Possible Mobile POS deployment drops?

Shopping is a favorite pastime amongst so many people be it shopping for an occasion, for pleasure or therapy. Of course, majority of the figures probably lies in the window shopping category. One of the key influencing factors resulting in a successful acquisition could be impulsive buying. That which I believe could be motivated by the ease and convenience of mobile payments. Mobile Commerce Daily reported that 33 percent of retailers are actually having second thoughts on having to adopt the mobile point-of-sale systems. IHL Group reports that there is a slump in deployment figures compared to the previous year.

The truth is people are less likely to embrace new changes. And so if there is little or no acceptance to mobile POS,  it is unlikely consumers will follow suit. As retailers are aware of the potential to enhance their in-store experience with mobile POS, they also identified the problems through integration of mobile POS into their store operations. While I believe they are worried of the big undertakings through this adoption, I strongly recommend the importance of giving consumers a more conducive and effective shopping experience. I do not think retailers should compromise that brand experience with possible issues like merchandise security, cash handling, bagging, customer service levels nor traffic flows.

– quote from mobile commerce daily –

“There has been a lot of hype around mobile completely eliminating POS mostly around some announcements from a few retailers, however, most retailers are taking an approach of utilizing mobile as an add-on to service and not a replacement,” said Greg Buzek, president of IHL Group, Franklin, TN.

“At the same time retailers are using mobile as a way to rethink their entire omni-channel transaction processing, looking to move to a single business logic regardless of the channel in which the customer chooses to buy,” he said.

“Finally, retailers are having to rethink their entire operations as they deploy mobile.  This includes security of the device, security of the merchandise, security of the transactions, payment handling, receipts, bags, and traffic flow.”

Mobile POS has inevitably improved the shopping experience of most shoppers and should continue to improve to eliminate these possible fears from retailers. Let’s work together to a new and more innovative shopping experience.