Hi,
We operate a couple of retail locations and for the past couple of years we have been using shopify POS on iPads with the approved bluetooth barcode scanner. The problem is that our employees have consistently over the years complained about the connectivity of the bluetooth scanner. Basically everyone hates them and end up using the camera on the ipad or typing in the part number by hand in the search field. So knowing something about barcode scanners, I decided to try my luck with a “non approved” USB scanner.
For reference, our SKUS/barcodes look like this 12345-122-SMBK. The 12345-122 is the family name (lets say pants-2022 version) and the SMBK is the variant (small, black)
It kind of works, with two main issues:
- The approved scanner does not require that you place the cursor in the search field. You just scan and go. The usb scanner requires that you place the cursor in the search field manually before scanning. No big deal.
- The scans done by the approved scanner pull up the exact sku/variant (pants, small, black). The usb scanner- like any manual search- returns up the entire product family (pants) rather than the exact sku/variant. You then have to manually select the product family and then choose the variant from the list (small, black). This gets to be too much- it’s easier to use the camera on the back of the ipad.
So, my theory is that the approved barcode scanners somehow by-pass the entire manual search function and use some kind of special channel to shortcut the manual search field and return exact matches for the entire sku- not just returning the family of the product.
Is there a suffix/prefix I can program into this USB scanner to get similar results? At least some kind of operator done before a manual search to return exact matches only?
Thanks,
-John