Reflecting back what you told me, what it implies for the project, and the funding shapes we'll have on the table for the owner conversation. Final figures and the formal proposal come once the blueprint is locked.
With ~70% of sales going through card, every one of those today involves a staff member manually typing the amount into the DNA terminal — roughly 90 manual amount-keys per day across both tills, every one carrying a typo / fraction risk. Replacing this with auto-amount push from the till to a Dojo terminal eliminates a whole class of "end-of-day mismatch" headaches.
Receipts on a Brother A4 office printer is unusual for a shop your size. Receipts are slow, expensive (full A4 sheets + ink), and look less professional than they could. We'll factor proper thermal receipt printers into the project so receipts go from ~minute-long prints to sub-second, and paper/ink spend drops dramatically.
This is a comfortably sized SMB — busy enough that till downtime hurts, small enough that we don't need enterprise-grade infrastructure. A modern web-based EPOS on a clean database, hosted on a single small server with daily backups, has more than enough headroom — including space for a second branch when you're ready.
150 active credit accounts is a healthy amount of trade business. The current system makes that book harder to manage than it needs to be — every improvement to the credit module (statement, limits, repayments) is improvement to your cash flow.
Five realistic paths to fund the project. Each one is a different shape of commitment — the owners pick whichever fits their cash flow best. Specific figures land with the formal proposal once the scope is locked.
Standard agency model — paid in four chunks tied to delivery gates. Cleanest commercial relationship and the lowest total cost overall. Best fit if cash flow allows a meaningful first payment up front.
Roughly half the upfront commitment of Option A, balanced by a small monthly retainer that also covers hosting, support, and small ongoing improvements. Predictable monthly cost — easy to budget on the P&L.
No capital outlay at all. A single monthly fee covers everything — build, hosting, support, hardware lease — for a fixed term, with full ownership transferring at the end. Easiest "yes" if cash is tight today.
We bill on milestones the same way as Option A; the owners borrow the build cost externally and repay their bank over 3–5 years. Many SME-friendly UK options exist (Funding Circle, iwoca, Tide, high-street banks). Your accountant may actively prefer this for tax reasons.
Lowest-risk on-ramp. We run a paid pilot phase (data audit + first till + credit module live on one till). You evaluate it for 30 days. If you continue, the pilot fee rolls into the full project price. If you don't, we stop and you keep the cleaned data. Smallest first commitment.
None of these block the blueprint from being drafted — they just sharpen the proposal we put in front of the owners. Most are covered in the Round 2 questions.