NCR Counterpoint News

 In case you missed this notice from NCR Counterpoint:

Data Breaches, ID Theft, Credit Card Breaches - we hear this all the time in the news.  And this is the last thing you as an owner or manager want to experience for your business!

Please take time to read this!  It could save your business!

 In case you missed this notice from NCR Counterpoint:

Given all the recent security scares, we wanted to share this informative blog from NCR Counterpoint regarding security and your point of sale system:

Talk of the Equifax breach has dominated headlines, blog posts, and dinner table conversations over the last few weeks. According to a post on the Federal Trade Commission website, hundreds of thousands of people’s names, Social Security numbers, dates of birth, addresses, credit card numbers, and, in some cases, driver’s license numbers were compromised in one of the largest data breaches in history. This has inspired small-to-medium businesses to take extra precautions in securing their own data, but many still feel overwhelmed and under-prepared.

If you accept credit cards in your business and want to avoid charge backs and/or reduce credit card fraud,  we strongly encourage you to read this article from TSYS, one of our favorite preferred credit card processors:

" Charge Backs, Why They Happen, How to Prevent Them"

See the list of the questions about charge backs answered in this article:

Update from one of our major paper suppliers:

January 5, 2018 – Thermal paper supply continues to be allocated by the mills due to the on-going leuco dye shortage.  Mills continue to search for alternative sources of supply to meet customer demand.  These sources often come at a price premium driving up prices for thermal paper.  A thermal paper surcharge was just passed to the market and will be in effect at least through the first quarter of 2018.  

As of today, neither Chinese leuco dye plant has restarted production.  The exact date for the restart of the Chinese leuco dye plants is still unknown.  When they resume manufacturing, the supply chain is expected to take months to fill.  As such, we currently project supply will remain allocated through the first half of 2018.

Our strategy with respect to thermal paper supply continues to keep Iconex in the best possible position for paper availability. 

We want to thank you for your continued support and business this past year - and wishing you the best for the New Year.

So the good news first - the pricing of bond paper (non-thermal paper often used in kitchen printers) has gone down, and we have lowered our prices accordingly.   We like lowering our costs, and passing the savings on to our customers!

If you use a scanner at your store, the State of Alaska has reminded us of the following:

From a press release today:

Ok, it's a little early to be celebrating, but we wanted to make sure you have the instructions as you prepare for your year end!  So, if this is also your fiscal year end, there are some things you will need to do to close out the old year and open the new year in Counterpoint Version 8.

 To make it easier for you, we are posting instructions on how to do this.  Scroll down below to download a copy of the instructions.  Or watch this video!

Like most businesses, we are constantly looking for ways to improve. We have a flyer we have pinned up on the walls here that lists some of the key points we are looking to focus on for the year and one of these is: “Better communications with our customers.” 

As a technology provider, our phones are our life line to just about everything we do, whether it be assisting customers, working with vendors or communicating internally. We decided that it was time to invest in a new phone system, and we reached out to GCI for assistance in getting there.

You love Counterpoint, but you have a small business that doesn't need all the bells and whistles?  

Check out NCR Silver - NCR's retail point of sale solution for smaller retail operations.

SILVER POS FEATURES FOR RETAIL STORES

There are plenty of simple ways to take transactions at your retail store. But NCR Silver’s powerful and easy-to-use back offce program can help you manage your entire shop, even when you aren’t there in person.

NCR has Purpose Built Point of Sale Hardware for Any Retail Environment:

Built to last:  

Like the NCR RealPOS™ XR7, the XR5 was designed to offer the sophisticated elegance of the latest consumer technology, but with the robustness and reliability of industrial grade, purpose built POS technology—giving you the best of both worlds. With its rugged die-cast aluminum chassis, long life LED display, projected capacitive touchscreen, fan-less design, solid state drive, and long life components, the RealPOS™ XR5 will provide years of reliable operation.

Peace of mind:

Data security is a top five priority for most retail owners. Safeguarding customer data is of critical importance to your business, and we understand that. The NCR RealPOS™ XR5 includes several key security features, such as an encrypted MSR and an Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) solid state drive to protect shopper data.

Watch the Video on the XR Series:

Daylight Savings Time ends Sunday, November 5th.  Don't forget to set your clocks back so that you can get that extra hour of sleep!

 In case you missed this notice from NCR Counterpoint:

I just read an article by Linda Kirkpatrick - Executive Vice President, U.S. Market Development at Mastercard - "No More Signing on the Dotted Line".

Thomas Greenman came to Skurla's 9 years ago from Alabama.   (How weird is it that we have two employees from Alabama - yes, Jesse hails from that state, too.)  Thomas was originally hired as our Service Coordinator, moved up to Service Manager, then Operations and Sales.  

Data breach - those two words can (and should) scare the heck out of business owners.  It is everywhere in the news.  I think on some level, people are just throwing their hands up in the air at this point.  However, we don't want our customers to go through this experience - no one wants the CIA showing up at their back door or having their funds frozen because of a suspected breach.

To help you understand the impacts, we wanted to share this article by Justin Zeigler, the director of product development and marketing at Datacap Systems.  (Datacap Systems develops integrated payment interfaces for any type Point of Sale Application - so they are very in tune with security for point of sale systems.)  In this article, he discusses:

• What Is a Data Breach and How Do They Most Commonly Occur?
• What Can  You Expect When a Breach Occurs? What Are the Steps?
• Who Is Liable?
• Best Practices to Prevent Breaches and Mitigate Liability
• Using a QIR (Qualified Integrators and Resellers) Certified Reseller

As a business owner, it is vital to understand the effects of a breach on your business, your customers and your employees.

Read this eye opening article below:

For more information on ecommerce solutions for Counterpoint, call us at 907-243-2683.

It's September. What does that mean to many Alaskans? (Besides the fact that termination dust was sighted on the Chugach Mountains this morning.)

Our world is changing, quicker than some of us would like and for others, not quick enough.  All this change affects restaurants and retail like no other because your customers are on the forefront of these changes.  As your trusted Point of Sale (POS) provider, we find ourselves changing too.  We can’t just be a company that provides for you today, we also have to be able to provide for your future.  To help us do this, Skurla’s has been a member of RSPA (Retail Solutions Providers Association) for the better part of 40 years.  RSPA isn’t just for retail though.  At its heart are hundreds of POS providers and vendors, working together for a common cause: to help you.

Every year, RSPA members, vendors and partners meet at an event called RetailNOW.  I was fortunate to be able to attend and see what the future holds for restaurants and retail.  There were too many things to cover here but there were a few that stood out as key areas for merchants to take note of.

Customer engagement was one of the most popular areas that other POS dealers such as us were interested in.  A lot of this revolved around things like customer loyalty, data analytics (using it) and mobility.  These three things are fast becoming inseparable to the modern merchant.  They don’t have to exist together but when they do, it’s a big win for the customer and the merchant. 

• Customer loyalty is a system that rewards the customer for coming back to a merchant and giving them repeat business. It’s usually offered up in the way of points that are redeemed for good and/or services.  The big change here is making it as easy as possible for not only the customers to participate but having the merchants staff understand the process and help the customers engage.  Your staff are the “face” of the business and if they are engaged in the process, they will sell it like no other.  But to make it easy, you need to make another change: mobility.
• Mobility is a two-way street and your customers are already experts. If you don’t have the right mobility options to engage them, you’re falling behind.  New POS options have beacon technology, which enable merchants to know who is in the store or if they are close.  Utilizing this, smart merchants can know what a particular customer likes and market or sell to them direct and the customer will cheer you on for it!  But in-depth knowledge of your customer preferences takes more than just data.
• Data analytics isn’t enough – utilizing it is key. There are plenty of companies out there who will gather data for you but what do you do with it?  Using that data in a meaningful way is the third piece of customer engagement.  Have you ever been to a store or restaurant and filled out a comment card and never received a follow up call or email?  Or maybe not seen the changes that you would have expected?  Sadly, customers see this all too often and the result is that they don’t patronize that merchant again or are dissatisfied and share their experiences with other potential or existing customers.  Having tools and systems in place to act on your data will help you better serve your customers and turn them into raving fans.

NCR Counterpoint recently held their annual Synergy Conference.

Words that come to mind when we think about Jesse Dison, our Senior Implementation Specialist:

NCR has Purpose Built Point of Sale Hardware for Any Retail Environment:

Did you know if you are a Counterpoint  Software Subscription user that you have access to the NCR Counterpoint Knowledge base on the NCR COUNTERPOINT USER PORTAL.?  For Login  access, you will need your serial number and the zip code that your license is registered to with NCR.

In some businesses, credit sales account for over 80% of their daily sales.  If this is your business, you are depositing very little cash every day.  And while most of us count for and reconcile the cash, are you reconciling your daily credit card deposit to the credit card batches that actually go into the bank?  It seems easy and automatic, but here are a few tips and tricks we have learned over the last couple of decades installing integrated credit card systems.

Our office will be closed on Tuesday, July 4th in honor of Independence Day

  A reduced staff will be working remotely/on call to handle the needs of our customers on Monday, July 3rd.

However, we understand the importance of customer service and issues that may arise during this busy retail holiday.

 If you have an emergency, please call us at 243-2683 and follow the prompts to page our after hours technician.  For support hours and information, click here.

Have a safe and Happy 4th of July.  From the team at Skurla's!

• There has been a lot talk about ransomware and the Wanna Cry outbreak recently and we’ve heard lot of questions: 
  
  Am I vulnerable?  How can I protect myself? 

New Features in NCR Counterpoint 8.5.3

• EBT Support for NCR Secure Pay
• Ability to Turn Off Scrolling Receipts
• Sage 50 2017 Certified
• Quickbooks 2017 Certified
• Microsoft SQL Server 2016 Support and E-mail Format Validation

User Interface Features

 Meet Jeff Wood - one of our superheros .  Jeff joined us in 2012 - and knows point of sale inside and out.  One of our fundamental core values is Teamwork - and Jeff embodies that value in everything he says and does.  

The NCR team has been hard at work creating a new look and new features to help navigate through your NCR Counterpoint software! Today they are releasing the new version and providing you with a first glimpse at this new release. 

This is the most important security rule of all. Back up your drive with all of your data, weekly or daily (or even more frequently), depending on the volume of transactions. A rule of thumb: You should never be in a position where reentry of data requires more than a day’s work.

It's Friday night - your store or restaurant is packed.  Things are humming along nicely and you're thinking - we are busy, life is good!

Then you get the call - we are out of receipt paper at the register - can you bring us a roll?

You look, you panic - oh man - you forgot to reorder last week after they used that last roll!!!!

But you, being a smart manager/owner - know that you have that emergency supply kit tucked away for times just like these!  Viola!  Crack open the kit, and all is good.

Ok, but for those of you that don't have that emergency supply kit, well.....

So here is our advice.  First of all, make your point of sale supplies stock is something you inventory and check stock of on a regular basis.  If you purchase your supplies from us, we can even get you accurate sales history of how much you go through on a regular basis.  Preorder for a couple of months or even a season and take advantage of our quantity discounts!

But the unexpected can still happen.  So, for that reason, we suggest you create an emergency point of sale supply kit that only you or your managers know about and have access to.  Make this a part of your disaster plan!

Here are some suggestions of what to keep in that kit:

I think it is always nice to put a face with a name.  For those of you who haven't met her in person, we wanted to "introduce" you to our amazing Office Manager, Mandy Richards.  Mandy has been with us since 2015, and we couldn't be happier.

You know what we are talking about - that busy season - summer, tourists, people in general just out and about more.  And businesses get busy!

Update from NCR Counterpoint:

Announcement from NCR Counterpoint:

"We are excited to release a new look and feel to the NCR Counterpoint product, with our NCR Counterpoint V8.5.3 release! In addition to re-styling the software to create a modern interface, both the login experience and main menu have been entirely redesigned to provide a great new user experience when launching and navigating NCR Counterpoint.

As part of this effort to modernize the product and move it forward, it was also necessary to drop support for some legacy features and capabilities that were inhibiting these efforts. Please be aware that support for the following items is removed in the NCR Counterpoint V8.5.3 release:

We are pleased to announce the NCR RealPOS XR5 models are now fully supported for use with NCR Counterpoint.

NCR Counterpoint API is now available! The NCR Counterpoint Rest API will allow secure access to business level functionality in a way that is far simpler than the past. The API is a foundation for future "managed" customizations and integrations are are easier and less expensive to develop, more capabilities including the ability to scale, and easier to upgrade and support. 

NCR Counterpoint is  establishing new processes to ensure alerts and updates are reported in real time. The primary resource for updates are the CPGateway and NCR Secure Pay status pages on the End User Portal. They will communicate updates to these pages via email and the NCR Twitter account. 

Amazon Web Services (AWS) is the world's largest provider of internet-based computing services - almost 150,000 companys use AWS.  Companies such as Netflix, Spotify, Pinterest, Buzzfeed, and Amazon (go figure), use this service.  When AWS had an outage yesterday, it affected hundreds of thousands of businesses!  Dave Bartoletti, a cloud analyst with Forrester, told USA Today: “This is a pretty big outage.  “It’s got north of 3 to 4 trillion pieces of data stored in it.” That's a lot of data!

 Fortunately, for our customers that have products utilizing AWS, they are on a system that offers an offline solution or a solution that still runs even if internet is down.  

However, this is a great reminder that it is time to review the disaster plan for your business.  You have one, right?

Many disasters can befall a small business (power outages, earthquakes, internet outages, fires, security breaches, etc.), but few are worse than losing vital business information. Imagine losing your entire customer list, your accounts receivable data, your sales or payroll data, your menu setup, or your inventory records. You could spend weeks –even months - reconstructing this data. In a worst-case scenario, you might not be able to reconstruct it at all.   If you are on one of our hosted solutions, many of these worries go away.

In today’s highly-computerized business world, many firms are exposed to the sudden loss of information. Natural disasters, computer viruses, mechanical failures and electronic crime can all result in catastrophic data loss. No matter how hard you try, you can’t prevent disasters from occurring. But you can take forceful steps to safeguard your data, and ensure that you can retrieve and restore your computer records should you suffer a loss.  

 NCR will begin emailing a Counterpoint software maintenance (SWM) renewal (formerly Counterpoint Subscription Service or CSS) reminder to customers 60 days prior to their expiration date. This is in addition to the notice currently emailed to customers 30 days prior to their expiration date. 

We are all still hearing about EMV in the Point of Sale world.  And we still get questions about what it means to your business.  I thought I would share this blog post from NCR Counterpoint:

Tips and Tricks from the Point of Sale World:

Some of the things we hear often from our customers - "we don't use half of the features of our point of sale system, I wish I knew more about current technologies, we are still having problems with this functionality, or we could sure use more training in this area, we want to implement this loyalty this year, but not sure the best way to approach this."

These are just some of the reasons why we offer a free annual review of our customer’s point of sale systems and related business processes at a meeting with the owners and key managers.

Many customers tell us they don't have time - (or maybe they are afraid there is a hidden cost). So, therefore we are here to tell you how easy it is, and that yes, it is truly free - no strings attached!

We truly want you to take advantage of these meetings for many reasons:

1. It's free!  It's easy!  If you are in Anchorage, we can come to your place of business; if you aren't, we can easily set up a GoToMeeting conference call.
2. It's important for owners and managers to keep abreast of the point of sale and payment technologies - these are the systems that run your business!
3. Employees change - sometimes the employee that helped set up the system is no longer with your company - now is a good time to review your system and any system needs or changes you may have.
4. We will ask questions, such as, "What are your top 3-4-5 projects your management team has decided to pursue in the coming year?"  How can we help? How can we be prepared?
5. We want to do a better job for you and encourage customer feedback –  how we can improve our services and communications and how we can help you in the coming year.
6. Finally, we will come up with a specific plan and action items for the areas that came up during the meeting.

Plus, we like visiting with our customers and learning what is working and/or not working for them - as partners, together we can come up with solutions to benefit you in key areas.

What to expect at the meeting for your system review: