Technology has upended retail, even in staple industries like grocery stores and supermarkets. Many small and independent grocery stores rely on a patchwork of different technologies to keep up with changing customer preferences.
Unfortunately, this can make accounting and understanding your store’s financial performance harder. This is especially complicated when payments are handled on a separate system.
However, technology isn’t all bad. There are many excellent, industry-specific point of sale (POS) systems on the market to streamline how stores track inventory, sales, and employees.
More importantly, by managing payments directly on your POS system, you can simplify your accounting processes and gain unique insights to boost sales and customer satisfaction.
In this article, we’ll cover:
Many aspects of grocery store accounting are tracked on a POS system.
You’ll also need to track other accounting expenses such as rent, maintenance fees, and more.
You put a lot of extra work on your plate when you use separate systems for payments, inventory, and employee management.
However, managing and processing payments directly on your POS system creates a smoother customer experience, cuts costs, and simplifies your accounting.
The average credit card processing fee is between 1.5 and 3.5%. With credit cards and contactless payments topping the most popular payment methods, those fees can add up over time.
Grocery store POS systems with in-house payment processing tend to have lower processing fees. This helps you pass those savings onto customers at a time when budgets are tighter than ever.
Related Read: Contactless Point of Sale: Benefits, Features, and Top Providers
An in-house payment provider also leads to predictable cash flow, since it’s easier to avoid processing errors, and you can receive deposits quickly. Not to mention that you'll have better access to technical support if something ever goes wrong with the system.
Creating budgets and analyzing revenue requires an accurate view of your store's performance. This can be hard to do, especially when transactions must be reconciled at the end of each day.
A unified POS system with integrated payments solves this problem by tracking real-time sales data. This allows you to understand how your store is doing financially at any given moment, helping you make better decisions.
One of the most significant advantages of using a grocery store POS with integrated payments is how it streamlines inventory. Instead of reconciling inventory and sales numbers, a connected system will automatically update your inventory every time you make a sale.
This allows you to set low stock alerts that tell you the second a specific item drops to a prespecified amount. For accounting and budgeting purposes, this makes it much easier to perform inventory audits, monitor inventory turnover, and identify sources of shrinkage.
Related Read: Grocery Store Inventory Management System: 5 Features [+ 5 Tips]
Every day, your POS system collects tons of valuable data — but it’s hard to act on that data without context.
A modern grocery POS system helps you make better financial decisions by adding context through pre-built reports. Here are just a few of the ways reports and analytics tools can help:
Use this information to make informed decisions about your staff and inventory. Integrated payments make these reports more useful since you’ll have a combined view of sales, inventory, vendors, and more.
A comprehensive grocery store POS system is useful for accounting in many ways. Here are some of the main benefits.
With a precise view of your store performance, you can have a detailed understanding of COGS, which can help you optimize your inventory and profits.
Adopting a comprehensive grocery store POS system is a solid first step toward improving your business’ financial health.
IT Retail has decades of experience helping grocery stores be more efficient, maximize profits, and simplify their operations.
With a real-time picture of store performance and added-value features like customizable customer loyalty and seamless contactless payments, IT Retail gives small and independent grocers everything they need to succeed.
Schedule your demo of IT Retail today, or take our two-minute guided POS tour to learn more.