Business Networking

Some restaurants are moving into new technology by adding table based credit card readers to the table. This machine gives customers the ability to pay for their own meal at the table and reduces the need for waiters and waitresses to take the card away and scan it for payment. It is also being tested in hopes that the rates of credit card theft among the same wait staff will be reduced. This is one of the positive steps to help credit card holders reduce the amount of theft they are exposed to.

Restaurant owners were a little skeptical about this new idea at first because they saw it as a way to push their patrons into finishing their meals faster. Some of the restaurants, the fast food variety, allow customers to pay at the register when they order, and did not feel the need to add them at the tables. This technology is better equipped to serve restaurants which are designated as sit down meal restaurants.

The popularity of these readers among the wait staff is not too high. They feel that these readers will not allow them to receive tips and will not be a positive thing to have around when they are trying to get the customers to purchase more food items. The patrons will be focused on the amount of the bill instead of the more impulsive eating choices they have made in the past. It might actually cut down on the want to overeat because of the lack of funding to do so.

Europe has been the leader in this type of technology and the culture here is more accepting of this than in America. The real question to ask the patron is whether or not they are alright with handing their card over to a perfect stranger and watching them walk out of sight with it or would you prefer to keep it in hand and pay for the meal yourself? It might be worth thinking about and putting in your input to local restaurants to get this technology for your favorite eateries.

It only takes a second for you to slide you card in the machine and a receipt is printed for the wait staff to bring to you to sign. You then leave a tip as normal. The difference is that the wait staff never sees or touches your card at all during the process. You can swipe, sign, an leave, in the time it usually took to get the waitress or waiters attention to hand them the card. It not only brings convenience but also privacy to the way you pay for your meal. It will also reduce the workload on lower payed employees.

Each of the card scanners used at the table run about $100 and up for each unit. Restaurants are finding out the positive benefits of this payment option because the tables are being emptied faster to make way for new paying customers. The restaurant not only makes more money from this, the tips are also increasing as a result.

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 18th, 2008 at 6:38 pm and is filed under Credit. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.