Unlike backing up till data onto USB sticks or hard drives, till data archiving is intended for the long-term storage of data and is subject to certain documentation requirements. A cloud-based solution would be the most effective way to archive large volumes of data securely in a data centre.

Archiving is possible at any time

Even without an interface in the till system, it should be possible at any time to upload and thus securely archive till data in the cloud. The POS operator thereby indicates that data can no longer be altered once the till has been closed. This ensures they are better prepared for a potential POS audit. The POS data archived in the cloud is therefore available online at any time. This means that auditors can only access the data in read-only mode. The Cash register archiving should continue to enable the retrieval of archived data in accordance with the description standard. Automated data archiving in the cloud is intended to ease the burden on companies in their day-to-day archiving tasks.

According to Letter from the Federal Ministry of Finance dated 26 November 2010 A till system must record all transaction data in detail, along with other data, electronically and in a tamper-proof manner, and archive it for at least 10 years. The following are relevant for tax purposes: journal entries, reports, programming data and master data changes. Furthermore, the tax authorities attach great importance to ensuring that the completeness of the data can be verified, e.g. through sequential numbering. Archiving may take place in a downstream system. During tax audits, the data must be made available electronically in a format that can be analysed, which refers to a direct interface with the auditors’ IDEA software.

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Legislative requirements

The legislator further requires that, from 2020 onwards, all relevant systems (electronic or computerised point-of-sale systems, app-based systems, scales with a cash register function, taximeters, odometers, gaming machines and open shop tills) must have a standardised digital interface. The standardisation of till records is intended to achieve further objectives in addition to the uniform provision of data to the tax authorities: this involves the transfer of all till data generated in the respective system to an archiving system, in order to enable the automated further processing of the structured till data in financial accounting. Furthermore, support is to be provided for completeness and plausibility checks. A high-performance cloud-based system for cash register archiving can meet these requirements.

In autumn 2018, hsp Handels-Software-Partner GmbH will introduce the option to archive till data in the cloud or on-premises. This service is based on archiving software that has been tried and tested in numerous projects Opti.List. With this expanded range of services, hsp helps users and manufacturers of POS software to archive data in compliance with the law.

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