Installing the latest car wash access control system from PSD Codax has paid dividends for former Forecourt Trader of the Year, Touts Ltd, according to the company’s operations manager Darren Hamilton.

He revealed that following a significant upgrade to the washing equipment at its Nailsea site last year – which included the installation of two new Washtec rollovers – wash sales are up 15%. The success has also enabled the company to raise its car wash prices.

“We made a huge investment in car wash equipment as we really wanted to up the level of our car wash business,” he said. “It’s definitely a business worth pursuing – especially since the recent big influx of hand car washers are starting to disappear.

“The PSD Codax box sits at the entry to the car wash. It has a touch screen that plays a video and is configured exactly to our liking – the graphics, the lady talking about the car wash and so on. The biggest advantage is that customers can pay at the terminal, they don’t have to come into store to pay – although some prefer to. It gives the customer the option to do what they want to do - to choose the wash they want and pay immediately. For people that want a quick car wash and then get on their way, it’s been absolutely brilliant.”

“The system also gives you the facility to be much more proactive about how you sell your washing. It allows us to do subscriptions, discounts, and to upsell add-ons.

“Buying a subscription means a customer gets a RFID tag for the window, so they don’t need to do anything on arrival at the car wash – as the car approaches the system recognises the tag and triggers the wash cycle. The subscriptions are totally configurable – for example we could offer four mid-level washes a month for £20. But customers can easily upgrade if they want a different wash on a particular day, such as a wheel wash, so it allows us to upsell add-ons as well. We have 14,000 Signature card members, and they all get 25% off the car wash.

“We don’t use the screen for advertising other than the car wash, but we could if we wanted to as it is a TV screen.

“But it does a great job as an outside payment terminal, so even if a customer doesn’t have a subscription they can still pay using the latest technology as it’s contactless, so it’s card/phone/watch friendly. We installed the terminals around nine months ago. We currently have three - two at Nailsea and one at our Langford site - and they have proved to be 99% reliable. I would certainly recommend the system to other retailers.”

PSD Codax was acquired by US-based ICS two years ago in April 2016 – almost 2 years ago. Since then it has been busy updating its website, a name change from Programmable Systems Design Ltd to PSD Codax Ltd and revamped the product line with updates, new products, new mobile platform and new connectivity.

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