How does stocktaking by a security company help to prevent losses to a shop?
Managers of retail companies are often faced with the question of whether it makes sense to hire a security guard or invest in electronic surveillance to prevent shrinkage. In fact, there is one more option: outsource stocktaking to a security company.
Today’s technical capabilities do not require that each of your shops must have manned guarding on site for the entire opening time. One security guard can monitor 3–4 stores at the same time through cameras and report theft or breaches of public order immediately to the nearest patrol. The combined security service is effective and, at the same time, cheaper for retail chains than hiring a security guard for each shop.
Outsourced stocktaking service is faster, more efficient and cheaper
In addition, the security company can help to perform effective analysis and prevention work. If your store has concerns about product shortages, involve the competent employees of a security company in taking stock, because stocktaking reveals most of the problems related to a merchant’s product shrinkage.
The first concern regarding stocktaking for shops is often speed – they want to complete the entire shop’s stocktaking in one night, so that the shop can function normally again the next day. This can lead to there being shrinkage not due to theft, but rather human error, when a person who has been at work all day continues to count goods for several hours after work. For this reason alone, it is reasonable to hire separate professionals for stocktaking, who will do it efficiently and correctly.
Secondly, experienced stocktakers perform a product-based analysis at the same time as they count the goods, helping to find out which product group’s problems should be a priority. It is clear that no one can guard absolutely every product, but the information about what, why and how to protect can be obtained from a correctly conducted stocktaking.
It is very important that stocktaking is done by experienced people who do it more than once or twice a year, because it gives them the ability to act quickly and precisely and the ability to analyse the results. First of all, this helps the merchant save on resources, because experienced employees are faster, and secondly, neutrality is also important – outsourced stocktakers start at a clean slate, without prejudices and any need to manipulate the results. In addition to trained people, Viking Security offers its own software solution to carry out stocktaking.
Stocktaking can bring into light both internal and external theft, goods wrongly received, or repeated errors in counting the goods. By doing things without planning, you will not reach the desired result and the problems will keep piling up – for example, someone who has stolen once, will do it again and usually in an escalating manner, until they are caught. Once the results of the stocktaking are in, the security company will work out the next steps: routine checks, cash register surveillance, and interim counting of goods. The next results will be obtained with the next stocktaking, which will certainly have more gratifying results.
To cooperate with a security company, you must be sure of its background: to protect your store and goods, you must hire a proper company that belongs to the Estonian Security Association. This gives quality assurance that it is an honest service and the company pays taxes correctly. However, the price of the security service is determined by the merchant’s requirements: how many languages the security guard should speak and how many qualified people they want to hire.
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