accesso Siriusware vs. Square POS

Siriusware seems best suited for organizations that are working with many programs and events that are running at different times. You are able to easily check registration for different events at the same time which is very helpful. If you have staff that are focusing just on data analysis and reporting then Siriusware would be very useful for them. On the flip side if you need to train seasonal staff on the point of sale and process multiple sales in a quick amount of time then this is not the best fit. The interface can be clunky and slow especially when you have internet problems.

Incentivized

Square was absolutely fantastic when I first started using it. Easy to set up, use, changing settings, and the like. It has evolved over the years, almost too much, to an insane amount of options, apps, settings, et cetera. I would like to see options for just utilizing specific parts, such as invoices, versus the entire system being set up for daily sales. It makes the tracking side of things a little wonky when you only send 2-5 invoices/month for larger projects. Overall, I like that it’s familiar to me, which is why I continue to use it

Incentivized

• Allows for many different types of reporting. The multiple fields allow you to filter by date, point of sale, property etc.
• Allows us to process credit card transactions while not connected to the internet which is very helpful when out in the field.
• With the tablets we are able to have multiple people selling tickets to an event at multiple locations.
• Able to pull membership information and sell new memberships if needed.

Incentivized

• After you set a daily processing deadline time, charges processed by that time are deposited the next business day.
• The reporting dash board looks overwhelming but that's because it has all of the the information that you've processed before. That was invaluable when we recently went to look at the detail on a two year old transaction and were able to find the information by ourselves.
• The ability to use multiple devices is great. We can process charges on a computer, a tablet, or even a smartphone.
• Receipts are automatically sent to the customer's preferred email or texted to their phone.

Incentivized

• Support is non-budging, "our way or no way" and will not consider options, adapt, compromise, etc.
• Company seems so big (too big) that one department does not know what another is doing. Items advertised by sales were impossible from the perspective of the implementation team and then the follow-up support staff had little idea of anything that happened previously.
• In some instances Siriusware (Accesso) support will not touch anything without someone in IT letting them in and waiting while they fix it. Other times a support agent will go rogue and completely change a user's set up with no previous discussion or follow-up on what they did/changed. Leaving us to figure out problems later.
• They often will not listen or even try to understand special circumstances (many of which were shared earlier in the process) and simply say "we only do it this way!" This has left us to figure out our own solutions many times!

Incentivized

• The cost of the hardware (specific scanners and receipt printers) was prohibitive for my company, and whilst we managed without them, they would have been nice to have. The range of scanners and printers that integrate with Square is small, so despite our devices' capabilities to read barcodes (we used ipads) and the Zebra receipt/label printers we had, we couldn't use either as the system wouldn't integrate with them.
• Whilst Square's credit card reader is nifty in design, it's a bit small and lacking substance to have as a customer-facing reader so it really needs the dock the company offers. The dock is awkward to open to reset or pair the reader. We often found pairing the reader with the device running the system tricky and confusing, relying on pressing one button and then interpreting a sequence of lights that often caused confusion. The pairing process might have been clearer presented through the device rather than the reader.
• Truly can't think of any more!

Incentivized

I don't really foresee anything being able to dislodge Square from our organization—we're not evangelists or anything like that—it's just the best solution we've found for our use case. Being able to quickly handle transactions from customers and then track all of those sales for analysis/bookkeeping later on.

Incentivized

We find Square POS is very user friendly. Its interface is customizable to our needs and very easy to use. Before we adopted Square POS, we used a combination of solutions from different manufacturer to try and achieve a portion of the functionality that Square POS provides under only 1 login

Incentivized

Square POS support is good, I would not say they are great. There is a good knowledge base that you can access and there are other service providers who support Square POS who can assist you, but I find that the lack of help and support for setting it up for different industries is a let down. We had to research for hours just to find a solution to fix our need for a billing option for services for example. It would be great if Square POS broadened its support and solutions for various industries.

Incentivized

Any POS implementation is a lot of work, and a lot of learning for Admin, IT, management, end users, etc. This was selected by a consultant we hired. We have many regrets regarding the process, but are now kind of stuck and it is basically getting the job done. It is not ideal, but the people who chose this have learned a lot in the process.

Incentivized

Square POS is just the easiest to use and therefore the easiest to onboard new users to. I'd also like to point out, that if you're missing or lost one of the readers it's so easy to buy one at an Apple store or even other merchants like T-mobile or Verizon. WePay had less fees but was harder to onboard new users to. Eventbrite had really high fees.

Incentivized

• Well, it's job security for me, but negative for the organization, as I spend a LOT of time cleaning up data that comes into our CRM from Siriusware, and fixing issues that could have been avoided. This is a needless expense for my company, but it is what it is.
• Must have wifi. In our remote properties this can be problematic.
• A lot of training seems to be needed for accurate use by the end user.

Incentivized

• The transaction fees and charge rates are much higher than other options available. We only used this system for a short time while we were switching to a MUCH cheaper option (Authorize.net).
• I have also used this system with a charity that I volunteer with who only uses it during a couple of fundraisers a year when they have a small gift shop set up to sell donated goods to raise money. For such low volume, the fees aren't as big of a deal and the convenience of being able to take cards no matter where the event is located makes it worth it.
• This is a system your average consumer will recognize and trust, so there's that.

Incentivized