Revolutionizing Payments For A Financially Unified Future

According to MyBankTracker, 55.5% of Americans don’t do anything with their change. When presented with change from a transaction, most American consumers typically don’t put it in their wallets or intentionally save it. On top of this, they will often refuse it or throw it into a tip jar just to get rid of it. When they do keep it, the loose coins will often end up getting lost in a car seat or at home. This problem extends to businesses, as keeping track of all different coins and low-denomination bills can be difficult.

These struggles, alongside their challenges with change management, were understood by a small company. This grasp led to a transformative and innovative solution: a Clover plug-in for POS devices that would allow consumers to select a receipt with a QR code that records the value of the change they are owed. Consumers could then claim their change through their phones and deposit the money into their respective bank accounts. As a result, this method could cut off the amount of physical change that's handled by businesses and deliver a more convenient experience for all.

Cracking the Clover Code

Now, this kind of radical solution proved to be as complex as it sounds. However, the project would be realized through clear and extensive collaboration between our developers and the client. We started to develop the plug-in for Clover Station Duo devices alongside implementing a custom API for full functionality.

As for the tools the development team used to make this possible, we leveraged the foundational programming languages: Kotlin and Java. Java specifically is Clover’s primary programming language, while Kotlin is a programming language meant to be more concise and expressive than Java. These two components, alongside the already provided tech environment by the client company, made the development cycle an interesting one.

The initial project completion date was not extended even with the intricacy of working within the Clover landscape; our developers and managers didn't cut any corners. They remained consistent with quality, their process, and communication throughout.

Penny for Your Thoughts, Dollars in Your Pocket

There’s been a significant and noticeable shift in the payment preferences customers have over the past five years, with POS payment users being surprisingly evenly distributed between all income brackets. Cash usage has been on a steady decline, with many preferring the convenience of electronic and touchless payment options. Furthermore, this trend was then accelerated with the COVID-19 pandemic and the consequential growth of e-commerce. Plus, as Yahoo News recently found, "more than 86% of the total software spending in the retail industry is dedicated to the concept of 'unified commerce.'"

That reality, alongside an ingenious idea from a small company and the hard work of talented software developers, has paved the way for the reduction of low-count bills and physical coins in circulation. A reality that brings more money into the pockets of consumers by offering a flexible and efficient choice but also aids various small to medium-sized businesses in reducing costs and streamlining their operations. Ultimately, we’re looking at a financially unified future.