assessment fee costs between 0.10% and 0.15%. If your credit card processor isn’t transparent, you’ll see the fee lumped into another fee or just listed as a total fee rather than a percentage. How do you know if you’re paying higher fees? Here’s a simple calculation: Take the total amount the provider charged you for a specific network (Visa or MasterCard for example) and divide it by the total sales for that card network. If it’s higher than 0.15% (that’s on the higher side), you’re paying too much. Even if you pay a lower amount, notice if the percentage increases from one month to the next. You may be paying more than necessary.

2. Interchange Fees

While not necessarily a ‘hidden’ fee since every merchant knows they pay it, not all merchant service providers are transparent about the costs. Many hide the fee amongst all the other fees without explanation. Here’s the problem. Providers charge many interchange fees based on the type of card (debit, reward credit card, platinum credit card, etc.) If you don’t have a detailed breakdown, you don’t know what you pay. That sounds like a hidden fee, right? What if your provider adds a markup? How much is it? You have the right to know. Ask your merchant service provider, and then shop around. Compare your options to determine if what you pay is fair or if you’re overpaying the interchange fees.

3. Surcharges

How many times have you fallen for a teaser rate only to find out later that you pay more than advertised? You’ve fallen for surcharges – it happens often. Whether the provider only advertised the lowest credit card processing rates for specific cards and didn’t reveal the higher rates or they didn’t explain non-qualifying transactions, you may pay higher rates than you thought. Would you like to figure out if you’re paying surcharges? It’s simple. Total up the fees you paid and divide it by the total amount charged that month. This is your effective rate, or what it costs you to process credit cards. If it’s far off from what you were told, you may want to shop around or talk to the merchant service provider.

4. Daily Discounts

The ideal merchant service provider charges you the credit card processing fees monthly, on the same day every month. This makes tracking expenses, surcharges, and increasing effective rates easy. You know when to check your statement, and how. You know how much to expect and will notice if something is different. Some merchant service providers, however, do daily discounting, which means they take your fees daily. It’s much harder for merchants to track the fees when they occur daily. How do you determine your effective rate or assessment fees? Ask for monthly discounting and make sure the merchant services provider doesn’t charge you an extra fee for it. Most include it in their fee, but make sure before you sign up.

5. Increasing Rates

Even when you sign a contract, your rates may increase. Read your contract’s fine print. Does it include a provision for increasing rates? What method does the service provider use to let you know? Most put a small message on your monthly statement. If you don’t see it, and don’t object within 30 days, the new rate goes into effect. If you aren’t calculating your fees, you may not even realize it.

6. Bundling Fees

Many merchant service providers bundle your services and offer various tiered programs. They claim that you get more services with the higher tiers. You may get an extra service or two, but is it worth the cost of the higher-paid plan? Typically, it’s not. Before you sign up for a higher plan, compare everything at face value. You’ll likely see that the more expensive plans aren’t worth it.

It seems costly to accept credit cards, especially with the hidden fees some charge, but there’s one way around it. Cash discounting helps merchants save money on credit card processing by passing the fee to process the card along to customers. It’s not that credit card payers pay more for a product – everyone pays the same prices, but you can offer cash buyers a discount of 3 – 4% since you avoid the credit card fees. This way your prices cover the cost of credit card processing and it encourages more customers to pay cash.

Credit card processing fees can quickly eat at your profits if you aren’t careful. Take the time to read the fine print and know the full cost of processing cards before choosing a merchant service provider. Look not only at the services they offer, but the fees too. Look at how they charge them, what’s included, and when you may be subjected to surcharges or other unexpected fees that take away from your profits.

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    ©2023 Shaw Merchant Group is a registered DBA of EPX, a registered ISO of BMO Harris Bank N.A., Chicago, IL, Fresno First Bank, Fresno, CA, and Citizens Bank N.A., Providence, RI.