Remember those big electronic cash registers in shopping malls used for collecting cash and credit card payments? Those days are gone, and devices like credit card terminals and electronic cash registers are becoming obsolete. Nowadays, most small businesses prefer using a point of sale or POS system to manage their retail process.
The system helps these small businesses calculate their taxes and total costs, create product entries, create bills, and make payments. Some POS systems also help business owners track employee performance, inventory, and sales.
Before diving deep, let us first understand what POS solutions are.
What are POS Solutions?
POS (point of sale) software is a technology that allows small business owners to integrate with their systems and databases and track their sales, customer data, and inventory. POS software can be used on your smartphone or your desktop. A typical example of POS software is a portable card reader that can be used with a smartphone via an on-the-go or OTG adapter.
Benefits of POS System
Here is a list of the benefits of using a POS system:
- Smart inventory management
- Track your employee’s activities
- Better customer order management
- Better customer service
- Automatic workflow
- Making payments easier.
As a small business owner, you deal with multiple payments to multiple channels, but what if you get retail POS software for free? Yes, you heard it right! Numerous companies offer free POS software. This article discusses some of the top free POS solutions for small businesses in India.
Best Free Retail POS Solutions for Small Businesses
While surfing the market, you will find thousands of free retail billing software. However, certain factors must be considered when choosing the right one for your business. The free POS solution must have the following:
- Inventory management module
- Must have some exclusive features like developing reports, analytics, sale order, tracking, etc
- It should have a user-friendly interface.
Here are the top 5 free retail POS solutions for small businesses in India:
1. Lightspeed
This iOS-based POS system has been exclusively developed for the restaurant, golf, and retail industries. The company has recently partnered with Ecwid and sells its products using short video clips. Lightspeed is especially popular among small business people due to its advanced inventory tracking feature and simple user interface, which both beginners and professionals can use.
Features:
- With their inventory reporting features, Lightspeed will automatically send an alert whenever the stock is low.
- Once you sign in, you will be registered with the built-in customer liability program.
- The retail POS software has over 40 inbuilt report templates, which you can customize per your requirement.
- Lightspeed has a strong supplier network.
- You can access real-time sales data and can access customer payments.
For all small businesses, Lightspeed offers a free trial of 14 days, where you can use all their tools and features. After the free trial period, you will have to pay a monthly fee ranging from $69 to $289, depending on the type of tools and features you want. You can contact the company for a customized plan if you own more than one business.
2. QueueBuster
QueueBuster is an all-in-one point-of-sale (POS) application hosted in the cloud and designed to assist small to medium-sized enterprises in managing billing, inventory, Khata, or Digital Ledger, as well as the creation of online dukaan. It has a 30-day free trial period and many valuable features such as stock monitoring and alerts, automated ordering and billing, numerous suppliers, extensive search and reporting, and more. In addition to its other features, QBuster allows seamless integration with your business’s existing infrastructure and real-time monitoring/reordering capabilities.
Features:
- Create a variety of invoices, including proforma invoices, final invoices, credit sales, and no-charge orders.
- Store and organize data about your products, including their prices, taxes, fees, and more, down to the individual SKU level.
- Take payments from money, cards, digital wallets, UPI, vouchers, credit notes, and checks.
- A specialized module for handling all of the catalog’s stock information at the store and item levels
- Set up a system of rewards and promotions and offer temporary price cuts
- Complete sales can be monitored and analyzed using consolidated reporting and in-depth analytics.
- Set up an online store for customers to make online purchases
- Get detailed insights on the inventory and predict future needs
QBuster is a popular choice of retail POS amongst small-scale businesses because of its ability to adapt to different industries.
3. Floreant POS
Floreant POS is another popular free restaurant-based open-source solution compatible with Windows, Mac, and Linux. This free POS solution helps small businesses manage their stock order, sales, and cash flow. With the use of the software, you can also calculate regular taxes and the pricing of your products.
Floreant POS allows the managers complete control over the cash, and the cash terminal feature also gives access to the cash drawer from each terminal.
Features:
- Create advanced reports
- Business owners can access it from phones and tablets
- Direct access to the cash terminal
- Direct kitchen control and bar tab generation
- Table service and many management
- Manager facilities
Floreant POS also allows business owners to save customer records for future access.
uniCenta
If you are looking for an open-source POS solution used worldwide (in over 150 countries), you can try uniCenta. The POS software can be accessed from Windows, Linux, and Mac systems and can also be used on smartphones and tablets. This POS software allows businesses to track employee logins and enforce role-based access.
Features:
- Cash management
- ACH payment processing
- Barcode recognition
- Inventory tracking
- Online ordering
- Employee management
- CRM
- Customer management
- Detailed sale analysis
Most of the features of uniCenta are available free of cost as it is an open-source solution. However, you can only access premium features for a nominal fee. There are two types of plans: the Base plan, which is available for $72.90 a year, and the Plus plan, which is available at $165.24 per year.
4. eHopper
If you have just started your business or startup and are currently running on a short budget, then the best free POS software you can use is eHopper. The software can be accessed using Linux, Windows, and Mac-based operating systems.
Small business owners prefer this POS solution as they offer some of the best-paid features at a reasonable price. eHopper allows businesses and entrepreneurs to access their inventory management tools and customer data from any location.
Features:
- Contact management
- Employee management
- Payment management
- Inventory management
- Multiple reporting options
- Tip management
- You can directly print or email the receipts.
- eHopper can be used offline
eHopper offers a free plan along with three other paid plans. The free plan allows you to access inventory management, create barcode levels for your products, and manage your customer accounts.
However, you can only use the free version in one register and a single credit processor. The paid versions can range from $29.99 per month to $39.99.
So these are some of the top free POS solutions that most small businesses worldwide use for managing their transactions. Are you looking for an Indian POS solution to all your business-related issues and want to scale your retail business in 2024? Get a demo session with QueueBuster, and learn all you need to know!
Why Should you rely on QueueBuster?
QueueBuster is a leading Indian all-in-one business management application with a full-stack POS solution that can help you manage your inventory, customer loyalty programs, online stores, payment receipts, etc.
Now, if you are wondering about some of the salient features of Queuebuster, here is a list:
- Cloud upload: All your data is securely stored in Queuebuster’s cloud storage. So you can access it from anywhere at any time.
- Online Store: With Queuebuster, you can create your online store where customers can place orders directly.
- Access Payment: Queuebuster accepts all standard payment methods, so you do not have to keep tabs on different modes.
QueueBuster is the perfect POS solution for small businesses like restaurants, grocery shops, electronics shops, spas, and salons. You can request a demo and try out their features. Once satisfied, you can choose monthly, half-yearly, and yearly payment plans.
