Sharing is Caring: Making the Most of Payment Terminals

EMV is the latest and greatest development in payment terminals. At any given moment, they’re ready to take a payment while protecting your business, employees, and customers from fraudulent transactions. But when your terminals aren’t being used — which is a large portion of their in-store life — how can you justify the ROI on these state-of-the-art devices? Because, as we know, EMV devices can be up to five times as expensive than the generic swipe counterpart (if we ignore all the pesky non-compliance fees that come with these out-of-date machines). While money is well spent when it comes to upping your payment security, there is a saving grace; Terminal Sharing. 

This post won’t focus on EMV, but rather will dive deep into how to optimize your expensive fleet with a premium service developed for security-focused retailers, like you.

Terminal Sharing Explained

Let’s start at the basics; what is Terminal Sharing? Developed by iQmetrix, it’s impressive ability to provide cost-saving benefits is not to be ignored. Knowing that EMV terminals are expensive, we wanted users to get the biggest bang for their buck. This meant finding a way to develop technology that connects one terminal device to multiple POS workstations. In the simplest terms, it means your business can use one payment device in your store that connects to each POS station you have — no more one-to-one technology needed. Terminal Sharing effectively saves organizations hundreds or even thousands of dollars on the cost of hardware by replacing the old 1:1 device to workstation ratio and replacing it with a 1: Many ratio.

In addition to the benefit of cost savings, sharing is designed to be flexible. All new and existing payment terminals supported by iQmetrix are compatible with Terminal Sharing. Not only that, but both RQ and RQmobile workstations can be paired to any supported device. This flexibility allows sharing to support multiple configurations and store layouts. 

We know that your store is not only unique in process, but in layout as well. You’ve found an in-store flow that works for you and helps to provide your customers with the best service around. Terminal Sharing, like Endless Aisle, has many implementation strategies that will seamlessly integrate with your carefully-honed customer service flow. 

Stationary Sharing

Share a countertop payment device between multiple desktop RQ workstations. This is the most common sharing scenario as many users run RQ on a stationary desktop or laptop and most use countertop payment devices.

Mobile Sharing

Imagine sharing a mobile payment device between multiple POS tablets. Now, you can! Although mobile may currently be the least common form of sharing, the rise of mobile payment terminals and increase of new store layouts that have mobile-centric designs are trends we anticipate will continue to gain ground and cannot be underestimated.

Stationary/​Mobile Hybrid Sharing

Mix and match sharing countertop and mobile payment devices across multiple desktop or tablet workstations. Hybrid sharing is the most flexible scenario as it provides a larger number of use cases. For clients who are just starting out with mobile, perhaps those who have purchased one or two mobile devices per store, the hybrid option offers a simple introduction to the world of mobile. Hybrid sharing also ensures that any older stationary devices are still utilized and making you money.

Saving on the cost of expensive hardware and optimizing the devices that you already have is a no-brainer for your business, and when you pair Sharing with Branding and Reporting, you get the most bang for your buck. Read our blog on the added benefit of even more terminal solutions.