Inventory Management
Point of Sale
Financial Accounting
Customer Loyalty & POS Offers
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21 Nov
Shopify POS vs Square POS vs Books POS — Let’s compare which point of sale software is better for your retail store?
When looking for POS software, search not only for a point of sale but also test it based on your store’s requirements. Shopify POS vs Square POS – They both offers limited features and tools and are circumscribed to only purchases and sales. However, BooksPOS focuses on all aspects of the retail business to help you grow.
Let’s look at six important things you need to consider making an informed decision.
Inventory Management
| Features | Shopify POS | Square POS | BooksPOS |
|---|---|---|---|
| Unlimited Product Bins inside a retail location | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Delay Stock Adjustments | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Multi-Store Inventory | ✓ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Stock Transfers with Approvals | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Inter-location Stock Replenishments | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Tag Sales (or Purchases) using multiple vouchers | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Warehouse Management | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Partial physical stock counting | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
Shopify POS doesn’t offer even basic features except for its multi-store inventory management.
Likewise, Square POS offers not even a single advanced or even basic inventory management tools. A retailer looking for a inventory POS might get disappointing with Square POS.
However, BooksPOS makes inventory management lenient through its high-level features like unlimited product bins, replenishment, advanced inventory reports, and so on. BooksPOS gives you the power you need.
Winner – BooksPOS
Learn more about BooksPOS inventory management ->
Omni-Channel
| eCommerce Platform | Shopify POS | Square POS | BooksPOS |
|---|---|---|---|
| Shopify | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Woocommerce | ✗ | ✓ | ✓ |
Shopify POS is limited to its own Shopify platform. It does not allow you to sell over any other eCommerce platform.
BooksPOS and Square POS, on the other hand, already integrates with Shopify, Woocommerce, and more marketplaces.
Winner – Tie between BooksPOS and Square
Point of Sale
| Features | Shopify POS | Square POS | BooksPOS |
|---|---|---|---|
| End of day report | ✓ | ✗ | ✓ |
| User activity reports | ✓ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Advanced controls | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Centralized Inventory | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| User Access Control | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Barcode scanning | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Split payments | ✗ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Customized Invoices | ✗ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Customer Data | ✗ | ✓ | ✓ |
Shopify POS when compared to Square POS and BooksPOS offers limited features. Also, you will need to purchase expensive add-ons to access some features that a retailer might want.
Square POS is a good point of sale software. Yet, it does not provide some advanced features like end of day reports, user activity reports, and sophisticated controls.
However, BooksPOS offers you almost all the features needed by a retailer. You won’t need to purchase any additional features as BooksPOS integrates all requirements. Also, BooksPOS offers you advanced features like customer management, user access control, split payments, etc. required in retail to help them grow.
Winner – BooksPOS
Learn more about BooksPOS point of sale ->
Multi-Store Management
| Features | Shopify POS | Square POS | BooksPOS |
|---|---|---|---|
| Multi-Store inventory | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Stock transfers between stores | ✗ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Single report for all stores | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Franchise Management | ✗ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Create sub-locations in the warehouse | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Process B2B and B2C orders from warehouses | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
Shopify POS proves futile for a multi-store point of sale system. It offers no such important traits that retailers can use to manage their multiple stores efficiently.
On the other hand, Square POS provides you primary features for your multi-store inventory.
BooksPOS enhances and integrates with your stores or franchises with its single multi-store POS system with sophisticated features. Moreover, BooksPOS gives you visibility of all your stores in one single report.
Winner – BooksPOS
Franchise Management
| Features | Shopify POS | Square POS | BooksPOS |
|---|---|---|---|
| MRP Discount | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Revenue Sharing | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Stock Replenishment | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Profitability Reports | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Real-Time Reports | ✗ | ✓ | ✓ |
Here, Shopify’s and Square’s POS are on the weaker grounds when weighed for franchise management.
Shopify POS doesn’t support franchise management.
Square POS, though offers franchise management, provides you only real-time reports for other stores.
BooksPOS allows you to manage all your franchise stores and bill them on MRP discounts or allow revenue sharing. Moreover, BooksPOS also offers advanced replenishment controls allowing you to see the current stock at your franchisee stores and fulfilling them quickly.
Winner – BooksPOS
Learn more about BooksPOS Multi-Store Capabilities ->
Financial Accounting
| Features | Shopify POS | Square POS | BooksPOS |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tax Compliant Reports | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Financial Statements | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Multi-Currency | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Accounting | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Expense Management | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
Shopify POS runs on a weak accounting framework and you will have to use any other accounting software that is compatible with their POS software.
Similar to Shopify POS, Square POS accounting has been a hit or miss. It is neither tax compliant nor even provides you with advanced accounting.
BooksPOS never lets you down. Accounting comes built-in in BooksPOS. Journal, General ledgers, Financial statements, Expense management, tax reports, etc, everything is included in the software. BooksPOS is the only platform that depicts the true picture of your business.
Winner – BooksPOS
Learn more about BooksPOS accounting ->
Customer Loyalty & POS Offers
| Features | Shopify POS | Square POS | BooksPOS |
|---|---|---|---|
| Advanced loyalty slabs and features | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Unlimited price-lists | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Gift Cards | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Coupon Discounts | ✓ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Product Combos | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Offers based on customer’s purchase history | ✗ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Club multiple offers on the same product | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Controls to disallow discounting | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Manual Discounts | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
As a retailer, you should be able to run smart offers that are unique, resulting in more sales.
Shopify POS supports a loyalty program, but a miss is that it only provides manual discounts and offer coupons to the customers. ShopifyPOS is limited in terms of automated discounting and promotions stacking for the items in the cart.
Square POS allows you to create manual discounts and offers based on customer’s purchase history.
However, BooksPOS does much more. BooksPOS allows you to create custom offers and feature-rich customer loyalty benefits, and membership options. All the offers get applied to your sales automatically with BooksPOS software.
Winner – BooksPOS
Learn more about BooksPOS CRM ->
Get more value for what you pay
Shopify POS for retail needs a Shopify Subscription and an additional $89/month per location.
Whereas, Square POS for retail needs a Retail Subscription starting from $119/pm and additional transaction fees of 2.75%.
However, BooksPOS starts with $29/month per device which is the most affordable option with the best features for small retailers.
Winner – BooksPOS
Transaction Fees
| Terms | Shopify POS | Square POS | BooksPOS |
|---|---|---|---|
| Transaction Fee | 2.0% per online transaction | 2.75% fee per transaction | No Fee |
| Integrated Payment | Available | Available | Available |
| Use of POS Payment Provider | Mandatory –otherwise the fee is charged | Optional – the retailer may use his own best payment solution | Optional – the retailer may use his own best payment solution |
| Surcharging | Not Available | Not Available | Available |
Shopify POS charges a separate transaction fee unless you use their own Shopify Payments. Also, if you use your own payment methods other than shopify payments, you will charged an additional charge which might eat up your profits.
Likewise, Square POS also charges a transaction fee whenever you make a transaction.
BooksPOS allows you to save more by using a payment solution that it already integrates or you can bring your own – either way, it does not take a cut of your sales. Additionally, BooksPOS natively supports surcharging allowing you to save a lot more on your credit card transaction fees.
Winner – BooksPOS
BooksPOS Value
| BooksPOS Features | Value |
|---|---|
| Accounting (QuickBooks) | $75/mo. |
| Omnichannel Inventory management | $40/mo. |
| Business Intelligence tool | $200/mo. |
| White Labelling options | $50/mo. |
| API Access | $250/mo. |
| TOTAL | $615/mo. |
*API Access is a customs requirement and there will be an additional cost to using it. The cost depends on a case-to-case basis.
BooksPOS gives more value to the dollar you pay than any other POS software in the industry. With the BooksPOS subscription, you get access to all the features and the updates we release frequently.
Conclusion – Shopify POS vs Square POS vs BooksPOS
It is clear that BooksPOS is a better point of sale software. We provide better inventory management, customer management, and point of sale.
BooksPOS is an all-in-one Retail Management solution for your business. Shopify POS, on the other hand, is a part of a larger Shopify platform which is an eCommerce platform. Likewise, Square POS is a part of its SquareUp services that offers tool to run your business.
Though BooksPOS supports everything Square and Shopify POS provides, it does much more. Therefore, BooksPOS is the current best POS software in the industry. To know more,
