IT for Retail & Hospitality

Retail and hospitality businesses do not get to take the morning off when the network drops. If the EFTPOS terminal cannot reach the bank, or the point-of-sale terminal cannot authorise a transaction, the shop stops trading. We design and support networks for NSW retail venues with that constraint in mind.

What we support

• Point-of-sale terminals and the network they sit on.
• In-store guest Wi-Fi that is isolated from the POS network.
• Back-office systems: stock control, rostering, accounting.
• Security cameras and digital signage.
• Multi-site networks across shops and cafés.

The problems we see

The most common issue we fix is a POS terminal that drops offline during peak trading because the wireless network was designed for a home office, not a busy shop floor. The second most common is a router provided by the internet service provider that handles both routing and wireless with no segmentation between staff, customers and payment systems.

What a well-run retail IT environment looks like

A retail shop in NSW runs on four systems: the point-of-sale terminal, the EFTPOS connection, the in-store Wi-Fi, and the back-office stock and accounting system. Each of these depends on the network. If the network drops, the shop stops trading. We design retail networks so that each of the four systems is on its own segment, with its own security policy, and with a 4G backup for the internet connection.

POS network segmentation

The POS terminal and the EFTPOS terminal sit on a dedicated VLAN. Guest Wi-Fi for customers is on a separate VLAN that cannot reach the POS network. The segmentation stops a compromised customer laptop from reaching the payment terminal.

Peak trading capacity

A retail shop that runs normally at 2pm is a different building at 12:30pm on a Saturday. We size the wireless network for peak client density, not for the quiet Tuesday. A site survey during peak hours tells us what the network actually needs to carry.

Multi-site consistency

If you run three shops, the network in each shop should be identical. A technician should be able to walk into any store and know where the router is, how it is configured, and what the backup plan is. We standardise on one firewall model, one wireless controller and one monitoring platform across your sites.