When it comes to our software solutions, we constantly strive to innovate in order to help our customers from the retail industry improve their regular day-to-day sales activities. To be honest – we can’t even believe that it’s already time for a new version of the NP Retail solution, but time flies when you’re working on a lot of interesting projects at the same time. Our product team released a new version of the NP Retail solution (NP Retail Version 19.0) on 7 March 2023.
Here’s a recap of everything we’ve been working on over the last month to make our NP Retai solution even better for our customers. Let’s dive into our new features:
- Control 2 Display: Process your returns quickly and easily
- Limit payment types to specific items: Meal, eco, and consumption vouchers;
- Change Responsibility Center: Manage your responsibility centers more efficiently;
- Change Bin: Know exactly where to find any product at any time with a few clicks;
- Email Receipts: Increase your efficiency and save costs with digital receipts.
- The performance toolkit extension: Prevent poor execution of certain procedures on time;
1. Display 2 Control: Process your returns quickly and easily
First, the bad news: did you know that about 30% of all products ordered online are returned, and when it comes to brick-and-mortar stores, the percentage is 8.89%? Now, the good news: According to Forbes, as many as 95% of customers would buy from the same shop again if the return procedure went smoothly. The previously mentioned figures are just proof of how important it is that the procedure is simple, fast and runs smoothly.
When it comes to the return procedure, with this new version we bring additional improvements in this field with a new feature called “Display 2 Control”. This feature enables the customer’s signature on the second display upon the returning of items, and then enclosing that with the invoice for that transaction. This can also be used in combination with the new “Take a Photo” feature by attaching the photo of the invoice as well. Before using this feature, a second screen must be enabled for the POS unit.
Watch our demo video below and learn more about this new feature first hand.
2. Limit payment types to specific items: Meal, eco, and consumption vouchers
In the past, meal vouchers were typically in the form of paper tickets. Gradually, they were replaced by electronic vouchers in the form of a special payment card. Today, they are exclusively issued in electronic format that combines the value of meal, eco, and other vouchers in a single card.
When it comes to payment methods, we have added a new feature to our POS system called “Limit payment types to specific items.“ This feature enables creating payment methods that are used on the POS for purchasing only items or item categories singled out during its creation. This option is especially useful when establishing vouchers as viable payment types for certain items only. Examples of such vouchers are meal, eco, and consumption vouchers, which are used in certain regions for purchasing comestibles and eco-friendly supplies or for temporarily boosting consumption rates.
- Meal vouchers can only be used for purchasing comestibles. They are usually reloaded by the employer onto the employee’s electronic card on a monthly basis.
- Eco vouchers can only be used for purchasing items that support the green economy by promoting environmentally friendly, eco-designed and/or sustainable products. They are usually reloaded by the employer onto the employee’s electronic card on a yearly basis.
- The consumption voucher has been introduced by the Belgian government to stimulate the economy, and boost employee purchasing power. It supports the recovery of sectors that have been hit the hardest by the COVID-19 pandemic. The consumption vouchers were loaded onto the employee’s electronic card only once.
Watch our demo video below and learn more about this new feature first hand.
3. Change Responsibility Center: Manage your responsibility centers more efficiently
The use of responsibility centers is one of the most established and widely used techniques in financial control. Responsibility centers are essential cogs in any organizational machinery. They can help retail companies grow and seamlessly manage their activities if implemented correctly and efficiently.
In order to facilitate the management of responsibility centers, we added a new feature to our POS system called “Change Responsibility Center.”
With this new feature, you will be able to handle responsibility centers more efficiently. The feature provides you with an option to change the responsibility center in an open POS sale.
Watch our demo video below and learn more about this new feature first hand.
4. Change Bin: Know exactly where to find any product at any time with a few clicks
Have you ever been in a situation where you can’t find a certain item in your warehouse due to the huge amount of different items, and the customer is waiting for you at the checkout? Stressful, isn’t it? Bins are extremely important for retailers who have huge warehouses, but also a huge number of different items in stock. Bins represent physical shelves and rows in which the shop’s inventory is stored.
With the new version of the NP Retail solution, we bring a new feature to our POS system called “Change Bin.” If there are multiple bins in one store location, you can choose which bin the item will be taken from during POS sales. The key benefit of this new functionality is reflected in the fact that it is possible to use more bins at store locations, but also to find different items in your warehouses much faster.
Watch our demo video below and learn more about this new feature first hand.
5. Email Receipts: Increase your efficiency and save costs with digital receipts
Digital receipts can offer a range of benefits for both customers and retail businesses of all sizes. Customers like digital receipts because they can store them on their emails and whenever they need them, or in other words, they can easily find them, unlike paper receipts. On the other hand, printing a paper receipt costs money. It might not seem a lot of money, but these costs increase over time, especially if your company is doing well and you’re printing receipts all day. And last, but certainly not least, paper receipts can be a huge environmental problem as they are printed using harmful chemicals, which means that they can’t be recycled.
In order to improve the aforementioned, we have added a new functionality to our POS solution called “Send Receipt.” This new feature enables the option to send the receipt to the customer via email with just a click on your POS. You can either send the last receipt, or you can choose a receipt from a list.
Watch our demo video below and learn more about this new feature first hand.
6. The performance toolkit extension: Prevent poor execution of certain procedures on time
Companies who successfully implement a customer experience strategy achieve higher customer satisfaction rates, reduced customer churn and increased revenues. To stay ahead, as a company we are aware that we need to focus not only on delivering good products and services, but also on an excellent customer experience. This requires seeing things from the client’s perspective and solving certain challenges even before the client notices them.
For this reason, it is extremely important for us that the procedures of our NP Retail solution work flawlessly according to pre-defined criteria, but also that we identify certain deviations in the execution of the procedures and eliminate them in time. To monitor the mentioned procedures, our developers use the Performance toolkit, as well as telemetry where all data is recorded. Based on this data, they monitor whether certain procedures are performing well or need further improvement.
For example, it takes ‘x’ time to execute a certain procedure, but after our developers’ insight into the telemetry, they found that the time required to execute the mentioned procedure is significantly longer than expected. This is a valuable sign for our developers that it is necessary to improve the procedure, i.e., in this case, to improve the execution time of the mentioned procedure. The above means that we improved a certain procedure without our client even noticing it, in that way preemptively acting on their experience with our solution. Simply put, we know that satisfied customers remain loyal and we do everything in our power to ensure that satisfaction.
7. Do you happen to have a question? We have the answer!
We hope that we have met your expectations this time as well. If you would like to know more about our new functionalities, please feel free to contact us! We’ll be happy to answer any questions you may have.