POSMarket introduces Protouch POS software
ProTouch is aimed primarily at the hospitality and retail industry and has been designed to meet the demands of this business sector.
Service quality surveys consistently reveal the need for a product that is reliable and responsive to the operators needs. In this regard ProTouch has been designed with a flexibility that enables the product to be adapted to the ever changing requirements of customers.
ProTouch has a successful history. Its concept and design are mature, based on eighteen years of continual development.
Sales continue to grow rapidly in New Zealand and Australia is now producing sales in line with forecast projections for the product.
Changing Standards
Customers' expectations are forever changing. Features that were once thought of as differentiating a product are now standard. Customers demand more from their software and seek products that fulfil their special needs rather than bending to suit available technology.
The level of functionality and capability delivered by ProTouch continues to grow.
As an example consider:
Information Systems Requirements
For many businesses utilisation of data and information forms the basis of their competitive advantage.
To meet this customer need ProTouch incorporates a real-time information technology controlling system that starts at the POS and moves into the back office enabling stock control, in-depth reporting, cash and labour management, order taking and purchasing.
Continuous product development in line with future customer needs is imperative for software products to remain competitive in the marketplace.
To this end, ProTouch product development includes:
*Expanding the current back office to include online purchase and reporting enabling management control of the business from any place, via the Internet.
*At the front end TouchTec is investigating integration between the new WAP/IP phones. This will allow the user to place an order to the ProTouch system, via the Internet. This is very similar to text messaging on mobile phones through the internet
ProTouch Software
The product was initially designed from the ground-up in 1986. It is based on 14 years knowledge in building POS hardware and Software solutions in New Zealand and abroad.
ProTouch was designed in such a way that it could be adapted to meet the needs of many different markets. It is this flexibility that has been instrumental in making the product what it is to day.
The ProTouch product in its present form was first developed some nine years ago and has passed the testing stage in its life cycle with 400+ sites throughout New Zealand, Australia and South Pacific. The core product is written in Borland's Pascal which produces a very fast and easy to use POS system, although certain parts have now been rewritten by Delphi, VB and Dream-weaver.
The product first went to market eight years ago and was originally installed on a cruise charter. It is now predominantly used in the hospitality market.
The product has shown the strength of time through its maturity and capability to cover a broad range of vertical markets from Butcher shops, Bars, Petrol Stations, Hotels, Bottle shops, Nightclubs and Fast Food through to general retail environments and specialty shops.
ProTouch - The Product
ProTouch is modular software that operates POS and business management in retail environments.
The Product comprises three main units
Treg: Touch register
Tman: Tab Manager
Toffice: Touch back office
Both Tman and Toffice programs have the ability to switch software modules / features in/on or out/off. This allows the system to be priced according to customer requirements and assign only the modules required by the customer.
The Treg program allows custom modules to attach / integrate with other programs. This is where the flexibility and adaptability comes in to its own, as this integration can be written by third parties.
All units are integrated and go hand in hand in supporting one another in a retail environment.
Modules operate together to perform the complete business function. Operators use the register Treg POS side and the Toffice gathers the information from the POS. Toffice manipulates the data in the reports by date, server, category and product and houses all clients' product information.
A key driver behind the ProTouch design strategy was that the NZ market was considered too small to have a vertical system solely in the hospitality industry. The system allows for third party software companies to write and integrate their applications with the ProTouch Product with ease. During runtime, the 3rd party modules can even request extra fields to be inserted into the ProTouch database files.
Product Structure
The project has been written as a horizontal application with heavy use of DLL inserts. This helps 'future-proof' the customers' business because ProTouch can be tuned and tailored to meet the clients' need very easily, ensuring long-term functionality
Product Features
Main Features
*Modular in design - this allows the system to be configured to meet the pricing and system complexity needs of small to large customers.
*All data is presented across the network in real-time to provide up to the second information in labour, stock, sales reporting, table status, etc.
*The front office register maximizes the real-estate space of the screen in respect to the number of products that can be displayed.
*The register maximises product keys and minimises the management keys displayed on the main screen. This in turn makes it easier to train staff and decreases the time to complete a sale.
*Each key press at the register is recorded at the register and then sent to the back office - this provides absolute proof of each key stroke - which is accessed easily by drilling down through the sales reports to view all sales orders and transaction items.
*Easy to use stock system with purchase orders and stock history and the ability to roll a stock item at any stage.
*Graph report of server performance at the register plotted against break-even point.
*Adaptable in design and can address many markets.
*Open data base design allows integration with products like Microsoft Access to enable custom reporting.
*All reports can be saved as CSV file format ready for spreadsheet manipulation.