The Casio SE-S10 cash register has been around for a number of years, more than we have been blogging for at least! It has proved to be an extremely popular cash register over the years and we thought it worthy of a somewhat late review.

The SE-S10 replaced the out-going TE-M80 model in the Autumn of 2010 with its first stand out feature being a full size cash drawer. Five years on it remains the cheapest cash register available in the UK with the full number of coin (8) and note (4) compartments. Not having to mix your coin is an often over-looked feature – having a pot for each coin saves your cashiers time in dispensing change and cuts down on embarrassing change errors.

The next big feature on the SE-S10 is its fast, silent thermal printer. The standard receipt header message can be customised to your requirements. The five lines of text can be personalised with your shop name, address details and or promotional message. Having your receipts personalised adds a level of professionalism and prevents confusion around refunds and exchanges. The cash register is supplied with a take up spool enabling it to be used in journal mode. However, the most popular use is receipt mode. The SE-S10 can only issue one receipt per transaction – this can be automatically done with every sale or only on customer request, but once the receipt has been issued no duplicate is available.

The SE-S10 has five department buttons (with the use of the shift button this can be up to 20), which can each be custom programmed with a description and price. If no preset price is applicable the department button can be left open for variable sales amounts.

The SE-S10 has a number of useful functions including a discount (or surcharge) button, refund mode, single item sale and low battery indicator. The secure key lock ensures manager control over sales reports, refunds and programming. The SE-S10 is also capable of supporting up to 500 PLU’s.

The SE-S10 has a ‘number only’ LED customer and operator display. Both are fixed in position, but it does allow both the operator and customer to see the sales total as each line is entered. The operator display also shows the department number the current transaction line has been assigned to.

As with any cash register that can have it’s printer ‘de-activated’ so it issues receipts and reports only on request, the running costs for the SE-S10 are relatively low. SE-S10 till rolls are available in boxes of 20 for around about the £10-£12 mark depending on how many boxes you order.

The base and cash drawer are of a robust plastic construction and we reckon the register is suitable for any premises requiring a professional cash register capable of processing somewhere in the region of 80 transactions per day. Should your business be processing a higher volume of transactions we would recommend investing in a cash register with a heavy duty metal base. Retailers with busy shops could consider either the Casio SE-S400 or the Sharp XE-A207 cash registers. With both of these tills you also get substantially more detailed reporting, significantly more sales department buttons (16 on the XE-A207 and 25 on the SE-S400), both support SD card use (for exporting sales information to a PC and for backing up the programming information). In addition to this the Sharp XE-A207 is supplied with a onsite warranty.

In summary the SE-S10, after five years on the market, remains a competitive model and we would recommend for any retail premises processing medium volume of transactions, requiring ‘on-request’ receipt issuance. However, if you require more than five department buttons, duplicate receipt functionality, SD card compatibility or a heavy duty cash drawer then there are other cash registers that will prove a better fit for your business.  For more information on the SE-S10 or to view other cash registers please visit the shopstuff website.