KORONA POS Review

KORONA POS's platform allows businesses to manage their back office and front-end retail businesses and a large range of niche industries. It's not the most popular retail POS system on the market, but could it be the right fit for your business? Read on to find out.

KORONA POS is a well-rounded point-of-sale (POS) solution that supports a wide range of industries and business types.

It's a highly customizable platform with affordable pricing and customer support options, and it's worth a look for businesses looking for a reliable retail software tool to support their single location, multi location, or franchise business.

KORONA POS can be installed locally or used in the cloud, and is a good fit for both retail stores and online stores. In this review, we will focus on KORONA POS' retail POS system capabilities to help you decide if it's the right option for your business.

Who is KORONA POS for?

KORONA POS is suitable for small to medium-size businesses in a range of industries, including bakeries, wineries, bookstores, hardware stores, cafes, and liquor stores.

KORONA POS supports a wide range of industries. Image source: Author

KORONA POS features

The standard KORONA POS plan offers basic POS features, inventory management, reporting and metrics, multiple payment options, and customer management tools.

Instead of offering several pricing bands, KORONA POS lets users build on their standard plan by adding distinct modules that suit their business (though we will focus on its retail features in this review). One of the newest features available in KORONA POS is the addition of a separate Promotions module. Previously part of the Sales module, the new Promotions module lets you set up promotions and set price rules for all of your products.

Let's take a look at some of KORONA POS's most useful retail POS features.

Inventory management

KORONA POS offers several good inventory management and inventory control features:

• Auto ordering (set automated order placements based on stock levels)
• ABC inventory grading
• Employee permissions for loss and theft prevention
• Vendor management
• Shipment tracking
• Label and price tag printing
• Product analysis
• Import product databases
• Centralized product database
• Scan inventory via barcodes
• Receiving items through the back office, POS, or via the mobile app

However, the system lacks some inventory management functionality that likely excludes retailers selling clothing or similar items, or would require setup of each individual product. For example, the system doesn't include functionality for listing products by variables such as size, color, etc., so each size and color variation would need to be entered as a separate product -- not a problem for a small gift shop, but prohibitively difficult for a large retail store.

KORONA POS' inventory count feature can quickly generate daily and weekly count lists. Image source: Author

Payment methods

KORONA POS offers several payment methods:

• Credit and debit cards
• Cash
• EMV chip payments
• Contactless NFC payments (also known as mobile payments)
• KORONA POS gift card

When setting up payment methods, you can also add detailed information about each method, such as payment service used and types of currency accepted, with the option to add multiple currency types. You can also choose whether to access the cash drawer and whether to print additional receipts, such as gift receipts, and you can also set a maximum payment amount. However, the system does not appear to offer a virtual terminal to manually process card-not-present payments.

Back office

Effective retail POS systems require a powerful back office to match. KORONA POS offers a number of solid back-office features to help support efficient business operations:

• Employee management functionality grants users different permissions and provides a report of POS activity.
• POS reporting provides daily, weekly, and monthly reports, and staff reports.
• Customer management tools.
• Loyalty management features such as coupons and gift cards.
• Receipt customization.

Reporting

KORONA POS offers solid real-time reporting functionality. Here's what included within the system's reporting and analytics feature:

• ABC product analysis technology that gives every product its own specific grade and report.
• Report generation for single employee shifts, annual overall sales, average customer spend, product return rates, conversion rates, and other granular KPIs.
• Volume reporting shows sales quantities and revenue data.
• Warehouse reporting provides data on reorder levels, maximum levels, total ordered goods, and total goods in stock.
• Tax reporting shows the generated sales tax per economic zone.

Users can view daily, weekly, and monthly POS reports. Image source: Author

Customer management

KORONA POS offers an integrated CRM system that supports SMS messaging, email, and branded apps to help run promotions and targeted marketing campaigns. All customer information and purchase history is stored in a single database.

Users can view reports such as number of customers per hour. Image source: Author

The solution also comes with a point-based loyalty program for every customer and the ability to create both plastic and digital gift cards.

KORONA POS ease of use

KORONA POS offers an unlimited free trial, so potential users can get used to using the software and its many features.

KORONA POS has a simple yet dated user interface, though its back office might take a little while to get the hang of if you don't have experience with POS systems.

The main POS dashboard screen can be customized to each business's needs, and users can choose the features they want to appear in the main sidebar and assign shortcuts to most-used functions. The dashboard is fully customizable, so you can add or remove widgets as desired.

KORONA's dashboard offers getting started resources along with sales, products, and revenue data. Image source: Author

KORONA integrates with Quickbooks Online, along with bLoyal and Como for loyalty management. For users with an online store, KORONA POS also integrates with WooCommerce, Magento, and Shopify, along with various credit card processors. If you're interested, KORONA POS also offers API access for building your own custom integrations.

KORONA POS' dashboard interface is largely customizable, but a little outdated. Image source: Author

Source: YouTube.

Overall, KORONA POS doesn't overcomplicate its retail POS software, and users can expect to get to grips with the system within a short time, helped by the many video tutorials and its extensive user manual.

KORONA POS' pricing

It always frustrates me when a vendor claims to have straightforward pricing, only to then make a potential customer dig for simple pricing information.

Instead of your standard table that lists pricing, features, and term pricing band conditions, KORONA POS offers a YouTube video that goes through their pricing options. Here's what I could glean from the video:

• KORONA POS offers a monthly subscription pricing model, which includes full training, automated system updates, and 24/7 customer support.
• Pricing starts at $49/month for each POS terminal in use, and users can activate and deactivate POS terminals at any time.
• For advanced inventory management features, prices start at $59/month per POS terminal.
• For businesses that operate turnstyle/ticketing-based businesses, prices start at $79/month per POS terminal.

However, KORONA POS redeems itself with a very generous offer of an "unlimited free trial", no credit card required. Additionally, they have no cancellation costs if you change your mind about the software, and even offer a money-back guarantee within 60 days if you're not satisfied with KORONA POS.

KORONA POS also offers individual add-on modules for Retail, Food & Beverage, Ticket, Franchise, and Invoice, with prices ranging from $10 to $50/month, per terminal.

KORONA POS support

You can use the best POS product in the world, but if the system goes down in the middle of the day (or night), you will still need customer support. Luckily, this is an area where KORONA POS shines, with customer service second to none. All customers, no matter their pricing plan, have access to a variety of support options, which include the following:

• Phone support: All KORONA POS subscribers have access to phone support during regular business hours as well as 24/7 support in case of emergencies.
• Email and chat support: For non-emergencies, email and live chat support options are also available, with a quick turnaround time.
• In-depth user manual: KORONA POS' online user manual contains detailed instructions and videos to help users learn how to use all features.

Besides these options, KORONA POS also includes a training demo, so you can get used to the software before going live. In addition, they also offer installation assistance to ensure everything is properly installed and ready to go. For those that prefer video tutorials, a series of YouTube tutorial videos are also available.

KORONA POS offers solid 24/7 customer support options. Image source: Author

Benefits of KORONA POS

KORONA POS offers businesses a customizable product, which is a bonus for those who find out-of-the-box solutions too broad to meet their needs. Users also have the flexibility to choose their own payment processing platform and are offered flexible and reasonable pricing options.

Its unlimited free trial is almost unheard of, a huge benefit for businesses who want to trial a platform without committing to a contract. For those who subscribe monthly, there's also a 60-day money-back guarantee for users who aren't satisfied with the product.

KORONA POS's customer support options are also excellent, which gives businesses peace of mind they can solve issues quickly without disrupting business.

KORONA POS is a simple and affordable system for a multitude of retailers

If you're looking for a highly customizable retail POS solution with a low price point, KORONA POS is worth a look.

What I liked most about the software is the ability to build out the package with its array of feature modules to suit your business and expand the software's functionality. I was also impressed with its commitment to improving its offering, with its automatic system updates that occur overnight without interrupting business.

However, it does lack inventory functionality that might exclude retailers selling items that need to be categorized by product variables. There's also limited system integrations, which is a drawback for businesses who want to synchronize their tech stack.