How Refurbished Point of Sale Technology Can Cut Return Fraud

By Alice Lane

It is estimated by the United States National Retail Federation that the industry loses $9,600,000,000 a year due to return fraud. With that kind of money at stake, it behooves retailers to use all the weapons they can in the battle against return fraud. Luckily, refurbished point of sale technology is both a shield (defensive weapon) and a sword (offensive weapon) in this ongoing battle with thieves. Moreover, this can be done without having to enforce an onerous returns policy which alienates customers and employees both.

The first way that POS software can assist is by enabling you to track your own return statistics. When you discover that 10% of your returns are phony, then it's time to start tracking your return statistics. Other symptoms to watch for are an increase in the returns rate in the recent past; increasing markdown rates following returns; and a decline in the percent of returned items which you are able to resell. Much point of sale software enables you to quickly access and use this information just by clicking a button.

Armed with this information you can change your returns policy, or update your software to help you track repeat perpetrators. Things to watch out for are the quantity of tender overrides, manager overrides, and returns without receipts - all of which should be tracked regularly to reduce theft by employees. Statistics show that 8 percent of return fraud is perpetrated by employees of the store. POS software enables you to generate reports which indicate whether a particular employee is handling a quantity of returns which exceeds the average. Since much return fraud occurs with stolen merchandise, with the perpetrator returning the funds to a phony credit card, or taking a gift certificate or cash, the use of point of sale bar code and digital receipts gives you the ability to verify that the return was actually purchased and paid for. If the digital receipt for the purchase doesn't exist, then you have the thief right there in front of you! Digital receipts also let you refund the money to the same card which was used in the purchase.

Refurbished POS products and POS software can also eliminate check fraud, which is when the perpetrator returns merchandise bought with a fraudulent check, before that check clears the bank. You can have your check verification system linked directly to your POS software so that you can access your customer's checking account directly to see if there are sufficient funds in the account; and also to compare a customer's check with a database of bad check records such as Early Warning, Fidelity, First Data, and Telecheck. Using POS software to verify checks eliminates the paperwork of traditional verification systems and saves everyone much time and effort, in addition to providing real time accuracy.

Refurbished point of sale software has been a real boon in reducing - and in some cases, eliminating entirely - the problem of return fraud. Refurbished POS products and software enable real time tracking of transactions, customers, and employees' activities. Point of sale bar code and digital receipts make for many happy returns - less fraud, more profits.

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