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Pros: This software can handle TONS of inventory. We have used the software for over 12 years, and now have over 15000 unique items. Each one is able to track purchasing history, selling history, even details down to the name of the customer who bought this item in march of 2005, what he paid, and what else he bought on the same ticket! We use it a lot for warranty issues, as we're able to see if someone truly bought an item from us, or if they bought it online, and are just trying to get us to fix it for free. Super useful! Cons: Once you start, you cant stop. Well, that's probably true of any POS system.
You end up with too much data to lose, so I couldn't change now even if I wanted to, not that I do. The real problem with being stuck is that you have to pay up for it. Every year, they stop supporting the version from 3 years back. I.e., in 2018 they stop supporting the 2015 version, in '19 they will stop suporting '16, etc. So, you're just fine until windows does some auto-update in the middle of the night. You come in to find out you can't run your business.
So, you call support. Support tells you that your version is no longer supported, and it'll be cost per register to upgrade to the current version. Then you're good for another 2 years. We've done this for over 12 years. It's the same song and dance every time. Now I know, and I can budget for it.
All in all, it's worth every penny. I've yet to find anything else that can handle such a large selection of inventory, with so much adaptability, for the price. Just know that the price is hardly a 1-and-done thing. Comments: I generally liked the QB POS software and what it did for us. But we grew out of this. Ideally this would be great for a small business that had fixed assets that didn't change and if the SBO didn't want to pour out too much money for a POS.
Pros: 1) They release a new product upgrade every other year so there is no need to update your computer software every year. The upgrades are not necessary, but upgrades to provide more features. 2) Everything is backed up to a single database file on the computer; so in the event of a computer crash as long as you're backing up the QBPOS db, you can re-install the software, re-point the db file and get going again.
3) It's easy to use and navigate. 4) Does not require internet connection if the internet goes down 5) Great reports 6) A great company, with solid reputation, with a good name brand product Cons: 1) Customer support is great, but you have to pay for it. I learned to reach out to 3rd party companies for Support.
That seemed more eager and 2) Does not integrate with an online store presence. For our online store each time someone purchased something online we had to update our instore inventory; and vica-versa. 3) The software upgrade is a little pricey for 1 upgrade. I remember it was affordable for an upgrade for me; and we only had 1 POS computer & 1 seat. If we had 2 computers it would have been more expensive. 4) Constantly trying to add new inventory and remove old inventory was kind of a hassle.
If your business had fixed assets then ideally this would be a good solution. 5) If your computer crashed or you need to get a new computer, you would have to setup the new computer and reinstall the software on the new computer along with the help of QB POS Tech Support. While this in itself wasn't bad it was trying to schedule a time that they were open and the store wasn't open so I could fix this. Vendor Response by Intuit on July 17, 2018 Happy Tuesday, Weldon. We love hearing about how we can improve the product, and interface suggestions are always very much appreciated. I'd be glad to pass your feedback along to the engineers directly, as they frequently review customer feedback when developing new features/enhancements. When you get a bit of downtime, please send your ideas to me in an email ([email protected]).
I'll forward them on your behalf, and will keep a lookout for your message. In the meantime, I encourage you to explore the Point of Sale Resource Center at There you'll find expert advice, articles, and workflow tips on the small business fundamentals, with a focus on the Point of Sale product. Until we chat again, wishing you all the best!
Jess, The QuickBooks Team. Pros: This product has allowed me to be more organized with my small business. I am able to keep track of my customers and the orders that they place.
Also, my inventory is neatly organized and allows me to see exactly what items I have in stock and what items I need to order. I particularly like the 'quick find' search option which I can use to quickly search for a specific item/client/or receipt. This option also searches through item descriptions which allows me to find exactly what I'm looking for with a few keywords. By far though, I really like how well and organized my previous sales are presented to me. I am able to see how my business is doing through various methods such as a pie chart or a graph, and using my own parameters to analyze my sales. Cons: It does take a bit of a learning curve to fully grasp all that this POS system has to offer.
It does have a tutorial and video guide to walk you step by step through all the features but you need to dedicate quite a bit of time just to learn everything. There are a lot options and a lot of ways to do each part of the POS system such as 'make a sale', so it can take a while to figure out which method works best for you.
Once you have learned everything, it takes a bit of practice in order to be able to do a function quickly enough to not keep clients waiting. Pros: It seems that the ability to really do ANYthing with the software is there, yet without the proper time and training one can use it only to about 10% of its potential. That said, the 10% is better than the old cash register and this has been a very useful tool for getting our business's inventory managed and sales organized. Cons: This is an incredibly complex system that ought to come along with intensive (and free of cost) training. This is not an intuitive software and there are just so many ins and outs and ups and downs that I learn something new everytime I poke around a bit and think: 'shoot, I wish I would have known about that three years ago when I got this thing!!!'
Comments: I've used QuickBooks Pro in my retail liquor store for about fourteen months. I don't like it, for four main reasons: First, if I'm making a sale and I notice the price of the product or the on-hand quantity is wrong the software won't allow me to make corrections from the 'Make a Sale' screen. It will allow me to change the price, but the change will show up on the receipt as a 'discount,' and the price will remain wrong in the database. To change the price or the on-hand quantity in the database requires exiting from the 'Make a Sale' function and then entering the 'Item List' function.
This is impractical to do when a customer is waiting to pay and get on his way. It is also inconvenient and cumbersome to switch back and forth when we are checking in replacement inventory items during business hours and we have to get out of the 'Item List' and go to the 'Make a Sale' function. When we had Microsoft Point of Sale we could do both functions from the same screen. Second, QuickBooks Pro will not produce a simple report showing what products were sold and how many were sold during a previous period of time, plus how many remain in inventory. I need to know this information so I can decide what items to replace in inventory. QuickBooks Pro will report all the sales during any chosen period, but obviously the same products are often sold multiple times during a day, so when I'm ordering I have to look at every transaction and consider whether to re-buy the same items multiple times, and then look at another report showing how many were sold during the past months. If you were in a business like mine you'd appreciate the difference between looking at several hundred individual transactions and looking at a single list that summarizes what was sold, how many remain in stock, and how many were sold in the past three months.
I think a good POS system should be able to produce a list of what was sold in one column alongside another column showing how many remain in inventory, and a third column showing how many were sold during the previous three months or whatever time period the user would choose as a guide to decide how many of each to re-buy for stock. QuickBooks Pro will not do this. Also, QuickBooks will not let you copy the name of an item in a report, which would make reordering easier.
Instead, I have to type the name of what I want when I go to the suppliers' ordering systems. Third, it won't handle some barcodes. There are some that'll work in the 'Item List,' but not in the 'Make a Sale' function and some vice versa. Some won't work in either function.
We never had this problem with Microsoft Point of Sale. Fourth, and worst, QuickBooks drops transactions and changes the quantities of items in inventory. Every night when I do my tallies I have more money in the till than I should have for a number of sales that day as reported by QuickBooks. I've seen no rhyme or reason for this happening-the software just decides on its own to delete a transaction or two every day.
It also decides on its own to make changes to the quantities of items in inventory, so I don't really know how many of an item we have in stock without walking to the shelf and counting them myself. I seldom have time to do this, so I frequently order things we already have plenty of, or we run out of things and don't notice it until a customer complains or we just see a hole in the shelf where something should go. I've tried to imagine a business that would be satisfied with this software. Please don't recommend it to clients with high product turnover and many transactions to keep up with. Pros: Poor as it is, it does keep working. It hasn't crashed yet. Cons: See review Recommendations to other buyers: See review.
Pros: Very easy to use. It generates bar codes to corresponding with individual or grouped items and then displays the price, merchandiser, and all vital information in the same place for me to find. I liked to be able to track when, where, and by whom an item was brought in and then sold. Cons: Quick-Books was prone to glitches and to dumping, data on inventory entered. I lost over 2,000 records on new merchandise brought in for our annual holiday sale. Overnight there was no record I had ever entered, sold, or updated anything over a two-week period, the most pivotal two-week period of our year.
Luckily my accountant and I had already paid the artists for their sold works, but it took hours for me to put the inventory back in and update the records. My sales records for those two weeks were also unaccounted for, and suddenly my sales were down by thousands compared with the last year. I was purchasing running shoes from another local business down the street a few weeks later and the saleswoman was having a field day trying to sell anything as overnight, same as what happened to me, Quick-books had dumped all her inventory and it had to be entered in again. Overall: I used Quick-books for about a year and while it was an easy system to use on the PC, I found my business needs were better met by moving to a POS system that was mobile friendly. Quick-books has a very easy to use the system-items are tracked with a generated barcode and the system lists when the item was brought in when it was purchased last, and by whom it was purchased. I appreciated the compatibility of the technology to be able to automatically print barcodes for our use as opposed to other Mac POS systems, and overall the system was just fine until one day, two days after the largest sale of the year for our company, I went to ring up an item and I found Quick-books had experienced a major glitch and had deleted all the inventory I had added, sold, or updated within the last two weeks.
I was devastated. I had input over 2,000 new pieces (individual, one-of-a-kind pieces of art) into Quick-books for our annual holiday sale and then when I tried to secure records for the pieces sold, bought, or input, suddenly the barcodes did not work, there was no record of me having ever entered in all the new works, and I had no sales records for over 100 artists.
Luckily my accountant and I, the Store Manager, had already paid out everything that was sold from the large event, but I spent hours inputting the data back in for the remaining pieces. I was confounded and furious and customer service had no answers as to why this had happened. I immediately began researching POS systems that were mobile friendly and that stored my data and records on the Cloud or other web means so that I would never again have to experience lost data. My decision to move from Quick-books was justified when, just a few weeks later, I went to another local business to buy running shoes and the saleswoman apologized for the slow checkout process, noting that overnight her entire inventory had been wiped clean from her POS.
I asked what POS she used, and sure enough, Quick-books had done it to again, left someone in the lurch from unexplained dumped data. For the price and poor customer service and unreliability, I never regretted moving from Quick-Books Point of Sale to another POS system. I now use Shopkeep and I am very happy with it. Recommendations to other buyers: Quick-books is an okay system for the PC but in the shifting world and its technological advances, I would suggest to anyone that moving to a mobile-friendly POS is the way to go. I loved being able to make a sale from anywhere in the building with my mobile-friendly POS, and not to be chained to the desk with my PC to make sales. Pros: Ease of use. It was simple to teach employees how to use the register side of it.
It synchronized easily to quickbooks financial once everything was mapped. Cons: I could not upgrade past windows 7 on the machines that ran this product. It required I have a machine set up as a server. It cost me pretty much the full price of the product to add another register, or back end user. In order to update the product you had to buy it outright again. There was next to no updating of the product. I bought version 10 back in January of 2011 and until I stopped using it in August 2016 there was no updates.
I had to buy the product again if I wanted an update. Customer support cost a lot extra per month, they would even charge you for calls when the problem was their fault. Many reports were limited.
For instance, fields I would expect to be in a report simply were not there. For instance, the top customer report, had no way to put the email address into it. So what was the point of that report if you could not send them an email promo? It was not stored in the cloud, so I was limited in that the product could only be used in my store. If I wanted remote access I had to use a third party computer access product to see my POS. If you wanted integrated credit card transactions you had to use their merchant services.
Their fees were higher than everyone else. I ended up saving thousands a year when I moved to another merchant processor and adding extra steps at the checkout. Once my file got big, it would lag out loading customer/inventory information. I ended up changing POS systems when we got another location and it was just going to cost too much to upgrade the product to cope with multiple locations. Recommendations to other buyers: Check out subscription cloud based products.
While paying monthly may be off putting, you have a current up to date product that is easy to access from anywhere. Also look into products that work on more than one platform. And there are products out there that will sync your POS to your website. Pros: Ease of ringing up customers. It's very simple to start ringing people up. We didn't have to train our staff more than a couple minutes. Tech support is horrible.
There is a reason this is number one!!!!!! If you have more than one computer at a location there are issues if you don't have a wired internet which brought us down for hours and hours and hours over weeks without anyone diagnosing this to be the issue. Customer service just kept logging in and changing the IP address without explaining what they were doing. I finally got a good tech support person that helped me figure it out and how to fix it on my own. (Do NOT use wireless internet. You MUST use hard wire to computer.) 3. We have inventory items that keep reappearing after deleting them.
We then tried to merge them and they still keep reappearing. Tech support couldn't remove them either. This really messes up our reports. We had a day that at the end of the day QB restarted and lost ALL the transactions for the day. We were never able to get the information back and it also took a weeks worth of transactions with it. Tech support never retrieved the information nor could explain what happened.
There is only 2 levels of departments. You have a 'work around' for this by allowing you to customize a field, but you have to write the department name in each time. If you forget the exact word you used such as 'snack' instead of 'snacks' it won't run adequate reports.
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I can't imagine many places that don't need more departments. For example, I have 'Tours' and 'Merchandise' as my main departments. I want to have 'Snacks' 'Apparel' and even further under snacks I'd like to have 'Cookies' 'Chips', etc. Sending and receiving files from Intuit server does not always go through. This would be ok if there were an error message, but there isn't. It just didn't send. The only way to be sure this didn't happen when running a report on headquarters is to check to see if there is information each day.
I have more than one location so this is tedious. If I find a day that is missing I have to have the staff manually go in and resend data. I'm sure I have MUCH more, but that was the ones I could think of off the top of my head and QB POS has taken up enough of my life!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! If I can find a better solution I would before you could blink your eyes. I am constantly looking and shopping around.
Recommendations to other buyers: Run as fast as you can away from this product!! If there was less than 1 I would rate it as far negative as I could see on my monitor. Vendor Response by Intuit on August 13, 2018 Thanks for taking the time out to leave us your honest review. While I'm glad the customization options have lent a lot to the functionality you enjoy, I want to make sure you can easily navigate the software. The Resource Center is a awesome outlet in that aspect, and there's one made for POS at You'll find a ton of tutorial and guided videos there, as well as advice on the small business and retail fundamentals. The info above will help streamline your workflow, but I want to make your voice is heard when it comes to your suggestions about the interface.
We love hearing how we can improve, as the engineers default to customer ideas when drumming up new features. Could you send me your feedback in an email ([email protected])? I can forward your comments to the Development Team. This way, I can also take a look at the issue you've had with scanning and provide a fix one-on-one. Jess, The QuickBooks Team. Pros: many of the reports and report functions are great, easy to use, sensible setup. Easy to use on the register as well as from the back end.
Cons: customer support is terrible if you finally get someone, many times they made changes that ended up affecting the operations in a negative way. When, support was elevated to a higher level, many times you would never hear back from anyone. You don't just buy your license and that's it, they come out with upgrades etc.
And many require you buying the newer licenses to be able to continue to function. Price is prohibitive, having to buy new licenses every 14-18 months. Pros: Easy to adapt has two different screen settings that make it easy depending on your type of retail business that allows it easy to understand. If you are not a computer expert you can still feel smart using the POS software. Cons: Price and if you do need to call for help, since it is a QB product support time is usually longer than you want. The support call time can be a problem if you have an issue with the POS system during normal operational hours. Overall: DIdn't require to be online as some other versions of a POS system do require.
This is a nice feature as it is a pay one time not monthly. Comments: This is a great way to go from no point of sale to a solid tool that will serve the small shop. There is very little in the way of customization, or integration that can be done with this product, don't expect to use it with other software easily. Pros: Reporting features are excellent At-register experience is good Integration with Quickbooks is seamless Cons: Integration with outside software such as e-commerce is poor Gift card options are unnecessarily limited, frustrating, and expensive Customer support leaves a lot to be desired. Pros: Good inventory managment tied to sales. Easy to use and train. Nice variety of sales reports and profitablity.
Cons: Inability to process another transaction while waiting for a customer to provide tip info eg must complete sale including tip amount before doing anything else (taking an order, printing another receipt for tip inclusion). Cannot process transaction if the internet is down. Overall: Inventory management and sales transaction and history. Nice customer reward program based on sales. Comments: We are currently running Quckbooks 2008 and I do not know if newer versions of Quickbooks have improved some of the current issues Pros: Sort of intuitive to USE for the cashier.
If set up correctly much can autofill at the time of sale. Cons: Can be difficult to manage in regard to mapping for uploading of information to Quickbooks financial. Some reporting can be difficult and not customizable as much I would be beneficial. We tend to export and then manipulate the data in an office document. Comments: Once, one of the only games in POS.
Town, Intuit now has robust competition. We are seriously looking into a cloud based alternative for our store. Having said that, I will say that my most recent call to customer service was one of the best I have ever had. Maybe they are feeling some heat from the competition. Pros: Very versatile, perhaps to a fault at times.
Quite easy to learn at least initially. Integration with QuickBooks. Cons: UI needs a serious updating. Many fine features on the software are not immediately apparent or easily accessible.
This is at least partly due to the somewhat outdated and clumsy interface. We have had the desktop based version of this POS since 2003 and have had a tenuous and oftentimes rocky relationship with customer service and support. Intuit is such an enormous company that one feels like an unimportant cog in the wheel when trying to fix a problem. Comments: Overall the software is great! The customer service makes up for the lack of explaining certain things during installation. A service rep spent hours on the phone helping repair the problem. She was wonderful.
The absolute best customer service I've ever used! Pros: Customer support from Quickbooks POS is by far my favorite thing about this software! Very helpful.
Cons: Functionality of this product was a bit hard to work out. Especially in the install process when installing Quickbooks POS Server. Explaining the server and client sides of the software better during installation process would. Pros: Very intuitive program. Lots of bells and whistles for the money. Easy to learn, plenty of reports and employee time tracking. Cons: You pretty much have to use their merchant services.
If you choose to use a third party, you will have to manually enter credit/debit sales transactions into another terminal. This leads to a double entry for these types of sales and mistakes happening. You have to pay for support, either monthly or very costly by the incident. Upgrading can be costly and if you don't upgrade, your version will not even be supported at some point. Recommendations to other buyers: Look for long term growth. Get what you might need down the road now. You have to look at upgrading equipment cost as well as software at some point.
Cloud based systems to me are ones to look at. Pros: Most small business accounts use QuickBooks Cons: It's so badly prepared, the service is worthless, the documentation - both online and written, awful, and they make what should be easy, very difficult. Overall: I'm a Proadvisor so I know a little. But nothing is helpful; create Custom Forms is a joke.
Call India help desk, more time spent on nothing. It takes a lot of time, most spent on really bad documentation, but good once it's done. Recommendations to other buyers: Make sure you have someone install it who really knows what they're doing. Pros: I like that it is easy to use for someone who is not an accountant. It is easy to categorize vendors and employees. It is easy to pull all kinds of reports to stay on top of finances. It is also easy to track various bank accounts in one place.
I just love it! Cons: There isn't much I don't like about this software.
There is some functionality such as the vacation pay that could be a little more user friendly I feel. We have employees who get paid a set amount of vacation a year and by hours they work. And we found it a little confusing to set up.
But, it did get set up. Comments: Don't purchase a POS solution where the administration for support takes hours before you can get a support person online. Also, because of turnover at our organization, we have been trying to change the contract person for more than a month. The requirements include a copy of drivers license, copy of bank account, and letter from President!!
Top that off with contact people who you have no idea where they are located. Administration that insists on calling back 'after hours' for our Eastern time zone and the support turns out to be useless at best.
We cannot change the contact person and the actual tech support team members cannot help us out with intermittent issues with the POS freezing up. I would never recommend QB, Intuit, or the POS.
AND I have to add that there is no escalation at Intuit, so no one actually cares that there are problems. Pros: Inexpensive POS software, but the tech support and administration is nearly impossible to work with.
Cons: POS is general a mission critical function and the support from QB POS is the worst I have ever experienced. Pros: It is very easy to use. Reporting is very strong It is robust in its functions. It is very helpful to ascertain the level of purchase from any vendor based on sales performance of the products. Cons: In a network environment client get disconnected from server many times in a day. Troubleshooting is not very easy.
In its GUI mode, there should be option to select discount in terms of percentage or in terms of dollor which is not like so in it at the moment. Printing of customer sale history or his ledger is not very professional in POS. Comments: Quickbooks POS is one of the smoothest operating point of sales I've worked with.
Most of my employees have never worked retail before this job and they were able to learn the program quickly and easily. Not only is the retail side of the software great, but the back office modules are all intuitive and make my job as the General Manager much easier. No POS software is perfect for every business, but Quickbooks has done a great job focusing on what most businesses need. Pros: Very User-Friendly Both Retail and Back Office Modules are well-designed Customisable Reporting Options Cons: Not suitably-equipped for handling serialized inventory Technical Support is difficult to work with at times Recommendations to other buyers: If tracking serial numbers and being able to search for them is important to you, have Quickbooks walk you through that part of the process before making your decision. This is a great point of sale, but that has been the one big downside for my business. Comments: We have been using Quickbooks POS since 2012, and are very happy with the product. Pros: Very user-friendly, straightforward.
Syncs seamlessly with Quickbooks. Complete customization of receipts, item list, sales screens, etc. Allows for receipts to be held and notes to be stored along with the held receipt for instances when the internet is down. Cons: Sales take a couple of steps if you do not have a touchscreen. Combined inventory across all stores as a whole is not an option, and if merchandise is moved between stores, a transfer slip must be created within the software (leaves room for human error). Recommendations to other buyers: Find a local sales/customer service rep that can show you a demo and help you with training and support! Comments: It is just not the best for smaller businesses especially since every few years they tell you you have to pay to continue using but OH!
They're giving us a 50% discount for being customers already. Sorely disappointed in the position they have pushed us into.
The cost is not a small sum for small businesses. Pros: Yea it has a lot of features, but whether you use them or not you are paying for them. Quickbooks has been great for our business besides the crazy charges they demand. Cons: Being forced to pay every couple years for the same service just because they 'fixed' a few things.
That is not how to treat loyal customers. Pros: There are some nice inventory management features but other than that it is crap!
Cons: EVERYTHING IMAGINABLE especially customer service Overall: If there was less there was less than one star for customer support I would give it that. I was down an entire week! And they didn't even care. You can't contact anybody that is of any help. I now have sales up and running but my item list and inventory list can't be tracked. This is the worst company on the face of the planet run away!!! Recommendations to other buyers: DON'T EVER BUY THIS PRODUCT!!
Vendor Response by Intuit on October 24, 2018 Please know we have a wealth of training tools to ensure you can master and operate QuickBooks with ease. To start, we offer walk-through guides to help you sort through the system, run reports, and upload inventory in our Community (I encourage you to check out this self-help space, as well as our weekly webinar service (The second occurs in live time and is hosted by experts, so the assistance you need is only ever a click away. It's the perfect outlet when you need to learn more about the basics, and we created both sites with you in mind. Jess, The QuickBooks Team.
Comments: Every day, I use Quickbooks POS. I like that the program is, for the most, part straightforward; specifically the integration of the 'I want to.' Pull down menu makes finding things easy. I do wish there were more options as far as reports. I also would like there to be an easier way to over-hall the inventory.
When there are issues with the POS communicating or rather sending the days sales figures back to the designated Quickbooks computer, there are times when this operation fails and trying to get both up and running and resending data is often a headache. Lastly, there should be options for gift certificates as well as gift cards as far as selling and redeeming; this can also be such a pain that employees don't push those sales. Comments: I've been using Quickbooks for business sales and teaching senior volunteers how to use the product. It was very user-friendly that even old people can navigate through it in no time.
The platform is very easy to understand, you can navigate on the software with ease. With regards to performance, Quickbooks is a trusted software.
You can do a lot of things that would your business grow more. I've been using it for almost a year now with sales and it never ceases to amaze me how easy it was.