As South African retailers continue their recovery after two years of varying lockdown levels while navigating fresh headwinds in the form of increased interest rates and record petrol prices, retail shrinkage continues to present a real and growing threat to their bottom line. In an effort to address retail fraud, made worse by increasing digitisation and cybercrime, retail software specialist RedPanda Software has partnered with IntelliQ to bring cutting-edge fraud analytics to more retailers.
Retail shrinkage, or loss of inventory, can be attributed to many factors such as employee theft, shoplifting, administrative error, vendor fraud, cybercrime, damage and cashier error. The end result means a loss of profits for retail businesses.
With a deep understanding of the retail environment, redPanda Software understands that retail shrinkage is a persistent problem with real implications for the bottom line.
It’s not just a South African issue.
In 2020, the National Security Survey, which is conducted among US retailers, found that shrinkage was at an all time high, accounting for 1.62% of retailers’ bottom line and costing the industry $61.7 billion. It was also found that 7 in 10 businesses calculate a shrink rate that exceeds 1%.
The 2021 survey found that loss prevention and asset protection professionals have taken steps to address the shifting landscape, which as anyone in South Africa would attest to, involves a noticeable spike in cybercrime.
TransUnion research just last year found that a year into the pandemic, 37% of South African consumers had been targeted by digital fraud. Organised crime syndicates don’t just target consumers. TransUnion also found that 17.5% of all global e-commerce transactions and 7,8% of South African transactions between Black Friday last year and the next Tuesday were potentially fraudulent.
Online crime syndicates are well-aware that as retailers increasingly digitise their businesses and move to omnichannel strategies to improve their engagement with customers, there is an exponentially increased attack surface, such as the “buy online, pick up in store” functionality, among much more. This danger extends to threats inside a business, such as rogue employees or systems that need addressing.
Gerhard Nortje, redPanda Software Managing Director says: “As a leader in retail software solutions, we are constantly looking at ways we can enhance our offerings to our existing and growing client base, whether it be bespoke solutions built by our highly-qualified teams, or through world-class partnerships such as the one with IntelliQ. This partnership enables us to provide retailers with many years’ experience in shrinkage reduction through the deployment of the IntelliQ fraud analytics solution.”
The IntelliQ Forensic Analysis solution provides retailers with a sophisticated fraud analytics platform for identifying invisible employee dishonesty at the point of sale, as well as procedural non-compliance and external fraud incidents including ecommerce and omnichannel.
Gareth Davies, IntelliQ Business Development Director, says the partnership helps IntelliQ to build its existing South African client base. “IntelliQ is delighted to be partnering with redPanda Software to offer our solution to the South African retail sector. This market is extremely important to us and redPanda Software was our natural partner to aid us in better serving both existing and prospective clients in the market. We look forward to helping South African retailers with identifying and deterring employee fraud as well as the additional value and experience that redPanda Software brings to our fraud analytics solution.”
Peter Ludi, Business Development Director at redPanda Software, said, “This news is in line with our continued dedication to providing our clients with the best solutions that address the challenges and capitalize on the opportunities in the South African retail environment. This collaboration with IntelliQ unlocks the unparalleled domain expertise in loss prevention fraud analytics for SA retailers, complemented by redPanda Software’s deep understanding of our retail markets. It’s a winning combination and looks set to make a huge impact in the fight against retail fraud.”
The Data Challenge
The Data Challenge process is incredibly straightforward and has paved the way for numerous retailers to invest in the solution and generate a significant Return on Investment within a matter of months.
IntelliQ benchmarks the areas where fraud and risk exist in businesses against industry averages so that a complete picture emerges of how organisations can be improved whilst demonstrating the ongoing benefits that can be rapidly generated by adopting an analytic fraud detection solution.
