It's lunch time and you have a line of hungry customers eyeing your menu. Your employees are chipper and even upselling like they're supposed to. You look at the dining room and there's not a wrapper on the floor.
Then your POS terminals shut down, and suddenly what looked like a profitable lunch hour just took a turn for the worst.
But losing your POS system for an hour or even a day doesn't mean you have to take a hit in sales. A good operator is always prepared. Here's a checklist that should help operators in this situation:
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-- Alan Guinn Restaurant consultant |
Be certain that your POS operators know the amount of tax to charge on orders 
Check the power plug-in and wires to terminals. A cord could have been pulled accidentally between orders.
Inspect the breaker. "Ideally, one employee should be able to monitor the POS while another employee flicks (for example) breaker 13. This is important because when power goes out, people tend to waste time figuring out what breakers go to what," said Joe Schamel, technical support director for InfoSoft Technologies. Just as a preventive measure for power outages, Schamel suggested operators hook battery packs to terminals. They can power your system in case of electrical failure.
Restart the terminal. "This may sound simple but every employee should know where the power button is," said Tom McLeod, vice president of sales for InfoSoft Technologies. If the machine is working, make sure credit card readers are back online. "With today's Web-based POS technology, most systems have a central database that stores all point of sales data," McLeod said, adding that modern systems save sales to the database every 10 minutes.
Do not attempt to move the terminal or crisscross wires. "If it's at the point where they have checked all the wires, breakers and have re-booted, then they need to call their manufacturer because fixing it is beyond the average operator's abilities," Schamel said.
Move into manual mode. Keep a calculator, manual credit-card swipe and guest book handy in case of emergency. "Be certain that your POS operators know the amount of tax to charge on orders," said Alan Guinn, restaurant consultant. "And make sure your employees know your product prices."
Put your best employees in order-taking mode, said Ann Reichle, co-owner of three-unit Angelina's Pizza in Olmsted Falls, Ohio. "You want people who understand the abbreviations you'd normally use with the POS. You don't want people leaving information out, such as whether it's an original or deep-dish crust, because you don't want a problem to occur because of a lack of information. Customers don't always mind waiting, but they do expect you to get the order right."
Let customers know there's a problem and their order might take a few minutes longer. Customers appreciate knowing the truth, said Reichle. "Usually they're pretty sympathetic. Most people say, 'Oh, I have a computer at home and at work and they crash all the time.' Most people are willing to wait in that situation when they understand you're doing the best you can.
Steve Coomes contributed to this article
