CategoryCustomer Service

There is a difference between the various POS systems in the market and a difference between the various POS software companies in the marketplace. Only someone who has used the various systems can truly know the difference.

We can’t speak for what our POS software does compared to another, just as they can’t for us.

What we can speak to is what we focus on for differentiation, what we offer and what we do to stand out, be talked about positively and to be loved. Here are some areas of differentiation we pursue:

Human service. Call us, and a human answers. For POS software customer service you can speak with a human, someone skilled in retail and skilled in using our POS software. They will chat with you to understand your questions. They will answer without following a script. It’s a conversation, between humans. Better still, you can. speak with the leadership team of the company for any escalation.

Your voice matters. You can promote software changes and have other users of the software vote on them. Suggestions on this transparent voting platform are considered and reviewed prior to finalising the content of each software update. Every update has some of the suggestions addressed – demonstrating that we listen.

Small business focussed. Not selling to big groups or chains means that each customer is equal, each voice as important as the other, none of our customers get lost in a crowd of monsters and ants. In our community everyone is equal, and respected as such.

Proactive change. Thanks to regular software updates the POS software itself evolves as the needs of retail evolve, sometimes faster – ensuring that the software is a commercially valuable solution in a rapidly, changing retail landscape.

No hidden fees or costs. Tower approaches pricing with transparency. We make our money from renting access to the software. There is no required payments platform, no fee per transaction in customer businesses.

Learn your way, in your time. Thanks to an awesome library of training videos that is regularly expanding and a wonderful library of knowledge base articles and that these are brought together through structured learning paths, staff in retail businesses using our POS software can easily learn, for themselves and the business they serve.

These are some of the ways we seek to differentiate at Tower Systems.

When it comes to your retail business, smooth operations are everything. Especially when it comes to your point-of-sale (POS) system, any question can bring things to a halt. That’s where a local reliable help desk comes in, a help desk where calls are conversations rather than strict script driven.

Tower Systems is Australian based. All of our help desk colleagues have retail experience. They don’t follow a script. You are not required to detail your query within strict parameters. It’s a conversation, something familiar in local small business retail.

An Aussie help desk will understand the nuances of your questions and be able to troubleshoot issues specific to Australian regulations and business practices.

When a POS system in any retail business crashes or does not perform and you expect, you need help fast. An Australian help desk operates in the same time zone as you, meaning you can get in touch with a real person during regular business hours. No waiting for an overseas team to wake up halfway across the world.

Here at Tower Systems customers set their own contact priority when they reach out to us. This determines the urgency. They are in control.

We cater to the specific needs of our retail communities: jewellers, garden centres, gift shops, bike shops, toy shops, newsagents and more. Folks on our help desk have a deep understanding of these local systems and the challenges you might face. They can provide tailored advice and solutions that are relevant to your business.

We see each of our POS software customers as a valued customer, not just another ticket number. Individual businesses matter. All of our customers are small business retailers. We don’t serve big business retailers. We take the time to understand your business and develop a relationship with your team. This can lead to faster resolutions and even proactive support to prevent future problems.

We also provide easy to access forums, like user meetings, where every voice is heard.

If being able to access useful and understandable customer service about your POS software matters in your business. Tower Systems is here for you. Locally made and supported POS software for local specialty retailers.

Decades ago software companies like us would run user meetings around the counter. They provided an excellent forum for dialogue between software users and developers.

We have continued our commitment to user meetings. Today, they are run online. They are an open and inclusive as ever. We find them invaluable.

In a few hours we are hosting our next POS software user meeting. Our 4th so far this year. we are grateful to customer engagement with these.

We have just completed a project working with customers that we could see were not backing up their POS software data daily.

This is customers not running in the cloud – customers who prefer to run on computers in their businesses. There are plenty of situational reasons where this is required.

Anyway, we did a deep dive and found a group of several hundred not following our advice to backup daily. So, we engaged with each of them, reminded them of the importance of daily backup, offered easy access to automated safe cloud backup and urged them to do something.

The whole project resulted in a different type of engagement with our customers – proactive with us reaching out to them to say hey, things don’t look right here.

Customers loved it.

You don’t want to discover that you need a backup when you don’t have one.

Hardware failures, natural disasters,cyberattacks, accidental deletions, and even power surges can all lead to irreplaceable data disappearing. This can be catastrophic for a business, causing delays, damaging reputations, and incurring significant financial losses.

That’s where daily data backups come in. Regularly backing up data creates a safety net, ensuring you have a recent copy of your information readily available in case of disaster. Here are some reasons why backing up your data every day is crucial:

• A data loss event can bring your entire operation to a grinding halt. Daily backups allow you to quickly restore lost information and get back up and running with minimal downtime. This keeps your business productive and prevents lost revenue.

• Ransomware attacks are a growing concern, and businesses are prime targets. By having daily backups, you can avoid paying hefty ransoms to retrieve your data. Simply restore from your latest backup and continue working.

• Human error is inevitable. Accidental file deletions or system malfunctions can happen to anyone. Daily backups ensure you have a recent copy to restore, saving you the heartache and hassle of data recovery.

• Disasters can strike at any time. Floods, fires, or even power outages can damage hardware and destroy data. Daily backups stored offsite guarantee you have a copy of your information safe and secure, enabling you to resume operations quickly.

Our advice to any POS software customer is to ensure you are backing up daily.

24/7 support is vital for retailers using POS software like that we offer from Tower Systems. Over an extended break like Easter, which starts tomorrow, we have opportunities in place through which our customers can easily access knowledge and support to answer questions and resolve queries.

Via our website, our POS software customers have access to an enhanced chatbot experience. This chatbot has been comprehensively tested over the last two months with many different queries and scenarios put to it. It passes with flying colours. It has the ability to draw on knowledge from 900+ knowledge base articles and other technical content about the capabilities of our software.

Our customers also have access to our vast knowledge base as well as a large and growing library of training videos.

All of these resources are unique to Tower Systems and its community of POS software customers. Better still, the resources continue to evolve. Take the training videos, we have added more than forty this year already.

Backing all of this leading-edge tech up is our human team, they are accessible too, including through to leadership team escalation.

This is the type of customer service that sets us apart.

Tower Systems prides itself on offering comprehensive support to its customers. This includes after hours service for those times when a critical issue arises outside of regular business hours.

To access support after hours for any urgent issue: call 03 9524 8000 and our phone system will automatically transfer you to the available after hours support personnel.

What we know, though, is that two thirds of all after hours calls can be answered via the website chatbot or a knowledge base search. This self serve access is faster. It also helps users of the software better learn the software and this enhances their efficiency.

By combining after hours support with their self-service options, Tower Systems ensures its customers have the resources they need to get the help they need, whenever they need it. This is POS software customer service in 2024 – providing help for retailers in a cost effective way.

We are grateful to our customers who help us continue to evolve the customer service experience.

Have a wonderful Easter break.

We’ve all been there. You punch in the numbers based on the menu options they provide, you think you’re at the right place and it turns out you are no, so you have to start again. Or, you say what you are looking for, and the computer on the other end thinks you have said something else. Or, you send an email like they want and there is no response, ever. Or you use their customer service chat bot that provided a response that bears no relation to your query.

Accessing customer service today has become messy as plenty of companies seek to save money on this most vital part of their business.

Real-life situations rarely fit neatly into pre-programmed options that companies dictate.

Real-live situations like we encounter at our POS software company start with a conversation, often some distance from an error message or a description of the actual query.

There is the issue of local slang, too. An Aussie customer service rep, on the other hand, can understand the nuances of your situation, whether you’re having a “shocker” with a faulty product or your internet’s gone belly-up. They can grasp the emotions behind your enquiry, be it fair dinkum frustration or a bit of larrikin humour, and tailor their approach accordingly. This not only gets you the solution you need faster, but it also shows that the company values you as an individual, not just another barbie on the snag.

There’s a certain comfort and level of trust that comes with interacting with a human, especially if they are in the same country as you. A friendly voice with a hint of a Queenslander twang or a broad Melbourne drawl can go a long way. A skilled customer service rep can build rapport with you, crack a few jokes, making the experience more positive. This is especially important when you’re dealing with a complex issue that may not make sense to you. Having someone who can empathise with your situation and actively work towards a fair dinkum resolution makes a world of difference.

The Power of Flexibility and Thinking Outside the Box

While chatbots and automated systems can be great for handling frequently asked questions, they often struggle when faced with unexpected situations. A human rep, on the other hand, has the flexibility to think outside the shearer’s shed and come up with creative solutions. They can access a wider range of information and resources, and use their judgement to find the best course of action for your specific needs. This can save you time and frustration, and leave you feeling like your problem has been genuinely addressed, not just swept under the barbie.

A human on a help desk can agree with out that something does not make sense. A bot is unlikely to do that. A computerised phone system won’t even let you get that far.

Sometimes, a simple apology or acknowledgement of your frustration can go a long way. A human customer service rep can offer that human touch, a sense that someone genuinely cares about your experience, whether you’re a bloke in the bush or a city slicker. This can turn a negative interaction into a neutral, or even positive, one. After all, when you feel like you’ve been heard and understood, you’re more likely to be a loyal customer and sing the company’s praises down the pub, not whinge about it to your mates.

Technology can certainly play a role in customer service. Here at Tower Systems though we make talking with a human easy, in any part of the company. We publish direct email addresses and phone numbers for different team members in the company from help desk, admin, accounts and the leadership team. This is important to us when we are customers, we know it is important to our customers.

It is a differentiator for our POS software company. Access to us is easy and content we publish is fresh. This speaks to our relevance in 2024 we think.

Our office is now closed until December 27. If you have any urgent need for support, please call any of our office numbers and we will connect you with one of our after hours team members.

www.findit.com.au, a free marketplace for local independent small business retailers, is helping local Aussie retailers attract shoppers in-store.

Free to Tower Systems POS software customers, the FindIt marketplace is like a live catalogue, an online catalogue, a place where shoppers can find what they want the local retailer who stocks what they want.

There is no cost for retailers and nnjo cost for shoppers. This is genuinely a free platform through which the thousands of retailer susing the Tower Systems POS software can find shoppers for themselves.

FindIt has been live for just under a year and already retailers are reporting success with new shoppers attracted as a result of finding products they want through the FindIt local marketplace platform. Just last week a retailer told us of three new shoppers attracted to their business thanks to the FindIt listings we provided for no cost.

  

While the actual cause of the Optus outage on Wednesday has not yet been detailed, the outage itself encourages us to work on our businesses, to ensure we are better protected.

1. Check your network. Make sure routers are current. Talk to your ISP about a more current replacement.
2. Check your computers. Dust is a killer. Power off, remove the cover, take it outside and use a can of air to clean.
3. Document your computer’s and network. List everything you have and who is responsible for each. We often receive support calls for items not supplied by us and not known about by us.
4. Check your backups. Get the most recent one restored to ensure it is backing up everything you need.
5. Use a cloud backup service for in-store and offsite storage.
6. Have a plan. If your network, computer system or EFTPOS is down, what’s your plan? Document it. Train all staff. Make sure everyone knows the plan and where to find it.
7. Consider redundancies, like a mobile phone on a different network in case your main network is down, a secondary EFTPOS box for payments should that be down.

First responders are good at what they do because they plan and drill, such that responding is muscle-memory. What happened with Optus is a reminder to be prepared in local retail so you are less impacted.

This advice was first provided to Tower Systems POS software customers in a customer support email. It’s good advice any business could / should follow at the very least. We kept it brief to ensure it’s read and actioned. We kept the language simple to ensure it is accessible to all.

For sure we have no real idea what caused the Optus outage. But we do know that following this advice we have shared will better prepare local retail businesses for tech challenges they may face themselves.

The best time to prepare for a disaster, no matter how big or small, is well in advance of the disaster. The steps we have outlined here are simple to follow and achievable in any business regardless of technical skill set.

We are experiencing no impact here because of the Optus outage today. Our phones are up and running as are all of our online access points.

While it’s a public holiday our after hours crew is here for urgent calls.

At our website, www.towersystems.com.au, once you choose your marketplace, you can watch a recent software demonstration immediately, without providing any of your details.

Alternatively, you can, with one click request a personal demonstration lead by the needs of your business.

We believe in easy to access customer service, pre sales, and post sales.

Just as retail is personal, POS software support is personal.

The number of clicks and the amount of information you have to provide in order to watch a POS software demonstration says something about the ease of access to help with that software. See for yourself.

While we love talking with our POS software customers and take hundreds of calls for advice, training and support every day, plenty of our customers are loving the enhanced self-serve facilities through our website where many day-to-day queries are answered instantly, without the need to call or email.

The advanced tech behind this innovating is delivering terrific POS software support content to our customers, helping them to get more from our software instantly, when they need it.

Customers using this self-serve access to help desk advice free our people to handle more complex queries on how yo use our POS software.

Our help desk team members don’t follow a script. Each call is a conversation, free flowing, in pursuit of valuable and appreciate answers for our POS software customers.

We are grateful to have published plenty more POS software training videos to our free to access training library. Each video is on a separate topic and compact in time – to get to the point, cover it and provide customers an opportunity to try for themselves.

We have found these short videos to work very well in training local retailers in the use of our POS software.

Here are some of the new videos we have published:

• Monthly Sales Comparison – the best report for ay retailer looking to understand and grow their business. 
• Ranked Sales Report – so many options for discovering what’s working and what’s not.
• Installing Retailer Updates – how, when, where and what.
• General Stock Listing Report – for those who like old-school.
• Supplier Stock Listing Report – when you want to hone in on a supplier.
• Sales Transaction Log – the guts of sales history.
• Detailed Takings Report – everything you want to know.
• POS Touch Screen Advanced Settings – make your POS screen your own.
• How to access and find knowledge base articles (including using F1) – the easy way to get help when you want it.
• Access Support – Understanding Priority and Logging Support Tickets – tips for the best customer service experience.
• Importing a Supplier Stockfile – we make it easy, and certain.

These videos and the many others released this year are designed to help you get more from the software for your business. We are grateful for customer feedback on the videos.

POS software training can be a challenge in a retail business with a staff turnover or a roster of casual staff. Our video training library with, now, around 70 new videos offers a resource set that retailers can use to ensure staff are well trained to get more form their Tower Systems POS software.

In publishing this list of most recent training videos produces by us for our POS software customers, we are showing our commitment to customer service. It would be easier to tell, but we prefer to show. facts matter and this list of training videos is real and fresh training content that our small business retailer customers are telling us they love, and we are sincerely grateful for that.

Okay so today is a public holiday for the Queen’s Birthday. We’re taking a break – but fear not! If you have an urgent query our after-hours crew is there for you.

We are grateful to have hosted another meeting of users of our software. This was done yesterday, via Zoom – a platform plenty of our POS software customer prefer.

At this meeting we previewed our next software update, sought feedback on some development plans in the pre-planning stage. We also had plenty of time for questions, which is the real value of meetings like this for plenty.

We know that being accessible is important to our local small business retailer community. It’s why we do these sessions regularly, and why they are open to all customers, and why there is no cost whatsoever.

To ensure we can answer as many questions as possible we had people there from development, support as well as senior management.

Back in the day, decades ago, in-person user meetings were a key feature from engages software companies. They still are today, but online, saving everyone time as well as travel costs.

We are grateful to the customers who joined in yesterday and those who watched later on video. Feedback from sessions like this is vital to our future.