Buying your first POS
Almost nobody buys their first POS from a standing start any more, which makes this the least written-about migration and often the most nervous one. There is no data to move — the risk is entirely in the changeover.
A till, a notebook, and everything in somebody's head
There is nothing to migrate, and that is the point
With no existing system there is no export to fight with, no column mapping and no reconciliation. The catalogue gets built once, on the call, from whatever you have — a printed menu, a price list, a photograph of the board behind the counter.
What replaces the migration risk is a training risk. The people who have been running the counter from memory now have a screen between them and the customer, and the first service is slower. That is normal, it lasts about a day, and it is worth choosing a quiet trading day for.
What to decide before the call
How your items are actually grouped — not how a catalogue thinks they should be. Modifiers, sizes and the combinations your regulars order by name are the parts that make a POS fast or infuriating, and they are much easier to set up correctly the first time than to reorganise later.
Who needs to see what. A POS enforces roles, which is either a relief or a conversation depending on how the business has been run; better to have it now than the first time somebody voids a transaction.
The honest caveat
A first POS pays for itself through what it tells you, not through the transaction itself. If nobody in the business is going to look at the reporting, most of the value goes unused and a simpler cash setup may genuinely serve you better for another year.
The general guide
What comes across, what does not, and when switching is the wrong call this month — all of it applies whatever you are moving from.
Read the full switching guideOther situations