Oddball question. Given that Sears and Kmarthave all but eliminated LP (Loss Prevention), could that be a sign that corporate is quietly encouraging theft, in order to reduce inventory? There is an accounting cost for carrying inventory, and if the company has to clearance items for 75% off, is it better for them to instead take a write off for theft losses (valued at 100%)? Could that be a cynical way of getting inventory off the books and monetized? Just curious if that could work, and be part of the reason for stores operating the way they do?
17 replies (most recent on top)
They lose dollars to save nickels. Ain't it so? Ain't it so? Straight out of the cartoons! LP is the biggest waste. where do I park my ladder? did I pick up a hanger? there are no workers paid to do the things LP has thought up that needs to be done. Let LP do it . Oh, no LP walks by(the offensive thing) to the PA to have some 'worker' do that? What workers? hardy har har as Jackie gleason said.
I failed to state that this is a Kmart location.
We seem to be the exception to the rule....we still have 2 asm's 2 floor supervisors, 8 or so leads and an APM with 1 AP associate. I read all the posts but our store just doesn't compare or resemble the conditions described on this forum and we still have approximately 85 employees. Attitudes are pretty good with minimal complainants. How long it lasts is anyone's guess but no....my name isn't Eddie nor am I related to him!! Lol
Then everyone wonders why our rim counts are so off,what the register count says we are suppose to have in stock and what we really have seldom matches,but no one seems to care when you tell a manager they just shrug it off. But don't forget what is important, SYW, KYM and credit. Of course now it is against company policy to open both a Sears and Sears MasterCard for the same member anymore of course that was exactly what management was telling us to do. Funny how things can change so fast.
Omg .... don't get me started.
After the infamous full time lead layoffs, we lost our Receiving Lead. They moved a Pt merchandiser into the position poorly trained, they call him a Grocery something and the former Lead came back in a created position called Consumables lead. What a joke for a couple aisles of consumables who are mostly maintained by vendors ie milk soda chips. Waste of manhours.
If the Grocery person aka receiving person is there or not, its a crap shoot who will go to receiving cause the key personnel won't respond. Of course, they give the pt grocery associate a key even though he's not vetted for key carrying etc.
Truck day its rare any reports get printed or checked and if you check it doesnt match alot for simply quantities (cases) per dept anyway.
Our inventory was the worst ever in years. Taking out the electronics register and not manning garden at all is a huge mistake. So much has walked out its ridiculous. Garden door has been chained alot which is a safety and security matter but the management doesnt seem to care.
We cant afford the manhours for garden, so why send plants etc? But we can use all the hours early every day so associates can leave by 11 or 12 with no coverage the rest of the shifts till close. No weekend coverages historically our busiest days.
Our stockroom is full and alot of merchandise isnt moving to the floor. Trucks are large and scheduling isnt about freight being worked out. Softlines is the worst as there is freight from months back. Many days go by and very little is addressed. So far the DM etc who visit is on truck days or right after so they dont seem to figure it out.
And so it goes...
I was the receiving clerk for 3 years. I would put in a claim and through all of the B.S. it would either be declined or I would have to do an audit to prove that I did not have the product. The SM did not give me time to presue the claim so it was dropped. I was told that my job was to get the back room ready for a truck, get the truck unloaded, and keep the back room looking good in case the DM came in to inspect. No checking the truck, no making a claim for damaged goods, no making a claim for overages or shortages. It was the most insane process ever. No accountability, no inventory control, no real process except get the merch, off the truck and on the floor. Corporate does not have a clue what goes on at the district or store level. Process is great but implimenting process is impossible at the current staffing and hour level.
To @Jk9quST-1sqb. we do ALL of that and even more. Last year and this year, we even followed the garden shop integrity book. The data lead would have know if we were supposed to have 4 of a particular patio set and only had 2. That discrepancy would also be checked as to last received date, etc. We follow everything. shipment detail, etc. That is why I was posting about how the company says we are charged for things we did not receive. It is not the store and employees fault when the corporate office runs more of their scams.
That last post really gets at the problem. The control processes are there, if the company would invest in the payroll hours to get the job done. They lose dollars to save nickels. Even with the current skeleton crews in the stores, Lampert and his minions promise MORE expense cuts.
I believe the company has passed the point of no return. Even if upper management got a clue about how they have destroyed the business, there isn't the money or time left to get things back on track. They would have to invest $billions to fix these ruined stores, with no guarantee of success. It isn't going to happen under Eddie Lampert. In the meantime until the company slides into bankruptcy, they'll keep trying half baked ideas such as bringing back Weatherbeater paint.
It would be great if we had a receiving clerk. The only one we had, two years ago, quit because they took the position from full time to part time. Every since then we have not had a receiving clerk working at all. Whoever is avaliable when a vendor comes or a truck comes is who is the receiving clerk. Most appliance deliveries come late afternoon or early evening, the only people who are working at that time are high school kids and a front end lead.
Also, who has time to do an audit, file a claim with DC, go over the manifest the day before etc. Most people in our store only work a few days a week and a few hours a day, think less than 20 hours. While the process that is suppose to be done makes sense, the actually real life application is impossible with the hours scheduled, the amount of workers the employee turn-over and the amount of work to keep the store stocked and open.
REPLY "It sounds like to me that your receiving department is broken and needs to be fixed.". No, Sears Holdings and Eddie are the ones that are broke and need fixed.
To the poster who was wondering why your cycle inventory was so off - it's because your receiving clerk did not do his/her job. After every truck offload, the receiving clerk is supposed to do a dept 12 and dept 18 electronics audit on the rmu and report whatever is missing to the office lead where he/she can report it to the distribution hub center. In addition, the day before a truck is received the store manager, asm, and receiving clerk should be looking at the manifest delivery on the operations workbench or the KIN/CRT. Appliances are always delivered on a separate truck and that information is also is on the workbench/CRT. Is your receiving clerk checking the KSN/UPC numbers to see if they match with what they actually received? I guarantee you that 9 times out of 10 that is your problem, and the receiving clerk is supposed to be reporting these anomalies to the office lead. In addition, the receiving clerk should be filling out a discrepancy form and affixing the carton label of any mismatched item and sending a copy of it to DC. It sounds like to me that your receiving department is broken and needs to be fixed.
I'd like to know what and why the company doesn't seem to care a whole lot about shrinkage and theft. That's a question that may go unanswered because this company is all about misplaced priorities.
Our small B-sized store lost $75,000 last year due to shrinkage. No big deal because they aren't doing anything about it. Of course we don't have loss prevention. Managers can't even do anything except call the police and that's not going to accomplish anything because by the time an officer arrives, the shoplifter is long gone. Bingo!
But, nevermind the shoplifters! Who cares if they walk out with a cart full of merchandise! Get back to work! Get those credit apps and those PAs!
It's amazing how far Sears and Kmart have come ever since Sears Holdings became a thing. It's amazing how incompetent upper management and executives are in this company. When this company is all said and done it will make for an interesting autopsy in MBA schools all across the world.
Wondering about their inventory control myself. At our inventory the company said we had 12 washer and dryers, 20 TVs, and six riding lawn mowers and a few other big ticket items that were missing.. The problem is that we never received these items and did not even know they were on the inventory until we were inventoried.
How can a company, not the store, be that off on inventory for one store? Those things did not walk out the door, we never received them. Also, we don't have the room to have more than one or two washer/dryers, 10 TVs and maybe two riding lawn mowers in our garden shop so there is no way they ever came in the back door
There is no purposeful strategy to encourage theft. They cut loss prevention because they are stupid and out of touch. It all flows from a general misunderstanding of business process. They look at all payroll as an expense to be cut, rather than an investment in the process of performing a job and making a profit. When things are bad they cut payroll and assume the savings will somehow magically flow to the bottom line. When it doesn't happen the response is to cut some more.
This is a short explanation for much of the foolishness going on at SHC. it takes some real understanding and vision to take the counterintuitive move and invest more in the business when times are tough. Eddie Lampert has neither business understanding or vision..
There is absolutely no advantage to buying inventory for the purpose of then having it stolen. None; this would never be a strategy. Claiming losses on inventory you never had is a different thing - definitely an accounting advantage if they are doing that. totally Illegal, but profitable.
Every single store in our Kmart district had bad inventories. We were told our shrink was 2% and then it came back as a 4% loss. The stuff they said we lost was stuff we never received. Personally I think that they are running a scam saying that stores had theft/shrink for merchandise they never sent them and are taking a tax write off. With a company that is as corrupt as this one, from the CEO down, anything is possible.
Been thinking the same thing. It is so odd. I actually arrived at the same conclusions, too. oh well Gordon lightfoot is still alive....got to see him and thought he was great as ever, shook his hand and he wheezed a bit. so what? I'm a 1958 model and SHC might think older is worthless ...Well, forget SHC. SHC forgot us. sorry, did I sound mad? Mad? No, mad only comes back to bite you in the a--. We must accept what has been done to us