Reject shop case study

ABOUT THE CUSTOMER

The Reject Shop is an Australian discount variety store chain. Founded in 1981 as a ‘seconds’ store in South Yarra, the company currently operates over 353 stores Australia-wide and employs more than 5,600 staff.

CHALLENGE

As is common for retailers, The Reject Shop faces an ongoing challenge to manage the cost and visibility of cash in their business.

The retailer was interested in controlling service costs, as well as gaining more visibility of cash movements, including transparent reporting for both outlets and head office of Fast Deposit Bag (FDB) banking by store, FDB bag, denominations and discrepancies.

There was no visibility on the frequency or value of change orders by the stores, or electronic details of cash clearances and discrepancies.

The Reject Shop was using FDB collections and change orders via local ANZ bank branches, which could be a time consuming and complicated two-step process.

The incumbent cash-in-transit provider was regionally-based, and did not have cash processing facilities to provide direct change order services. They relied on subcontractors at an ever-increasing cost to collect and re-carry banking for The Reject Shop to a local ANZ branch.

It soon became clear that these costs were unsustainable.

SOLUTION

Supported by Linfox Armaguard Group, the solution was an ANZ Direct2Depot service with Armaguard Online change ordering and reporting.

The Reject Shop continues to use ANZ's FDB product and bank deposit funds to their account on the day of service.

The Reject Shop can place change orders for delivery on the day of service and as an added convenience, pay for the change orders by ‘pay back’. This is when staff give the equivalent value of banknotes to Armaguard's secure transport crew to pay for the change ordered.

For example, The Reject Shop orders $450.00 of $2, $1, $0.50 etc. and pays Armaguard $450 in $50 notes.

Benefits include the:

• ability to place change orders online, with complete head office visibility of all orders placed
• ability for head office to view cash processing reporting by store, denomination and discrepancy value on the very next business day
• provision of online reporting, change ordering and cash re-carry without increase in service costs.

RESULTS

Linfox Armaguard Group was successful in providing value-added services across the entire 353 store network at no additional cost to the incumbent provider. Importantly, the cost was consistent across all stores, making reporting much easier for The Reject Shop.

Now, visibility and timely reporting of cash processing discrepancies have improved, and can be tracked in near real-time, where previously tracking could take two weeks or more.

Also:

• change orders are made online, making cash management faster and easier for outlet managers
• services are provided by a single national provider, making day-to-day transactions easier with a single point of contact
• feedback on the reporting has been overwhelmingly positive.

ANZ Direct2Depot doesn’t just work for The Reject Shop. The ANZ Branch network also benefits by reducing the number of FDBs lodged, in turn reducing the quantity of cash and change orders to be processed.