Back before the GST was introduced, many retailers were understandably nervous that their point-of-sale (POS) system wouldnt be up to scratch once the dreaded tax came in. Thats where the makers of AAPos, like many other software companies, saw an opportunity. MYOB Retail Manager, QuickBooks Quick POS and AAPos all came out with a POS GST solution. A year on, after sales for most specialist GST software have decreased, AAPos still is a strong POS solution. The marketing surrounding AAPos still heavily pushes the GST component, so much so that you could be forgiven for thinking that this application offers little more.

The list of features is impressive, from stock control and ordering, customer cards, saving sales and bonus points systems to accounts payable and receivable. There are a total of 60 different reports and graphs, all of which can be customised. One set of reports that are particularly nice from a managers perspective are the staffing ones. You can view which staff have been giving discounts to which customers, what percentage or dollar discount theyve been getting and so on. With setting up stock, managers can set minimum price margins to avoid heavy discounting. There are also staff performance and commission reports.

And yes, AAPos does do GST calculations. The system automatically handles the preparation of the quarterly or monthly GST (taking into account input credits and so on).

Setting up the program for the first sale is a task in itself, and the screens have a certain way of doing things. This isnt to say the program is unusable far from it. Once you are familiar with the way things work, its a quick process to add new stock or staff. Its just that the programs main function is to sell, and the programmers have had to put in some odd workarounds. For example, if you mistype a product name or code when entering in a sale, the program assumes you want to enter in new stock and brings up the appropriate screen.

You can set up the program to print invoices or receipts. As part of this you can set up the standard working for the invoices/receipts. This includes setting up feature-specific wording for lay-by payments and so on.

There are multiple levels of security, from the basic level of allowing access to all areas for all users, to choosing security based on the user, and many in between. This has to be implemented both at the global level (store setup), and again at the individual level. During testing we only set the program up at the individual level, and were surprised to be able to access all areas in spite of the security settings. The lack of usability in this area is small, but significant.

There are also two minor flaws in the timesheet feature. When logging off, a message window appears: Do you want to log off for the day?. If the user clicks Yes, they cant log back in until the following day. Also, it is only possible to log off twice: once for lunch and once at the end of shift. In the supermarkets, checkout operators log on and off multiple times during the day. That just isnt possible with AAPos.

Despite the marketing, this product is more than just a GST solution; its a good general POS solution with enough features to make it useful to all. Check it out on this months cover CD.