That's why you need integrated eftpos...

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Forums › Finance and wealth management › That's why you need integrated eftpos...

nate

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#148803 1-Jul-2014 13:12

From Stuff:

They had not intended to be quite so lavish but Hastings couple Wendy Schollum and Shane Simons went to town for son Josh's fifth birthday - spending just over $2300 at Subway on Friday.

The wildly overpriced meal turned out to be down to old fashioned human error after the cashier mistakenly keyed in $2325.10 for the $23 dollar spread while Simons absent-mindedly dialled in his pin.

When I first bought the cafe, I paid for a custom integration between our till and the eftpos machine. Push eftpos on the till, and the amount is sent to the eftpos machine. Tie this in with paypass, and the transaction is super quick.

Why subway, who would do a metric sht tonne of transactions a day, don't do this, my mind boggles.

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#1077826 1-Jul-2014 13:17

it is pretty common - I've nearly been caught a couple of times (350 vs 35 dollars).

As to why people don't integrate? Who knows - vendors being pains in the ass, having to follow franchise standards etc.

Doing it at a cafe for 1-2 tills - easy.

Doing it at a large site with 150+ tills, not so much.

Doing it for a chain with 100s of stores - eesh. Assuming they centralise, which they must do with the subcard thing.

michaelmurfy

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#1077827 1-Jul-2014 13:17

I sell DPS (Payment Express Terminals) and I must say, the feedback I get is "this is easier and faster'

Now when I go into places with Smartpay terminals (KFC, Pizza Hutt, Subway) I have to stare at the screen for about 30secs to get an accepted from my EMV transaction. It is not just killing human error, it is speed and efficiency too.

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Kyanar

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#1078203 1-Jul-2014 20:28

michaelmurfy: I sell DPS (Payment Express Terminals) and I must say, the feedback I get is "this is easier and faster'

Now when I go into places with Smartpay terminals (KFC, Pizza Hutt, Subway) I have to stare at the screen for about 30secs to get an accepted from my EMV transaction. It is not just killing human error, it is speed and efficiency too.

I've had occasion to develop for a Verifone terminal too. I would have to say that they are equally as fast as the Ingenico (DPS) terminals. Smartpay are the worst of the worst (although Cadmus are a close second).

And don't get me started on merchants asking you to hand over your card because the pinpad's card reader "doesn't work" (or it doesn't even have them - like those dinky ePay terminals where it's just an LCD on a pinpad the size of your keyboard's numpad).

The fastest I've ever seen has got to be Whitcoulls. Their terminal accepts an EMV transaction in half a second flat.

Coil

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#1078206 1-Jul-2014 20:31

Happened at subway today.

The dude handed me $1.10 and told me i got over charged.
I never knew nor cared to really check.

One would assume in this day these things don't happen due to the levels of automation available.

Behodar

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#1078209 1-Jul-2014 20:44

Kyanar: I've had occasion to develop for a Verifone terminal too. I would have to say that they are equally as fast as the Ingenico (DPS) terminals.

The local McDonald's has what I believe to be Ingenico terminals and they take 15-20 seconds. The fastest I've seen is at the local post office; someone on Geekzone (sbiddle?) had once posted that correctly-configured terminals are fast but I didn't believe it until I was at the post office and had the card accepted in a second or so.

richms

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#1078210 1-Jul-2014 20:45

The reason is the POS systems for these large chains are build by places in the US where is is considered acceptable to have a mag stripe reader going thru a POS machine back to a central server doing credit card transactions. They would have no idea what to do with an eftpos terminal.

I always make a habit at KFC to pull the card out early to make it need doing again to slow them down even more. They are cadmus machines like we used to have at work. Horrid things but the KFC ones seem to be even worse. Was glad to see the back of that and get a verifone machine when the contract was up. We got no paywave because none of the terminal suppliers would block debit cards from being used with it and screwing us out of more overpriced merchant fees.

Richard rich.ms

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#1078213 1-Jul-2014 20:50

richms: I always make a habit at KFC to pull the card out early to make it need doing again to slow them down even more.

You can actually speed up the KFC machines if you yank the card quickly enough. It'll conclude that the chip is busted and ask you to swipe and then you can put the card away while it processes. I'm not sure whether it's faster in absolute terms but you as the purchaser spend less time waiting.

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Kyanar

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#1078214 1-Jul-2014 20:50

Behodar:
Kyanar: I've had occasion to develop for a Verifone terminal too. I would have to say that they are equally as fast as the Ingenico (DPS) terminals.

The local McDonald's has what I believe to be Ingenico terminals and they take 15-20 seconds. The fastest I've seen is at the local post office; someone on Geekzone (sbiddle?) had once posted that correctly-configured terminals are fast but I didn't believe it until I was at the post office and had the card accepted in a second or so.

Oh yes, correctly configured terminals are fast indeed! The reality is though that a lot of those big chains most likely run their EFTPOS in IP mode, but connected via a VPN back to their head office (e.g. for EB Games, their terminals are connecting via Australia) which you can imagine is quite slow. The faster ones are the ones in IP mode with direct internet connectivity (on a high speed link, naturally) and not too low of a log on timeout.

Behodar:
richms: I always make a habit at KFC to pull the card out early to make it need doing again to slow them down even more.

You can actually speed up the KFC machines if you yank the card quickly enough. It'll conclude that the chip is busted and ask you to swipe and then you can put the card away while it processes. I'm not sure whether it's faster in absolute terms but you as the purchaser spend less time waiting.

I'm wary as hell doing that. One time I yanked the card slightly early - early enough that the terminal threw a "Card Removed - Declined" but the network had already authorised the transaction. Naturally, I had to wait for the transaction to expire (5 working days) before I got the money back. I wasn't even aware that it was possible to do that with a card present transaction!

richms

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#1078217 1-Jul-2014 21:00

Its always reversed right away for me, and my debit card has no functional magnetic stripe anymore because those crap things erase all the time and I need to get a replacement card with a new number to get a new stripe, they cant re-write them in a branch or re-issue the same card number. I have _HEAPS_ of stuff I would have to update if I change that card number.

Mind you, the failure to swipe has saved me from a skimming on at least one occasion so its not all bad. Now I know that if a shops terminal wont read the chip and requests a swipe to walk away or use cash...

Richard rich.ms

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#1078219 1-Jul-2014 21:05

Kyanar: I'm wary as hell doing that. One time I yanked the card slightly early - early enough that the terminal threw a "Card Removed - Declined" but the network had already authorised the transaction.

I pull it before it asks for the PIN so it's unlikely to double-charge me :) (it asks for it after swiping).

lucky015

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#1078241 1-Jul-2014 21:16

Kyanar:
Behodar:
Kyanar: I've had occasion to develop for a Verifone terminal too. I would have to say that they are equally as fast as the Ingenico (DPS) terminals.

The local McDonald's has what I believe to be Ingenico terminals and they take 15-20 seconds. The fastest I've seen is at the local post office; someone on Geekzone (sbiddle?) had once posted that correctly-configured terminals are fast but I didn't believe it until I was at the post office and had the card accepted in a second or so.

Oh yes, correctly configured terminals are fast indeed! The reality is though that a lot of those big chains most likely run their EFTPOS in IP mode, but connected via a VPN back to their head office (e.g. for EB Games, their terminals are connecting via Australia) which you can imagine is quite slow. The faster ones are the ones in IP mode with direct internet connectivity (on a high speed link, naturally) and not too low of a log on timeout.

Used to work for Burger King and remember on a number of occasions things being slow due to systems running through VPN's to Aus, Wouldn't suprise me if that was a big part of why the eftpos terminals where manual.

As for others, I regularly have to either wait for 10-20 minutes or go get cash when I show up at McDonalds at 3-4am because their entire system goes down every night while it compiles and sends to Aus, Remember a friend of mine who managed a Domino's store mentioning something similar.

Peppery

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#1078247 1-Jul-2014 21:20

We would LOVE this for our stores, but nobody is willing to help us out with our Mac-based POS. We recently switched to a wireless Verifone terminal simply because it's cheaper than having 3 wired ones.

richms

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#1078281 1-Jul-2014 21:42

lucky015: Used to work for Burger King and remember on a number of occasions things being slow due to systems running through VPN's to Aus, Wouldn't suprise me if that was a big part of why the eftpos terminals where manual.

As for others, I regularly have to either wait for 10-20 minutes or go get cash when I show up at McDonalds at 3-4am because their entire system goes down every night while it compiles and sends to Aus, Remember a friend of mine who managed a Domino's store mentioning something similar.

Whats with burger king insisting on taking the card and sticking it in on their side?

I got yelled at by one of their staff after I reached over to get my card out from their side when they had buggered off to go and do something else while i was being served once.

Richard rich.ms

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#1078344 1-Jul-2014 22:58

nate: From Stuff:

They had not intended to be quite so lavish but Hastings couple Wendy Schollum and Shane Simons went to town for son Josh's fifth birthday - spending just over $2300 at Subway on Friday.

The wildly overpriced meal turned out to be down to old fashioned human error after the cashier mistakenly keyed in $2325.10 for the $23 dollar spread while Simons absent-mindedly dialled in his pin.

When I first bought the cafe, I paid for a custom integration between our till and the eftpos machine. Push eftpos on the till, and the amount is sent to the eftpos machine. Tie this in with paypass, and the transaction is super quick.

Why subway, who would do a metric sht tonne of transactions a day, don't do this, my mind boggles.

My mother once charged someone $446 instead of $46, Thankfully she knew him and gave him the money back

I thought subway already had integrated? Well the one I go to does

richms

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#1078345 1-Jul-2014 23:00

Another thing with non integrated is to properly check the total eftpos and the total cash take. A friends work had issues with staff putting $10 extra on the eftpos and pocketing $10 from the till. everything still added up and most people never checked and came back.

Richard rich.ms

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