Information Technology for Business: Four Seasons Greenhouse and Nursery Case Study

This report discusses the advantages and disadvantages of the new POS system used by Four Seasons Greenhouse and Nursery, the role of POS in gaining competitive advantage, advantages of having a centralized database, and more. It also covers telecommunication options for the POS system and types of risks associated with it.

RUNNING HEAD: Information technology for business 0
Four Seasons Greenhouse and nursery
Information technology for business

Information technology for business 1
Contents
Advantages and disadvantages of the new POS system............................................................2
POS system in gaining business competitive advantages..........................................................2
Advantages of having a centralised database.............................................................................3
POS system in decision making process....................................................................................4
Telecommunication options for this POS system......................................................................5
Types of risks bring by the POS system....................................................................................6
References..................................................................................................................................7

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Introduction
Four Seasons Greenhouse and Nursery is located in Colorado. It was a small nursery and used
manual registers to track and maintain inventory. The profits arising was either negligible or loss.
The company needed to do something to effectively manage it’s business operations. The company
started using point of sale (POS) system in 2008 to eliminate need of tracking sales manually. The
system helped company to track important business data from the sales transactions. In this report
advantages and disadvantages of new POS system have been explained. The role of POS in gaining
competitive advantage has been discussed. Further advantages of having a centralised database and
role of POS in decision making have been discussed. Finally the telecommunication options and risks
associated with POS system are discussed to make effective use of POS.
Advantages and disadvantages of the new POS system
Advantages of the new POS system
Track useful business data: The POS system allowed owners of Four Seasons Green House
and Nursery to track useful business data from the sales transactions at the time of sale. It
eliminates the need of tracking sales manually (Luftman, Lyytinen & ben Zvi, 2017).
Updates inventory and gathers sales history: The POS system processes and stores data of
sales transactions. It updates inventory and gathers sales history. The nursery can easily
maintain inventory on daily basis.
Eliminates reliance on manual transactions: The company used to track sales and maintains
inventory manually in registers. The introduction of POS in 2008 allowed company to track
important business data immediately at the time of sale (Killian, et. al. 2014). It eliminated
reliance on the manual transactions.
Strong functionality: POS provides more strong functionality in inputting, allocating and
tracking data. It provides useful tricks to operate and manage business.
Disadvantages of the new POS system
Updates: The company need to update versions of POS system from the manufacture of
software company. The updates result in increasing costs. The company need to invest in
hardware as well.
Security risks: The customers who use debit card at POS indulge in the risk of sharing pin to
other customers. Mostly systems do not undertake the measure to hide keypad.

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Connection reliability: A consistent internet connection is required to maintain a POS system.
It is web based. If there is internet outage then there will be no access to POS
(Aleksandrovna, Fedorovich & Viktorovna, 2016).
POS system in gaining business competitive advantages
POS system helps business to generate an excellent return on investment by faster
technology.
Standardization: POS system leads to standardisation as it eliminates the guess work like how
much to order. It has helped company to gain competitive advantage by standardization of
activities. Standardization leads to efficient working of company.
Appropriate decision making: POS system helps in appropriate decision making by not
getting confuse for prices. The waterproof and UV resistant barcodes helps to scan prices of
inventory. Appropriate decision making of company enables maximum shopping experience
(Cabrerizo, et. al. 2015).
Expansion of control over employees: The system keeps control on employee schedules by
reviewing and allocating labour expenses for the specific departments. It also delegates more
responsibility to employees to establish accountability.
Strong Omni channel strategy: Incorporating POS with ecommerce enables cross channel
customer experience. It has helped company to recognise customers across all touch points. It
eliminated the need to install expensive technology in nursery.
Eliminates data loss:
Four Seasons used to keep track of sales annually in register before introducing POS system.
In this scene losing register meant losing data. The POS system convinces people to use
Dropbox or iCloud. The system manages data electronically and updates inventory. It has
changed the way company used to operate. Availability of data up to date helps in gaining
competitive advantage (Brown & Manarky, 2014).
Real time visibility: Four Seasons is having data to support it’s business decisions which
leads to competitive advantage. It gives the ability to company to see availability of stock.
Such ability provides more operational efficiency and the time used to find stock.

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Advantages of having a centralised database
As the Four Seasons is growing so the amount of internal generated and external accessible
data is increasing intensely. So, the importance of centralised data has increased.
Data transformation:
With the help of centralised database data can be easily rearranged, transformed and
managed. It can be processed by experienced programming and statistical staff. It also
improves data preservation. The centralised database includes redundant storage which
preserves and transforms the data. It transforms the data even in the event of cataclysmic
hardware failure (Brudnicki, et. al. 2018).
Reduced costs:
The centralised database requires investing heavily in server technology. It results in cutting
overall costs. The maintenance of database is less expensive then maintenance of multiple
systems. It also reduces the overall space required for data storage and processing.
Improves data security:
The business contains personal information of customers. In this scene data protection is a
major issue. The centralised data base ensures data security across multiple storage sites
(Wagner, 2016). It implements encrypted virtual private networks, firewall and password
protection.
Recovery of data:
In the centralised system data is backed up on a regular basis. It can be restored in the case of
server failure or natural disaster. The hardware redundancy is also maintained on both server
and infrastructure level. It ensures system is updated.
Improves data perseverance:
The centralised database improves data preservation. Sometimes the data recorded manually
in register can get lost. Computer and laptops also offer fault tolerance. Due to which data
stored in laptop is risky and can result in permanent loss (Kaminsky, Angell & Evora, 2018).
Saves time and money:

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The centralised system is managed by the experts and may take less personnel time. The
centralised system not only saves time and effort. The data and analysis can be managed by a
single system. It contains information about data in database.
POS system in decision making process
Why do point-of-sale systems process business activities more effectively?
POS system helps in running functions of business activities. The system helps company in
accepting and processing payment. It tracks important data from sales transactions at the time
of sale It easily fits the bill and tracks inventory in real time. The POS system gathers
information of customers which can be used by Four Seasons to advance it’s interests. It not
only updates inventory but compiles sales history to process business activities more
efficiently. The system helps in operating business more efficiently by recording, tracking
and allocating data. It provides useful information which robust functionality. The inventory
data provided by POS is accurate which helps in decision making. The decisions can made
easily for ordering units. The speculation can be totally avoided by using system (Hanson,
2015).
Can the information be tracked manually in an effective manner?
The information tracked manually takes more effort and space to keep paper documents.
When mistakes or changes are made then manual transactions are required to be done again
completely rather than update. It is also difficult to respond customers immediately as
information is stored in different spaces. In fact there are experts who can respond customers.
An ordinary staff cannot tackle this. It leads to contradiction in entry of data. The manual
system depends only on experts. The manually tracked information is labour intensive and
there are more chances of human error. It is time taking process and costly to produce reports.
It also lacks security as anyone at company can go through the transactions. There can also be
duplication of data entry (Orr, Lemley, Hotchkies & Dehoux, 2015). The information
tracked manually cannot be effectively tracked. The POS system is more advanced. It
eradicates the need of tracking sales manually in registers or notepads. The POS system is
more than a cash register.
Types of questions could be answered effectively

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The POS system can effectively answer all questions related to inventory. It can effectively
answer the following questions:
Type of item sold by company:
The POS system can respond items sold by company in real time. The company sells flowers,
fruits and vegetables. It allows company to report number of sales generated by them. It is
also capable to provide profitability. It enables inventory management, product labelling,
loyalty programmes for garden centre, employee time tracking and custom orders (Liberato,
Bailie & Brimblecombe, 2014).
The operational timings of business:
The system provides the operational timings of business. It also enables the working days. It
shows the off will be taken by company in future. The sale coming on week or weekend can
is also revealed by POS system.
Who are best sales person:
The company have name of persons who helps customers in POS system at the time of
making purchase. The record of effective sales person is kept who contributed towards
increasing sales of company.
Monitors store activity in real time:
The sales and the targets meet can be known by real time updates. It provides information on
the items sold and the features of POS system (Yang & Hwang, 2015).
Information used to better manage the business
The POS system provides a real time report of sales. It allows business to access the products
sold by it and the products lagging in sales. The system provides the latest sale report on day,
week, month or annual basis.
The information can be used for improved customer service. The information of scanned
items is processed quicker. There are also various methods of payment such as credit card,
debit card etc.
The system also provides an efficient method of handling inventory. The software keeps
record of a product. It can track the time products were sold (Deaton & Wood, 2014).

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It saves time spend on paperwork, accounting and inventory management. The POS system
can manage marketing, advertising programs, loyalty programs and discount programs and
more.
Telecommunication options for this POS system
WAN (Wide Area Network) is a type of computer network which is used to exchange
information even in long distances. It can be situated worldwide. WAN can be formed by
linking together various LANs (Local Area Network). The most common example of WAN
is internet. The WAN connects PC and POS together. These two are situated in local LAN.
The communication between PC and POS is connected by internet. WAN is the most secured
and transmits fast data between different networks (Tahon, et. al. 2014). The reports and sales
data can be checked from home or office by making use of POS system via WAN.
Mostly the wireless POS is used by Four Seasons. In the wireless POS, the wireless device is
used to facilitate payment for products. In this system wireless POS system consist base
station directly and it is connected to a central network. It is mainly used for recording and
tracking customer orders and to connect to other systems in network. WPOS confirms
customer’s ability to pay and ensures delivery of products. It reduces the cost requirements
posed by the wired POS installations (Tapajyoti, et. al. 2016).
The POS requires network or telephone cabling installation in order to communicate with
network or other stations. Cabling is required to be done before installation of POS. After
installation of cabling, company installs the wiring throughout the system. Bridge cable can
install cabling of new POS upgrades.
Types of risks bring by the POS system
Security is a major concern for the company. The vast information is stored and moved
between cloud systems. Network and software weakness is the most common security
problem that is come a crossed. The hackers can steal information such as business data and
credit card numbers. To protect business password should be changed in every 90 days to
reduce chance of infiltration. The devices of company such as computer and laptop are
supposed to be secured with passwords to inherent security matters.
The privacy issues can be faced such as unauthorised access to application of POS. It steals
the personal and sensitive information of customers such as credit or debit card information.

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The fraudulent purchases which results in financial losses (Kwan & Khal Hee Kwan, 2014).
It is important to improve security of POS applications by identifying suspicious and
fraudulent transactions.
The confidentiality issue is being faced by the company. The cloud security issues are similar
to the data centre problems. The company can preserve the confidentiality by avoiding
disclosure of personal information. The limited access of employees to personal information
of customers is helpful in avoiding confidentiality issues.
Conclusion
From the above report it can be concluded that POS system helped company to understand the
products which contributes most profit to the company. The system has helped in controlling
employee schedules. It has assisted company to delegate responsibility to the staff and establish
accountability. POS system helped company to remain competitive and alert. The company has
attained operational efficiency. The advantages of having a centralised database have been
discussed to efficiently manage the operational activities. The telecommunication options used by
POS have been discussed. The types of risk arising from use of POS have been explained so that the
system can be made safe.

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and method for one-time payment authorization in a portable communication device. U.S.
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Viedma, E., 2015. Fuzzy decision making and consensus: challenges. Journal of Intelligent &
Fuzzy Systems, 29(3), pp.1109-1118.
Deaton, D.W. and Wood, R.S., Catalina Marketing Corp, 2014. System, method, and
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Hanson, T., Payscan America Inc, 2015. Bar coded monetary transaction system and method.
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Liberato, S.C., Bailie, R. and Brimblecombe, J., 2014. Nutrition interventions at point-of-sale
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