forecourttech June 19

forecourttech
Could an old petrol station still
be ahead of it’s time?
Astro Baltics introduces their
latest solution - Cloudics.
Imagine a beautiful sunny day, you take your family on
beach. The day goes smoothly, everyone is happy but it is
time to head back. The car warns that the fuel level is low
and you need to fill up. There was a station on your way
back and you know that you can refill there. You reach the
station, and start looking for your wallet, eventually you
realise that you left your wallet at home. The station is too
far from home and you are out of options. The only way
is to call a tow-truck & pay a few hundred euros for their
service.
This a really common problem that can happen to anyone -
but what if there was a solution?
Researches show that people take mobile phones everywhere,
but forgetting your wallet is a common problem. If
this station would have mobile payment opportunity, they
would attract new customers, maintain the old ones &
these situations would not happen.
How to become an innovation leader with your renewed
petrol station
Using Cloudics in your fuel station can make you the innovation
leader in petrol station industry.
Today the majority of petrol stations are managed through
expensive hardware and their integration is time consuming
and costly. Cloudics enables fuel station operators to
control all the fuel station devices through a Cloud-based
forecourt controller (FCC). This also means that maintenance
and updates can be done over the internet.
Cloudics combines software and hardware solutions into
one and can be operated from the cloud-based web manager.
The solution comes with an application for mobile
payments that gives users an overview of their refueling
process and previous transactions. With Cloudics you
can keep the station functioning 24/7, reduce the costs on
deployment, implementation and maintenance while giving
a better overview of your equipment.
How your customer’s life will change with Cloudics
Trends show that consumers are eager for quick and less
complicated shopping experiences that mobile payments
are offering. With an easy and intuitive user interface cli
ents can make payments quickly and comfortably using
only their smartphone. This means an innovative and convenient
fueling experience for the users because they can
pay for their fuel without having any physical cards or cash.
Payments are provided with maximum security and
users can also easily get an overview of all their previous
payments. Credit card information is not stored on
smartphones directly but instead in the cloud so credit
card details are not extractable just by stealing your phone.
Mobile payments also allow shorter wait times at checkout
which, in turn, improves the customer experience.
How Cloudics helps fuel station owners
Cloudics can help you reduce fuel station hardware
expenses and setup costs, lower regular software maintenance
fees and on-site service costs. Total savings on
maintenance work and hardware can be up to €30k for a
small station. The cloud based fuel station is fully automatic
and therefore you can also save money on labour costs. In
addition to the cost aspect the installation of a new station
is faster and expanding your business becomes easier.
It is also much easier to implement and install new functionalities
and upgrades because all business logic and
data is stored in the cloud. This gives you a solution that
can easily adapt to fast market changes and helps you to
stay competitive and to attract new clients through innovation.
Cloud based fuel station is better equipped to adapt
to changes in a fast-paced fuel retail business environment
and fuel station can be controlled and managed remotely
from every corner of the world.
How to keep your station traditional but still innovative
It is true that we are not there yet that all the petrol stations
would have only mobile payment. To meet the needs of
the traditional and the innovative Astro Baltics has made a
hybrid station. The hybrid station has the traditional Astro
Baltics Outdoor Payment Terminal (OPT) with card and
cash payment but all other devices are turned into IoT
devices and the forecourt device controller is in the cloud.
Wet stock management systems, price displays and dispensers
are linked up using small controllers that are easily
replaceable and give site operators the ability to manage
everything remotely.
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