Auto Close

[Tina]

Dale,
I'm sure you want to get this thing up and working. The concept of this is great & I have yet another cool feature suggestion that could go hand and hand with the Auto Reports. What about including an Auto Close too. At the end of the day all an employee would need to do is make sure there is pleanty of paper in the printer and DHPOS would Run the close & reporting at a preset time. I'm sure this will save shop owners time, money, & human errors. Kind of like a set it and forget it type deal.

Tina

[Tina]

My prior post was suppose to go inside the Auto Reporting Posts.

Sorry Clicked wrong link..

Tina

[Dale Harris]

Tina,

So what happens if just at closing time Oprah taps on the window and as you go to open the door for her the register automatically closes itself out?

Or at my shop we close at 9:00 Monday through Friday, 8:00 pm on Saturday, and 6:00 pm on Sunday.

With the new feature you can now automate handling the journal and the reports so all that is left for the employee to decide is if he should reset the merchandise data.

[Tina]

Dale you crack me up.

You have a point there. In an ideal world I'd let her in so she can spent her millions & pray like heck that the register works. I'd actually faint, she'd call 911 and a month later I'd end up on her show.

Tina

[FormicaFun]

Well, funny you should suggest this. At the grocery chain that I work <which shall remain nameless> we're typically open 24 hours a day, so the "close" is typically nothing more than an accounting formality at midnight. However, on the rare occasion that we were actually locking the doors <Like say...for a holiday, all 2 of them> we found nothing cleared the customers out faster than telling them that in 10 minutes the registers would automatically close. This only came after a few years of pleading on the loudspeaker for that one last lady who couldn't decide which brand of Eggnog to buy for that perfect holdiay toast would keep one of us there <usually me> well past the time I was hoping to get out of there to spend time with my family...and share said eggnog toast with them. I'd usually just end up giving the lady several brands to choose from, paper bag...out the door, "have a nice day, no charge/it's on the house, I'm ready to go, goodnight and good luck". No, I wouldn't suggest this as a real feature, but if you ever need to clear the store out, it's a good reason to use. Acting concerned, and watching the clock like a hawk helps.....conveys the sincerity of your warning. Anywho, just thought I'd share the story, reminded me of days gone by....ahh Customer Relations, I remember you well.

[Dale Harris]

FormicaFun,

I think that setting the store on fire would clear it faster but your idea sounds more practical.

[FormicaFun]

Dale,

That has also crossed my mind, but not just for clearing the store out...would also work to get the next day off, get a transfer that you've been after, get them to finally fix that printer that's broken, I mean the list is endless. Hey, want some new floor tile?

-Ryan :-)

LOL

[ibmsystems]

Well, funny you should suggest this. At the grocery chain that I work <which shall remain nameless> we're typically open 24 hours a day, so the "close" is typically nothing more than an accounting formality at midnight. However, on the rare occasion that we were actually locking the doors <Like say...for a holiday, all 2 of them> we found nothing cleared the customers out faster than telling them that in 10 minutes the registers would automatically close. This only came after a few years of pleading on the loudspeaker for that one last lady who couldn't decide which brand of Eggnog to buy for that perfect holdiay toast would keep one of us there <usually me> well past the time I was hoping to get out of there to spend time with my family...and share said eggnog toast with them. I'd usually just end up giving the lady several brands to choose from, paper bag...out the door, "have a nice day, no charge/it's on the house, I'm ready to go, goodnight and good luck". No, I wouldn't suggest this as a real feature, but if you ever need to clear the store out, it's a good reason to use. Acting concerned, and watching the clock like a hawk helps.....conveys the sincerity of your warning. Anywho, just thought I'd share the story, reminded me of days gone by....ahh Customer Relations, I remember you well.

Yes this is all too normal in my store example:

Last week i had some contractor that couldnt decided weither to buy a blue or red key well about an hour later i made a key of everycolor i had threw them in the bag said here you go (in my mind: GET OUT OF HERE!!) lol

[mattfast1]

Sounds like a good trick to use at my national discount merchant.

[Dylan]

The idea of a register closing itself out at a preset time is rediculus to me.
I work with what is arguably the most advance POS system possible at
my other job. If one of the worlds largest companies thinks that it's not
a good idea, we shouldn't either. However, what - to me- is a good idea
is an "unattended close" app that could be set up once and then called
later by command line, or a batch file, or even IDS to close the system
with no user interaction with DHPOS like we have now. I'm just saying it
could be a neat app. Now, If you wanted to, you could actually set up the
command line auto-run feature to automatically run it whenever you want.
BUT, I think that auto-closing regisers are, well, impractical.

Consider this... You change a bunch of settings and add a bunch of stuff
to your stock table for a new promo rollout, and as you are double-
checking everything (or a POS technician, like me, is checking everything)
after the store closes then suddenly the POS system goes down, and
deletes MDSE data, etc. Then you (or me) are screwed. And let me tell
you, you do not want to deal with a pissed-off IT guy - especially in those
circumstances.

Anyhow, just personal thoughts.

Tech

[SwedaGuy]

Auto closing is extremely common in high-end retail...if there is the chance an operator may screw something up, or forget an important step, this facility is crucial. If you want to be able to lock the doors and walk away at night, it's just a convenience.

I've set up many small retailers to auto close, and in fact, all but one of my businesses do it. The first rule of thumb is to set this batch when no one will need to be in the system. If you close at 8:00 PM, you don't set the system to batch out at 8:15, but rather 11:30 or possibly in the early hours of the next morning.

Additionally, the systems that do this always provide a way to deactivate the auto close in the event of an emergency. For example, if a snow storm is coming you may close early, turn off the auto close and run the end-of-day before you leave--because you know you'll probably lose power at some point over night.

Dylan, that is such a coincidence that I am Dylan as well, and we both work with POS systems.

In any application I recommend to a customer, I always look for this feature, if only to prevent the "Sally forgot to z out last night" scenario...