Product Features : Special Features

Over a decade Retail Pro has developed many special functions to Add Flexibility, and Widen Application.

Pulse!

Windows Polling
Screen Captures: Transmission Checklist Properties Summaries

• Multiple remote stores can poll simultaneously, even while the main office and remote sites are busy making sales, POs, reports, etc. Polling in Retail Pro takes full advantage of the power of 32-bit Windows technology.
          - Never stops other activities to carry out polling.
          - Polls many stores in a very small amount of time.
          - Ensures polling reliability.
  
  
• The main system easily controls set up of remote sites. It handles changes at remote sites (passwords, price levels, etc.) as part of routine polling.
          - Gets new or existing stores set up fast with a minimum of effort.
          - Provides tight control over multiple remote sites.
          - Reduces error at remote sites.
  
  
• Polling is initiated at will by the remote site. Data can be uploaded or downloaded at any time of day or night.
          - Makes 100% polling results routinely attainable.
          - Requires little or no attention at the remote site.
  
  
• Retail Pro 8 Series is ready for Internet polling.
          - Provides a smooth shift to current new technology.
  
  
• Restores software and data to remote sites that have had hardware repaired or replaced. Maintenance contracts for equipment at remote sites do not cover restoring the store’s software and data after a hardware failure. On Retail Pro 8 the main office does this easily through the polling process.
          - Facilitates software maintenance at remote sites.
          - Reduces dependence on technicians at a distance.
  
  
• Retail Pro 8 detects any missing information from polled sites. The system asks for key missing data in the next polling cycle, and it is then automatically provided or restored.
          - Provides confidence that all transmissions are complete.
  
  
• Facilitates troubleshooting. The main office can poll the remote station’s polling log for use in diagnosing situations at a remote site. The log can drill down to required data, making polling easy to analyze.
          - Includes the right tools to keep polling trouble free.
  
  
• Selective purchase history distribution. Retail Pro 8 can flag certain customers to share their history and status among stores, and automatically update these customer files at remote sites as part of polling.
          - Updated history is available at any store for designated customers.

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EDI (Electronic Data Interchange) Interface

EDI is the computer interchange of information between a retailer and a vendor. It must include agreed formats for Purchase Orders, Advance Shipping Notices, Acknowledgments, and other routine documents. Its primary use in the retail industry is the transmission of purchase orders electronically to a vendor and the vendor in turn sending an electronic notice of shipment to the retailer's computer system.

EDI can speed and facilitate the turnaround of merchandise and allow a retailer to reduce the size and carrying costs of inventory. As it also helps the vendor, it can result in more favorable cost of goods. It can increase a retailer's ability to carry a wider range of merchandise, eliminate costly errors and misunderstandings, and reduce paperwork and phone expenses. It can make possible "Vendor Managed Inventory" (VMI) solutions, through which stock levels are automatically maintained at a defined model stock level by automatic replenishment.

Retail Pro interfaces with R-Net EDI, a full service electronic catalog and EDI provider. R-Net EDI (http://www.rnetedi.com) is a cost-effective solution with services specifically geared to supporting the independent retailer.

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Employee and Commission Tracking

• Employee Performance Tracking
  
  Many store managers want a report that accurately measures the true performance of the sales staff. Retail Pro provides graphs or written reports of gross sales broken down by sales clerk, as well as the amount of profit generated, the number of units sold, and the hours worked. A key factor is how much is being sold per hour by each sales person, which Retail Pro can instantly report for any time period selected.
  
  Retail Pro sales invoices each contain fields for the clerk making the sale and the cashier. In this way, the right personnel are always credited with the sales. And the system will track split commission sales when different sales clerks are each responsible for the sale of different items in one client transaction.

• Clerk Tracking and Check-In
  
  It is important in a retail environment to track the arrival and departure of clerks accurately and to know to what degree employees are following their schedules. Also it is vital to control access to sensitive activities in the system. Retail Pro handles both these points with passwords, clerk codes and the clerk check-in and check-out function which can be rapidly done at the POS even while a sale is in progress of being rung up.
  
  The hourly analysis report will list check in/out times for each clerk as well as hours worked before, after and within the designated shifts. It also lists overtime hours and absences.

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Accounting Link to GL, AP, AR

• Integrated Accounting Overview

  Retail Pro integrates with standard accounting packages to supply a full scale in-house accounting solution. For moderate sized businesses Business Works is available, a popular and stable solution that is widely used today. For larger businesses or those with complex accounting requirements, Retail Pro is also linked with MAS 90 from State of the Art Inc.

  General Ledger, Accounts Payable, Accounts Receivable and Payroll
  Integration includes:

  - Automated posting of invoices for new merchandise to AP and GL - Automated posting of sales to GL (and to AR in the case of charge or COD sales). - Suggested GL account distribution for easy, accurate posting.

  An audit trail of transactional postings and accounting activity is provided by the accounting program, as well as P&Ls, Balance Sheets and all standard accounting reports.

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Multi-Store Management Tools

• High Speed Automated Multi-Store Polling

  Since 1988 Retail Pro has included its own sophisticated polling and communication procedures for multi-store operations. Today literally thousands of stores are polled every day on Retail Pro to exchange daily information and updates between stores and main offices.

  Polling can be scheduled by the retailer to be done by the system late at night. In the morning, sales, receiving and new customer information is available at the main office, and new inventory, price changes, and other management data is available at the store. This feature includes complete E-mail facility as well as the transfer of merchandising documents.

  A new feature for larger multi-store operations is multi-user polling, which permits the main system to receive data from several stores at once. This dramatically shortens the time required to poll a large number of stores each night. New advanced procedures using the Internet will make polling even simpler and more convenient in the near future. Meanwhile, it is being done by Retail Pro users successfully on a routine basis today in over a dozen countries.

• Corporate and Regional Stations for Multiple Stores

  The common structure for a multi-store operation is a Main Office communicating with a number of remote stores. The Main is the controlling station and the remotes have capabilities designed to provide both flexibility and central control.

  Sometimes a larger retail operation will grow beyond this format. In a franchise structure, each store or group of stores is independently owned and operated, even though it may carry the same SKUs as other stores in the chain. Or, in a widespread operation of many stores, it is necessary to poll all the stores in one country or region and then poll the data up from those regional centers to a headquarters located elsewhere.

  All such scenarios are accommodated in Retail Pro by the use of the Corporate Station, which can manage multiple Main Stations under it, which in turn can manage multiple Remote Stores. This structure allows for unhindered growth while maintaining control and a fundamentally simple structure.

  In addition, remote owners who wish to keep fully informed of operations and perhaps to enter Purchase Orders or initiate email, but are not at the site of any receiving or sales activity, can use a Retail Pro Remote Information Station. This provides data and reports for all sites of a multi-store retail operation, even though separate from the Main Office.

  Each Main or Corporate Station can be from single-user up to 99-user. Likewise each individual remote store or remote Information Station can be from single user up to 99-user.

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New or Small Store Option

• Retail Pro Lite

  The original development of Retail Pro was geared towards the small single store environment. Even today almost half of the Retail Pro users in the world are single stores. As it evolved over the next 10 years, a multitude of enhancements and capabilities were derived from the basic program. Many of these advances were developed in response to demands from larger stores and multi-store companies.

  Inevitably the cost of the program - including the training and support to properly implement it - grew beyond the reach of some small single stores to easily afford. At the same time, it was still the best program for the small single store. And since most small stores would like to get big, Retail Pro provides an easy path of growth up to multiple stores.

  The solution to this is a special version of Retail Pro geared specifically towards very small stores or start-ups. This program is Retail Pro Lite. While retaining all of the vital features of Retail Pro needed for basic retail operations, it is specially priced to accommodate the limited budget of a someone just starting in the retail business. The simplicity of its features and screens reduce the number of hours required to learn it.

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Data Interchange to Any Other System

Under some circumstances it is desirable for a Retail Pro system to exchange information with other types of system. For example, a manufacturing operation which also has retail stores may wish to download its inventory descriptions from a mainframe computer platform directly into Retail Pro. Or a company may want sales figures sent from Retail Pro up into a mini-based accounting program. Or perhaps a user may need to use data from Retail Pro in the calculation of specialized reports by a report-generating program.

For these reasons Retail Pro includes a Bridge option, a special software tool which, once mapped by a technician, can routinely manage the interchange of any Retail Pro information to or from any other platform.

This can be used by a catalog company who wishes to transfer inventory directly into their outlet stores on Retail Pro, and transfer names of new customers from the stores back into the mainframe catalog operation.

Almost any desired information exchange is accommodated by Bridge between Retail Pro and other platforms.

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International Retail Capacity

In order to do business at retail POS level in different countries, many variables have to be addressed in a software product. Retail Pro has incorporated such capabilities and is active today in 60 countries. Among the international features of the system:

- Euro-ready including complete currency triangulation
- Currency conversion at daily rates with change in either currency
- European VAT tax and detaxing of tourist purchases on departure
- Translation into French, German, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian
- Fiscal printers for tax compliance requirements in certain countries
- Ability to process international UPC equivalent (EAN)
- Establishment of multilingual local training and support

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