Guardian POS — bank compatibility

Guardian is a point-of-sale system for fuel and hospitality, built by Independent Solutions. Twenty-five-plus years selling to independent grocers and fuel sites, and since the Vela deal it answers to Constellation Software in Toronto.

Certified on mx51, which is the engine behind several banks’ own terminal offerings rather than something a merchant buys by name.

Certified to do cash out, phone and mail order and surcharging.

The mx51 integration uses Spice and was last certified in February 2023, on Windows.

Independent Solutions has been fitting out independent retailers for more than 25 years — grocery, liquor, convenience and fuel. That is a specific and demanding corner of the market: scan rates, shelf tickets, promotions from buying groups, and on the fuel side a forecourt that has to talk to the pumps. Its current lineup is sold as Profit-Track for POS and back office, Flexi-Fuel for forecourt management, and a Head Office Management System for multi-site groups.

The company is now part of Vela APX, an operating group of Toronto-listed Constellation Software. Independent Solutions is frank about the trade-off in its own words: a small, flexible local company with the backing of a group it says spans over 1,000 software companies. Sales and marketing manager Dean Crowther has pitched it as "big business outcomes with small business personal service." Hardware and integration partners listed include Zebra, HP, Toshiba and Linkly.

One thing to verify before you buy a terminal: Guardian is not a name that appears in Independent Solutions' current published product range. Check with them which supported product your site would actually run, because the EFTPOS integration path differs between the grocery and fuel sides of their stack.

Independent Solutions also has SMARTFUELPOS.