Zeller launches POS app to challenge Square in Australia

Zeller has launched a point-of-sale app for small and medium-sized businesses in Australia, expanding its product range into business operations software.

The new product, Zeller POS, is a cloud-based application for iOS and Android devices, including tablets and smartphones. It connects to hardware such as receipt printers and cash drawers and links directly to the Zeller Terminal for payment acceptance.

The move puts Zeller more directly into the market for merchant software that manages orders, menus, sales reporting and checkout. It also intensifies competition with established point-of-sale providers, including Square, Shopify and Lightspeed, which Zeller identified as incumbent players in the Australian market.

Zeller POS includes menu and item management, order routing, customisable menu displays and real-time sales reporting. Data from the system syncs across the wider Zeller platform, giving merchants a single view of sales and business performance through the company dashboard.

An import tool is intended to help businesses switch from existing providers. Zeller says it can cut setup time from days to minutes by automatically importing item data.

Pricing model

Zeller is positioning the product against what it describes as a costly mix of software fees, hardware costs and transaction charges from larger global providers. It estimates that an average Australian hospitality or retail business spends up to AUD $17,000 a year on point-of-sale and payment-related software, hardware and infrastructure.

Zeller POS has no software subscription fee. Instead, it uses a transaction-based pricing model for card and mobile wallet payments when merchants use it with the Zeller Terminal. That structure suggests the company is targeting smaller operators looking to limit fixed operating costs.

Ben Pfisterer, Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Zeller, outlined the company's market strategy.

"Merchants have struggled for too long with the expensive pricing, outdated software, restrictive contracts, and limited support offered by foreign providers such as Square, Shopify and Lightspeed who have neglected the Australian point-of-sale market. We knew that it was time to bring local POS innovation into the Zeller ecosystem, to complement our growing list of POS partners and provide more choice for Aussie businesses," said Ben Pfisterer, Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Zeller.

He also described how the new software fits into Zeller's product set.

"Merchants using Zeller benefit from a consolidated view of their payments, accounts and spending. Real-time data about what their business is selling from Zeller POS, and how they can use this 360-degree view of their performance, will enable them to optimise their finances and grow their business faster," Pfister said.

AI tools

Zeller says it used artificial intelligence during the design, coding, testing and deployment of the new product. According to the company, this approach allows it to release weekly updates to Zeller POS.

Alongside the software launch, Zeller has introduced Zeller AI Assist within its dashboard. The assistant is designed to help merchants understand available features, later analyse sales performance, and generate financial insights from business data stored across the Zeller system.

The company argues that combining payments, financial management, and point-of-sale data on a single platform could reduce the need for merchants to compile reports across multiple software tools. That may be particularly relevant for small businesses without dedicated finance or operations teams.

Customer testing

The product has been tested over the past two months with local customers. One of those early users was Cofezo, a café in Balaclava, Melbourne.

"Operating alongside a very busy train station in the inner-suburbs of Melbourne, speed is critical," said Alvin Teh, Owner of Cofezo in Balaclava, Melbourne.

"Since upgrading to Zeller POS, we've been able to serve customers, process orders and accept payment faster than ever before. This reduces the pressure on my team, ensuring they can focus on delivering a great coffee and service," Teh said.

The launch also comes alongside Zeller's direct integrations between Zeller Terminal and other point-of-sale systems, including Triniteq, Impos, Redcat, Costar, Zii, The Edge POS and Oracle Simphony.

Zeller says Zeller POS is available to its base of more than 110,000 Australian customers, as well as to new merchants. Founded in Melbourne in 2020, the company also operates in the United Kingdom and says it supports more than 110,000 businesses globally.