The employee theft challenge in small business retail is real and expensive

Employee theft is a scourge in small business retail since it often, unfortunately, goes undetected for too long.

Tower Systems make employee theft detection easy in its POS software. However, like any tool, a retailer has to choose to use it. Too often, we see retailers ignore the easy access theft detection tools they have in our software, denying themselves the opportunity to catch theft earlier and thereby reduce the costs for the business.

Outside of the awesome theft m mitigation tools in our POS software, we help retailers with practical advice they can implement to further reduce opportunity for employee theft. We have developed these tools based on years of service in this area including working with police, prosecutors and others in catching and prosecuting cases of employee theft.

Here is some of the small business retail theft mitigation advice from our POS software retail experienced team:

1. Track your stock.Receive all stock into your business through your computer system so you know exactly what sock you have.
2. Scan everything you sell. Do not use department keys as this makes it easier for employees to steal since they know there is no trackback to stock on hand. Using department keys is an invitation to steal.
3. Track every sale by employees.Give your employees a card with a unique barcode or have them enter a code – to track every sale they make back to them. Change the code every six months or so.
4. Do your end of shift through your softwareand have a zero-tolerance policy on being over or under. Reconcile banking to your computer software end of shift. One business where this was not done was being skimmed regularly for $200 a day.
5. Do spot cash balancing. Unexpected checks can uncover surprises. One retailer needing to do a banking during the day uncovered a $350 discrepancy that lead to discovery of systematic theft.
6. Change your roster.Sometimes people work together to steal. One retailer found a family friend senior and their teenage daughter stealing consistently.
7. Check your Audit Log.Look at cancelled sales, deleted sales and items deleted from a sale. Leaving a cash drawer open from the previous sale, scanning items, taking the cash and cancelling the sale is the most common process used by employees to accrue cash they then take from you. Good software tracks cancelled sales and what was in them. This can be matched with video footage.
8. Check Gross Profit by department.If GP is falling outside what you expect, research it further.
9. Setup a theft policy.Put this on a noticeboard in the back room. Get staff to read it and sign up to it. See the last page of this advice.
10. Keep the counter clean.An organised counter reduces the opportunity for theft. It makes detection easier.
11. Have a no employee bags at the counter policy.This makes it harder for them to hide your cash.
12. Beware employees who carry folded paper or small notepads.These can be used for them to keep track of how much cash is in the register that is theirs – i.e. not rung up in the software.
13. Beware of calculators with memories at the counter.One retail business employee used the memory function to track how much cash had to be stolen prior to balancing for the day – cash from sales not rung up.
14. Do not let employees sell to themselves.If they want to purchase something make them purchase it from the other side of the counter.
15. Be professional in your management of the business.The more professional your approach they less likely your employees will steal as they will see the risk of being caught as high.
16. Advise all job applicants that you will require their permission for a police check.From the outset this indicates that you take your business seriously. In many situations applicants who have been asked for permission to do a police check advise they have found a job elsewhere.
17. Do not take cash out for your own use in front of employees.If they see you take cash for a coffee or lunch some will see this as an invitation.

These steps work – based on decades of helping small business retailers to reduce and manage employee theft.

Theft, employee and customer, costs a typical small / independent retail between 3% and 5% of product sales revenue.  Management attention can cut this dramatically.  It does not take much time. No, it is more about having professional processes in place that everyone in the business follows.