You have three provider tabs open and they all say roughly the same things. Fast, reliable, easy to use, trusted by thousands of merchants. Every demo looks good, because demos are built to look good, and none of them answer the question you actually have, which is what this will be like to run in eighteen months.
This guide is for you if you are actively choosing. Not researching the category, not wondering whether to upgrade, but comparing real options and trying to work out which one you will not regret. It gives you eight things to check and the questions to put to any provider, including this one.
The stakes are higher than the monthly fee suggests. Your POS decides how long a transaction takes, whether you can answer a question about stock without walking to the back, whether you own your customer data, and how much work a second branch creates. Changing it later is possible but nobody enjoys it, so the aim is to get it right once.
Below is the checklist, in the order that matters.
Every POS Demo Looks Good. The Differences Show Up in Month Seven.
Nobody chooses badly because they were shown a bad demo. They choose badly because the things that eventually cause pain are invisible during a sales conversation. Nothing in a demo reveals what happens when your loyalty provider raises its price, when your reports stop matching your register, or when you open a second branch and discover it counts as a second everything.
So evaluate for month seven rather than for day one. The right question is not whether the system can do what you need today. It is what this will cost, in money and in hours, once you are relying on it completely and switching again has become expensive. Every item below is chosen because it does not show up until then.
What Your First Month Looks Like When You Choose Well
Your catalog and staff accounts are set up during onboarding while your old system is still running, so you go live on a quiet day rather than closing for one.
In week one your daily sales report matches your register at close, every day, without anyone adding up receipts afterward.
By week three your customer database has built itself from your own transactions, without anyone at the counter asking a single person to sign up.
By the end of the month you have your first view of which products actually earn their space, which hours are genuinely busy, and which customers came back. None of that required a single manual action from you.
Ask for the Annual Cost, Not the Monthly Price
Headline pricing is the least useful number in this decision. What you want is the total you will pay over twelve months once everything you actually need is switched on.
Ask any provider to write down five things: the base subscription, every add-on required for the features you saw in the demo, any transaction fees, hardware costs and whether support is included or tiered. Then ask whether the price is per branch or per business, and what happens at renewal. Modular pricing is not dishonest, but a demo showing loyalty, marketing and reporting can easily be showing you several line items at once, so get them written down.
Qashier offers the Essential and Growth plans in the Philippines, billed annually, with add-ons available for a small monthly fee on top, all on one bill and one login. Ask us for your specific combination in writing, the same way you should ask anyone else.
Ask About Local Receipting and Tax Requirements Early
This is the question that costs the most if you leave it until after you have signed, and it is specific to operating in the Philippines.
Ask any provider directly how their system handles official receipting and the reporting requirements that apply to your type of business, what documentation they can provide, and what your own obligations are during setup and registration. Ask what happens when requirements change. Get the answer in writing rather than in a conversation, because this is compliance rather than a feature preference, and a provider who is vague here is telling you something.
Put this question to Qashier as well. It should be settled before you commit, not discovered afterward.
Check Whether Loyalty Is Built In or Bolted On
Almost every provider will tell you they have loyalty. What matters is whether the loyalty program knows what was bought, and whether the customer has to do anything difficult to join.
Ask three questions. Does the customer need to download an app or hand over details at the counter while people wait. Does each customer profile carry a purchase history, or only a name and a balance. And who owns the customer database if you leave. A loyalty product that sits beside the POS rather than inside it cannot time a win-back message, cannot tell you which products create repeat customers, and cannot be measured against sales.
Qashier Treats prints a QR code on the receipt, so customers register with their mobile number in their own time, in under a minute, with nothing added to your counter. Points are tracked automatically at every visit through QashierPOS, and the database belongs to your business.
Make Sure It Works the Way Your Industry Works
Generic systems fail on specifics. A retail POS handling variants and sizes well can be poor at modifiers and course timing. A food system can be poor at appointments and staff calendars.
Go into the demo with the three most awkward things you do and ask to see them, not described but performed. A complicated order with modifiers and a split bill. A refund on a partially returned multi-item sale. A customer booking that needs to be moved and reassigned to another staff member. If a provider talks around any of those rather than showing you, that is your answer.
Qashier runs point-of-sale, inventory, bookings, loyalty and marketing on one platform, so food, retail and service businesses work from the same system rather than from an industry-specific edition at a different price.
Ask What Happens When You Grow
The most expensive mistake in this decision is choosing a system that fits the business you have rather than the one you are about to have.
Ask what adding a second branch involves and what it costs. Ask whether stock can move between locations with the movement recorded on both sides. Ask whether one dashboard covers every site or whether each reports separately. Ask whether a customer known at one branch is recognized at another. And ask whether staff can work across locations on one account with permissions you control.
On Qashier, adding a branch means adding a location to an account that already exists, so your catalog, pricing, staff roles and loyalty program carry over. QashierHQ shows every branch in one view, Stock Request and Transfer moves stock between them, and Treats runs one customer database across the whole business.
Read the Contract Terms Before You Read the Feature List
This is the section most buyers skip and most regret skipping.
Ask for the minimum term, the notice period, what happens at renewal and whether the price is fixed for the term. Since plans here are billed annually, ask specifically what happens if you need to change plan partway through. Then ask the question almost nobody asks: if I leave, what data can I take with me and in what format. A provider who is comfortable answering that is telling you something useful about how they expect to keep you.
Ask about hardware separately. Find out whether you are buying, leasing or renting, what happens to the hardware if you leave, and whether the software runs in a browser or requires a specific device. Qashier runs in a web browser, so there is nothing to install and nothing to reinstall if your hardware changes.
Check That Support Exists When You Are Actually Selling
Support quality is impossible to assess from a website and easy to assess with two questions.
Ask what hours support operates and compare them honestly against your own. A provider available on weekday office hours is not much help to a business whose hardest moments are Saturday evenings and December. Then ask how many companies you would need to contact if something stopped working mid-service. If your POS, your loyalty and your reporting come from three vendors, the answer is three, and each will be able to suggest that the problem belongs to one of the others.
With Qashier there is one platform and one team, because the sale and the customer are one system rather than several that have been introduced to each other.
Ask How Long Setup Takes and What Migration Includes
Finally, ask what the first week looks like in practice. How long until you are selling. Whether your product catalog, staff accounts and existing customer records are moved over or rebuilt by you. Whether you can run both systems in parallel while you build confidence. And whether onboarding happens before your changeover date or on it.
Most merchants in the Philippines are selling on Qashier within a day, because catalog, pricing and staff configuration happen during onboarding while the current system is still running. Existing product and customer data can be moved over, and running in parallel for a few days is a sensible way to switch.
Everything Connects, Which Is the Whole Point
Read the checklist again and notice how many items are really the same question asked in different places. Does the loyalty know about the purchase. Does the second branch know about the first. Does the report know about all of it.
A platform where the answer is yes gives you a fast counter, a report that matches your register, a customer database that builds itself, a stock count you can trust and a second branch that costs you a setup rather than a project. A collection of separate tools gives you a demo that looked identical and an evening of adding things up every day for the next three years. That is the actual difference you are choosing between, and it does not appear on any comparison table.
With Qashier, everything you switch on appears on one bill and runs from one login, so you add capability without adding a vendor.
One login. One view. One platform.
Getting Started
QashierPOS, QashierHQ, Qashier Treats, Automated Marketing, Customer Reviews and Spotlight are available to businesses across the Philippines now, with the Essential and Growth plans billed annually and add-ons at a small monthly fee. Bring your checklist to the demo and ask about the awkward parts first.
Book a free demo and put every question on this list to us directly.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do I choose a POS system for my business?
Evaluate for month seven rather than for day one, because the things that cause problems later are invisible during a demo. Check the total annual cost with every needed feature switched on, local receipting and tax requirements, whether loyalty is built in or bolted on, how the system handles growth, contract and exit terms, support hours against your selling hours, and how long setup takes. Ask each provider to demonstrate the three most awkward things your business does rather than describe them.
What should a POS system cost in the Philippines?
Compare annual totals rather than headline monthly prices, including add-ons, any transaction fees, hardware and support tiers. Ask whether the price is per branch or per business and what happens at renewal. Qashier offers the Essential and Growth plans billed annually, with add-ons at a small monthly fee on top and everything on one bill.
What questions should I ask a POS provider before signing?
Ask for the total annual cost with everything you saw in the demo switched on, how the system handles official receipting and reporting requirements, whether customer data belongs to you and what format you can export it in, what a second branch costs and involves, the minimum term and notice period, support hours, and how long setup takes. The export question is the most revealing one, because it tells you how a provider expects to retain you.
What should I ask about receipting and tax compliance?
Ask in writing how the system handles official receipting and the reporting obligations that apply to your type of business, what documentation the provider supplies, what you are responsible for during registration, and what happens when requirements change. This is compliance rather than a feature preference, so settle it before you sign rather than after.
What is the difference between built-in loyalty and a separate loyalty app?
A built-in program records the customer as part of the sale, so each profile carries a purchase history and marketing can be triggered by actual behavior. A separate app knows who someone is but not what they bought, which means it cannot time a return message or show you which products create repeat customers. Ask whether customers must download anything, since sign-up friction is what causes most programs to stall.
Do I or my customers need to download an app?
No. Qashier runs in a web browser, so there is nothing to install and nothing tied to a particular device. Your customers do not need an app to join Qashier Treats either, because they scan the QR code on their receipt and sign up with their mobile number.
Can one POS system handle more than one branch?
It should, and you should ask what a second branch costs before you sign rather than after. QashierHQ shows sales, inventory, staff activity and customers across every branch in one dashboard, Stock Request and Transfer moves stock between them, and a customer known at one branch is recognized at another.
What happens if my internet goes down during selling hours?
Ask every provider this before you sign, because cloud systems handle it very differently and few volunteer the answer. QashierPOS has an offline mode that keeps taking sales when the connection drops and syncs them to the cloud once you are back online, so nothing is lost and your reporting stays complete. Ask specifically what is still possible offline and what happens to the records afterward.
How long does it take to set up a new POS system?
Most merchants in the Philippines are selling within a day, because catalog, pricing and staff configuration happen during onboarding while the current system is still running. Existing product and customer data can be moved over, and running both systems in parallel for a few days is a sensible way to build confidence before switching fully.