Taking payment away from the counter

The sale that does not happen

A lost sale rarely announces itself. Somebody gets to the front, finds out they have to go to a cash machine, says they will come back, and does not. Nobody writes it down. Over a season it is a real number.

Almost all of it happens in five places.

1. The market stall

Signal drops, the reader loses its pairing, and a queue forms. The fix is a reader that pairs to the phone rather than a base unit, and that stores a payment when the connection goes and settles it when the signal returns. Anything that needs a Wi-Fi network you do not control will fail on a wet Saturday.

2. The delivery round

Payment on the door, taken by the person who drove. This does not need a terminal at all: tap to pay on the driver’s own phone puts the money in the same account the shop’s counter does, and shows on the same report at closing.

3. The phone order

Somebody rings to order flowers, a cake, a repair. Reading a card number over the phone is slower, more expensive and less safe. A payment link sent by text takes fifteen seconds to send and the customer pays before you have hung up.

4. The queue on the pavement

Two tills where there was one, without buying a second terminal, because the second till is a phone in an apron pocket. Useful on a market day, useless the rest of the week, and costing nothing while it sits idle.

5. The event you said yes to

A fair, a school fete, a pop-up in somebody else’s shop. The kit that works here is the kit that fits in a bag and needs nothing from the venue.

The common thread

In every case the answer is the same: the ability to take a card should travel with the person, not with the counter. If your current setup cannot leave the building, that is the thing to change first.