Payment trends

Getting paid is important to any business, so making it as easy as possible for customers to pay makes good business sense. What’s more, with New Zealand consumers among the highest users of debit and credit cards per capita, accepting card payments is critical.

This article looks at some of the latest payment technology trends in the retail sector, and benefits offered.

Linked payment and point of sale systems:

Product and Marketing Manager for EFTPOS New Zealand Limited, Alan Sharpe says integrated and interfaced payment solutions are rapidly replacing traditional standalone terminals.

“These let retailers link their payments directly to their Point of Sale (POS) System, for example EFTPOS New Zealand’s PC EFTPOS or POSLink solutions.

“PC EFTPOS is an integrated solution that helps retailers to reduce the complexity of their payments. That’s because PC EFTPOS is scalable to support multiple point of sale lanes in one or more locations using a single communications medium,” says Mr Sharpe.

He says transaction details are entered into the POS System, which then automatically communicates the purchase amount to the EFTPOS terminal.

Once the cardholder has entered his or her details, the approved or declined message is communicated back to the POS System and if approved, the purchase is automatically tendered off in the POS.  

PC EFTPOS is available with its own management and reporting suite (MARS). “This allows businesses to remotely access their entire network of PC EFTPOS lanes and run their own reporting, diagnostics, configuration and upgrades, all from a centralised location – such as a head office,” says Mr Sharpe.

POSLink on the other hand is an interfaced solution. Mr Sharpe says it allows retailers to gain some of the benefits of an integrated solution by allowing a standalone EFTPOS terminal to communicate via a simple one-way or two-way messaging protocol to a POS system.