When you need a POS? vs When you need an ERP SOLUTION?

Whenever a business starts realizing that it needs a techno-corporate solution as a need, you may consider it as a perfect beginning in the direction of a successful business.

Considering a business with increased sales and customer base, it would start losing the same if it doesn’t adopt ecommerce software solutions for its customer-based operations.

Point of Sale and ERP solutions are two corporate solutions usually taken in use to minimize the operational lag and accelerate the execution process.

Considering the first part of the subject i.e. POS or Point of Sale.

It is a junction where the merchant and a customer meet either physically or virtually for the exchange of goods and money to complete commerce.

The exchange of needs occurs here, as the customer gets to receive the goods and the merchant gets the money in return.

Whereas, the second part i.e. an ERP solution is a mind itself. As it controls or keeps everything related to the business in a sorted manner that everything stays transparent and not only the staff but even costumers can get the concerned information through it.

To differentiate between ‘when you need a POS’ and ‘when an ERP solution is required’ you only need to understand the applications of both.

 

We will try to see things in this way, that if there is no point of sale, what could have happened? And the same for ERP solutions as well.

We’ll proceed ahead with some pragmatic examples so as to understand the applications of both, why and where simultaneously.

POINT OF SALE: EXCHANGE OF NEEDS

In a restaurant, the point of billing from which you receive the bill against the order you placed, is a point of sale. Here, each and every transaction as well as the order placed is kept on the system so that an easy tally of the balance at the end of the can be done.

Now considering you have a computer system at the point of sale, you must not have it just for keeping records only.

A system embedded with the food and restaurants solution or say a point of sale solution is to manage not only transactions but also to keep the kitchen notified about the customers waiting for their orders to be served.

 

It allows the staff to see the entire customer line up without requiring them to go and physically check for it.

It basically refrains the to-and-fro movement of the staff for managing the customers. You can say that a POS solution is just to manage the exchange of needs smartly with the least efforts required possible.

Let us see what an ERP solution does?

ERP: A MIND THAT CONTROLS EVERYTHING

An ERP solutions is generally required for a large-sized business where everything is required to be in the system and in control for continuous operations. It may cover finance, logistics, supply chain, raw materials, demand, requirements, sundry, or in-house workforce management.

The basic requirement of an ERP solution is when your business reaches at least a level in which more than one level of production exists. For example, if there is a production unit existing with raw materials at first, the cutting and machine operations at second, and assembling at the third stage, then to keep things in an organized supply chain, ERP solution is helpful.

It also helps in keeping the labor well-informed about the entire project and its status.

 

Thus, ERP is basically a solution to keep things in notice, well-organized, and in a manner that no one would miss anything.

 

A single and long line of production would require an ERP solution as it can be divided into multiple tiers. But a small production might be too light to deploy an ERP solution economically, however, there exist some small and mid-level enterprises as well which have adopted ERP solutions for reporting and supply chain management.

APPLICATIONS OF POS & ERP SOLUTION

A POS is applicable where-

 

1. Invoicing is required for selling, buying, renting, etc.

2. Inventory management software solution is involved and regular inventory transfer and transactions are taking place.

3. Multi-store management is required.

4. A consistent sales report is required for regular sales analysis

 

However, an ERP solution is applied where-

1. Customer relationship is to be maintained.

2. The financing and Accounting module exists and is required to be maintained by the same tool.

3. Tracking and visibility of the raw material, as well as the final product, is required.

4. Consistent tracking and monitoring are required.

5. Communication with the labor is required at distant locations.

BASIC REQUIREMENT FOR BOTH: POS & ERP

If you have a system deployed at the point of sale but do not have a point of sale solution installed in it, then you might not be utilizing the system smartly.

You answer this, that what is the benefit of having a system if it doesn’t reduce your work efforts efficiently?

Anyways, the point of sale solution requires just a set of hardware components for display and the basic internet connection, with cloud storage as the best resource for storage, as well as quick access.

Once you have the basic arrangements, you can deploy a POS solution that would reduce the physical efforts required to complete the commerce and make a note for each and every need of a customer.

However, an ERP solution requires a business with an ample workforce as well as more than one tier of overall working.

A custom-based enterprise solution developed from an experienced enterprise software development company that could bring you everything to manage the internal, as well as external resources, of an organization.

A pocket-friendly budget along with 24*7 ERP consultation services and trustworthy cloud support are some of the desirable aspects that we should look for before hiring ERP solution providers.

Types of POS & ERP solutions

At first, if we consider POS solutions, there come 5 types of POS devices, through which POS operations are handled quite easily, and they include Smartphones, Tablets, Card and Chip-based, Touch screen systems, and self-service kiosks, etc.

For each of them, you may get the respective POS solution developed for your shopping store. Some other types of POS solutions are-

 

1. Terminal POS systems

2. Online POS systems

3. Multichannel POS systems

4. Open-source POS systems

Similarly, you may choose to have a mobile-based ERP solution as well, which would free you from the boundation to sit on a system to run an ERP software.

There are numerous benefits of having a mobile-based ERP application developed for your business. You become just a touch away from almost everything your business has in it. Make sure to hire the best to get the best in return for your best asset i.e. your business irrespective of its size.