Skoop! Kiosk — bank compatibility

Skoop! Kiosk is a self-service kiosk for hospitality, built by Skoop!. A Long Island loyalty and messaging company whose own website never mentions kiosks at all.

Certified on Linkly, running in the cloud. Linkly reaches more acquirers than any other middleware in the market, which is why most POS start there.

The Linkly integration runs in the cloud.

Worth knowing before you shortlist it: Skoop! Inc is a US customer-engagement vendor out of Plainview, New York, and its own site lists 25-plus features across mobile payments, messaging, loyalty, online ordering and branded apps -- with no mention of kiosks or kiosk hardware anywhere on it. The accredited "Skoop! Kiosk v1.0" is a peripheral product of a mobile-marketing company, not a kiosk specialist's flagship. If you are shopping for self-service hardware, that gap matters.

It was founded in 2007 by Dan Giacopelli, an electrical engineer, who self-funded it with about $200,000 for incorporation and initial development and reckoned he had put at least $5 million in before it turned profitable, first reporting a profit in 2015. The first mobile platform launched in 2008, during the recession, building mobile websites and text-messaging apps. As at early 2017 it ran four full-time staff plus outside consultants, with the head office on Long Island, a sales office in England and technical resources in India and the Americas.

The business model explains the odd fit. Skoop! sells to franchises through channel partners -- ad agencies, direct marketers and payment processors -- and has said outright that none of its franchise clients are direct customers. Named end customers reached via partners include Planet Beach Contempo Spa, East Coast Wings, Forever Yogurt, Le Macaron, The Lash Lounge and 16 Handles. Its stated markets are the US, UK and Asia; Australia is not among them, and no Australian entity, office or ABN exists. In early 2017 the UK office was finalising a distribution arrangement with an unnamed Japanese POS terminal manufacturer, which is the most plausible route by which a Long Island loyalty vendor landed on an Australian accreditation list.