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Square Terminal

squareup.com

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Re: Square Terminal

#11

Post by harryh »

bpicolo wrote: post #7

I hope this takes off solely so I can pay with a credit card directly at my table at restaurants instead of having them take it to back of house. Much of Europe has been doing this correctly for a long time now

Speaking as an American, I've always found at-the-table swiping to be kind of strange, at least for higher end meals. It puts the commerce part of the evening a little too front and center for me. Or maybe I'm just not used to it.

Re: Square Terminal

#13

Post by adamtulinius »

harryh wrote: post #11
bpicolo wrote: post #7

I hope this takes off solely so I can pay with a credit card directly at my table at restaurants instead of having them take it to back of house. Much of Europe has been doing this correctly for a long time now

Speaking as an American, I've always found at-the-table swiping to be kind of strange, at least for higher end meals. It puts the commerce part of the evening a little too front and center for me. Or maybe I'm just not used to it.

You prefer strangers running away with your credit card?

Re: Square Terminal

#14

Post by techsupporter »

harryh wrote: post #11
bpicolo wrote: post #7

I hope this takes off solely so I can pay with a credit card directly at my table at restaurants instead of having them take it to back of house. Much of Europe has been doing this correctly for a long time now

Speaking as an American, I've always found at-the-table swiping to be kind of strange, at least for higher end meals. It puts the commerce part of the evening a little too front and center for me. Or maybe I'm just not used to it.

I'm an American who spends a decent amount of time in western Europe, to give you where I'm coming from. At high-end meals it is just like everything else with the service; if done properly, it is just as smooth and elegant as the rest of the meal. I actually prefer the single "interruption" of pay and depart (or not, considering most European dining styles involve a suitable amount of lingering even after payment) versus the request check, check delivered, payment method retrieved, ticket returned for signature series of steps, possibly including an optional return for the server to pick up the signed ticket prior to departure due to some back-of-house requirement.

Re: Square Terminal

#15

Post by acchow »

joshuawright11 wrote: post #8

IMO Square has great looking hardware but their software is pretty mediocre and unattractive. The Stripe guys are killing it on the software front recently, wondering if square should continue pushing hard on the hardware front when stripe is eating their online lunch.

Stripe is eating their online lunch? They go to different cafeterias and eat different cuisines

Re: Square Terminal

#16

Post by mynameisvlad »

bpicolo wrote: post #7

I hope this takes off solely so I can pay with a credit card directly at my table at restaurants instead of having them take it to back of house. Much of Europe has been doing this correctly for a long time now

Canada switched to that sort of system when chip+PIN was introduced many years ago, so the hardware is available in North America as well from major providers like Verifone. It's just that you need more terminals for concurrency with such a system, and it's not integrated into the full POS system so the waiter/clerk has to actually input the amount. Nobody wants to pay extra if they don't have to, which is why it's not as quick to rollout in the US. Chip+signature in the US still doesn't require the customer to interact with the payment terminal, so I doubt US restaurants and other businesses will be quick to switch to this or other handheld terminals.

Re: Square Terminal

#17

Post by techsupporter »

adamtulinius wrote: post #13
harryh wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Speaking as an American, I've always found at-the-table swiping to be kind of strange, at least for higher end meals. It puts the commerce part of the evening a little too front and center for me. Or maybe I'm just not used to it.

You prefer strangers running away with your credit card?

I suspect a lot of comfort with what happens with credit cards in the United States comes from people believing that their card issuer will simply handle the problem if any fraudulent or merely unauthorized charges appear. There's no risk from the card going out of sight if the card is useless because the card issuer will reverse charges upon request. (Moving to chips, even with signature, is supposed to alleviate the main source of fraud here, that being cloning the card.)

That said, I'm with you; I much prefer to have my card handled just once and within sight. It is faster, safer, and, to my mind, simply more convenient.

Re: Square Terminal

#18

Post by snuxoll »

joshuawright11 wrote: post #8

IMO Square has great looking hardware but their software is pretty mediocre and unattractive. The Stripe guys are killing it on the software front recently, wondering if square should continue pushing hard on the hardware front when stripe is eating their online lunch.

My problem with Square is they are so focused on their ecosystem that they basically ignore anyone that doesn't operate a traditional retail store or restaurant.

I'm really excited about Stripe Terminal as a developer, and I think they can eat Square's lunch by focusing on purely being the payment intermediary and letting 3rd parties develop solutions around their SDK (which supports web browsers in addition to mobile platforms, unlike Square which only supports iOS and Android and just recently divorced itself from requiring the Square app too).

Re: Square Terminal

#19

Post by singingboyo »

harryh wrote: post #11
bpicolo wrote: post #7

I hope this takes off solely so I can pay with a credit card directly at my table at restaurants instead of having them take it to back of house. Much of Europe has been doing this correctly for a long time now

Speaking as an American, I've always found at-the-table swiping to be kind of strange, at least for higher end meals. It puts the commerce part of the evening a little too front and center for me. Or maybe I'm just not used to it.

I think you're simply not used to it. Meals are almost always paid at the table here in Canada. Basically, the bill comes out, server either has or will come back with the machine, enters cost, hands it to you. You tip on the machine, tap, done. For higher end stuff or groups you break the $100 tap limit, so it's insert and enter pin, but it's still quick.

The speed of it is quick, and it also gives a good chance for wrapping things up (can we get this packed, thank-yous, goodbyes if it's a bigger group, etc).

Of course, it may also help that we have chip-and-pin and tap pretty universally, so we rarely hand our card over to anyone - having the server take the card is incredibly strange for me when I'm down in the US.

Re: Square Terminal

#20

Post by jumelles »

If this can always process chip cards that quickly, I'm very impressed. Usually it's at least 10 seconds, just standing there staring at the card reader, waiting.
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