Johns Blog

Monitoring Credit Card Settlements

There are many things in both our personal and business lives that are so automated, that we rarely  give any thought to them  until something goes wrong…  Often, this is because we are secure in the thought that we know that it has always worked, so that we don’t even entertain the idea  that something should be routinely checked for success or failure,

A recent example of this is…

A retailer had been having an issue with getting proper credit Card authorizations. Because users were not able  to get an authorization code through the computer software on a specific day, they used the "Force" option and inserted a bogus authorization code for a substantial number of Credit Card transactions on that day.

When a "Force" option is used, the assumption is that the transaction will ALWAYS be called  in to your processor for a VALID Authorization Code that would then entered into the "Authorization Code"  field.    Because this was not handled properly, ALL of these transactions were preventing  attempts to settle all other transactions dated from that date forward. Had any of these cards been bad or  over their limit, the merchant would have most likely not been paid for them.

To compound matters, the manager that ran the Settlement process was not checking on the failure of the  payment transactions to settle with the processor.  Despite the fact that the process was generating a visible settlement failure message, the manager ignored the warning for over a week.

While eventually resolved, the process adversely affected the business cash flow.

The simple rules that may have been forgotten here are:

• "Even automated processes need to be manually monitored from time to time in order make sure that  they are functioning properly."
• "If I get and error or warning message, I should follow-up on it ASAP"

-John

If you would like to have CCS check your systems for any anomalies, please contact the CCS Retail Systems  Support Department at 800/425-672-4806.

Is Your MSSQL Database Being Properly Maintained?

Proper database maintenance is essential to keeping your MS SQL application database performing optimally.

You can use the MS SQL 2008 Management Studio Maintenance Plan Wizard  to help set up core maintenance tasks to ensure that your database performs well, is regularly backed up, and is free of inconsistencies that cause performance issues.

The Maintenance Plan Wizard creates one or more SQL Server Agent jobs that perform these tasks on local servers or on target servers in a multi-server environment.  Execution can be at scheduled at regular intervals or be done on demand as needed.

To create or manage maintenance plans, you must be a member of the sysadmin fixed server role. Of particular note: The Object Explorer only portion of the tool only displays maintenance plans if the user is a member of the sysadmin fixed server role.

If you want to create or manage maintenance plans in a multi-server environment, additional configuration is required. For more information, see Maintenance Plans and Automating Administration Across an Enterprise in the MS SQL Help and/or contact CCS for further assistance.

Maintenance plans can be created to perform the following tasks:

• Reorganize the data on the data and index pages by rebuilding indexes with a new fill factor.
• Rebuilding indexes with a new fill factor makes sure that database pages contain an equally distributed amount of data and free space. It also enables faster growth in the future.  This also has that added benefit of making searches and updates to the database faster, thereby increasing the overall performance of SQL and applications using it.
• Compress data files by removing empty database pages.
• Update index statistics to make sure the query optimizer has current information about the distribution of data values in the tables. This enables the query optimizer to make better judgments about the best way to access data, because it has more information about the data stored in the database. Although index statistics are automatically updated by SQL Server periodically, this option can force the statistics to update immediately.
• Perform internal consistency checks of the data and data pages within the database to make sure that a system or software problem has not damaged data.  This can be critical for early detection of problems of database consistency.
• Back up the database and transaction log files. Database and log backups can be retained for a specified period. This lets you create a history of backups to be used if you have to restore the database to a time earlier than the last database backup. You can also perform differential backups. These can also be set to keep a specific number of backup sets on file.
• Run SQL Server Agent jobs. This can be used to create jobs that perform a variety of actions, and also the maintenance plans to run the jobs.
• Task Result Logging – The results generated by the maintenance tasks can be written as a report to a text file, or written to the maintenance plan tables, sysmaintplan_log and sysmaintplan_logdetail, in the msdb.
• Shrinking of the database transaction log file.  – This option frees-up disk space used by the database transaction log.  This is only available on databases using a "Simple" recovery method.

Maintenance plans only run against databases set to compatibility level 80 or higher. The Maintenance Plan Wizard does not display databases set to compatibility level 70 or lower.  The MS SQL 2005 and 2008 Express versions do support using maintenance plans, so this means that you would have to write your own OSQL ir SQLCMD scripts that run these commands via batch files as scheduled tasks..

Failure to have proper a MS SQL Maintenance plan is place can result in the inability recover from severe database corruption, complete hard drive failure, or other system event that would otherwise make the database unusable.

Please contact the CCS Retail Systems Support Department in order to schedule your new maintenance plan or to review your existing set-up.

– John

EMV Chip/Pin Update

EMV (Europay, MasterCard, Visa) is the standard for electronic payment cards with a smart  card processor embedded in the card.  Among it’s features are:

• Card holder data and payment application are stored on the processors system.
• PIN based or Signature based security.
• Requires EMV Card Reading Hardware.
• Credit Card remains in an EMV reader for the entire duration of the a payment transaction.

What are the Benefits of EMV?

• Because of the smart card processor embedded in the payment card, and the hardware  required to read the card, creation of fraudulent cards is much less likely than with other  card types.
• PIN based implementations have a far less likelihood of being fraudulent.
• Has about the same speed as a Pin Debit Card.
• Consumer retains possession of the card at all times.

What are the limitations of EMV?

 EMV does not encrypt personal account data, so it will be up to each POS provider  and/or EMV device  manufacturer to come up with standards for encryption and retention.

What is the current status of the EMV roll-out in the U.S.?

As of the end of the first quarter of 2015, many financial institutions are starting to  mail out the new EMV cards to their customer base.

With the industry goal currently being that all Retail merchants should be able to start supporting the full feature use of EMV Chip/Pin cards there is some rush to both compliant hardware and  software in place on time. While some retailers started rolling out hardware changes in lat 2014, many have opted to wait.   However,  this wait has resulted in pent-up demand has creating some backlogs on getting compliant Pin Pads ordered and installed.  This means that if you want this equipment in place by the last  quarter of 2015, you need to be placing your equipment orders in now.

If you need assistant with ordering the necessary software and/or hardware updates, please contact the CCS Sales Department.
 

Who’s Responsible For My System?

Over the years I have seen conflicts arise within organizations about who specifically should be responsible for certain computer software and data related functions.   Often, people make certain assumptions that a software manufacturer, software supplier, or support vendor should be doing something automatically, when in fact they have not been either asked or contracted to do so. This could also involve  such issues as enforcement of internal policies and procedures, to which only  selective end-users were aware of or were accountable to.

Here are some fairly standard examples of things that are most often NOT automatic:

1. Operating System and Security

• Installation of Windows Security Service Packs.
• Installation of Anti-Virus And Anti-Malware Software Updates.

By internal mandate, these items may not be configured to auto-download, auto-install, or auto-notify of success or failure. If something in this area is either only partially  automated or fully automated, one needs to take care that these processes are not going on while end-users  are on the system and using applications that would be affected, especially if a server  or workstation reboot was required.

2. Application Software – Application Software Security Service Packs

• MS Office
• Adobe Acrobat Reader
• Adobe Flash Player]
• Java

There are regular updates for the above applications that should be installed.  Failure to do so, could result in security holes being present with these applications.

3.  Application Software Data/Usage issues

• Point of Sale –  Sales Tax Rates, which are typically by state, or by Taxing Jurisdictions. The rates should be updated regularly so that the proper sales tax is withheld.
• Customers – Taxable Status.   If Tax Exempt, the Tax ID number and expiration dates may need  to be updated as the expire.   Doing this protects you in future tax audit situations.
• Items – Taxable Flags, Item Based Tax Categories, sizing information – If tax flags and item based Tax Categories  are not properly assigned, the  result could be incorrect tax amounts being withheld, and some nasty tax audits down the line.
• Payroll – Federal Tax Tables – This includes such things and Social Security  and Medicare tax rates, and FUI, 401K Maximums; State Tax Codes – This includes  SUI rates; Workers Compensation Rates. 

4. Data Purging

Without doing this on a regular basis, you run the risk of having your system bog down when doing data queries and extensive historical reporting.

If you have some specific issues or questions about these sorts of things, please contact the CCS Retail Systems Support Department.

– John

NCR Counterpoint 8.5 Kits/Bills of Materials Enhancements

NCR Counterpoint now allows for the use of the following features:

Grouped Tag-along Item Kits.

NCR Counterpoint now allows you to define and sell grouped tag-along item kits. As with tag-along item kits, the components of a grouped
tag-along item kit "tag along" with the parent item when you sell it,  but are priced independently of the parent item. Also, you can define
 prompts for each component of a grouped tag-along item kit to allow  users to decide, at the time of the sale, whether to add the component
 to the ticket.

When used this way, the components of a grouped tag-along item kit do not appear  as individual lines when they are added to a ticket. Instead, all of  the kit’s components are grouped together below the parent item,  allowing you to easily determine which items belong to the kit being sold.

You cannot modify the components of a grouped tag-along item kit or substitute  other items for them once they are added to a ticket. However, you can remove  a component of a grouped tag-along item kit from a ticket if the component is  not designated as Required.

Sales of grouped tag-along item kits are tracked by parent item and by component item, for inclusion on relevant sales reports. Further, accounting and cost  distributions are generated for the parent item and for all component items  of a grouped tag-along item kit.

Including Non-Inventory and Service Items in bills of Materials.

You can now include Non-inventory and Service items in bills of material and quick assembly transactions. This enhancement allows you to easily add labor, service charges, assembly materials (e.g., nuts, bolts, glue, or packaging), or other miscellaneous items to a bill of material and include their cost in the assembly of finished goods. To add a Non-inventory or Service item to the list of components in a bill of  material, enter or look up its Item number on the on the Bills of Material  window, and then enter the default Quantity of the component that is required to assemble of unit of the parent item.

Including Return Lines in Tag-along Kits

NCR Counterpoint now allows you to include return lines in tag-along item kits  and grouped tag-along item kits.  For example, an auto parts dealer that levies  a "core charge" as part of a car battery kit could include an optional return  line to refund the core charge for customers who exchange their old batteries. To designate a component of a tag-along item kit or grouped tag-along item kit as a return line, select the component item and click the Is Return Line button  on the Sales Kits window (Inventory > Sales Kits). The component’s Quantity  changes to a negative value and is highlighted in red to indicate that the  component represents a return line.

Using Field Names in Kit Component Prompts

You can now include field names from the VI_INV_PRC view in component prompts  for tag-along item kits and grouped tag-along item kits. This feature allows  you to display the field’s current value in the confirmation dialog for a kit  component.  For example, you could include the INV_PRC_1 field in a component prompt to display the component’s current price when a user sells the kit’s  parent item, or the QTY_AVAIL field to indicate how many of the component are left. To insert a field name in a component prompt, enter %[FIELDNAME] in the  Component prompt field, where FIELDNAME is the name of the field.

If you would like more information about adding the Kills/Bill of Materials option  to your existing NCR Counterpoint installation, please call the CCS Sales Department.

– John

What is Springbot?

Springbot delivers an ecommerce marketing platform that combines the power of marketing automation  and marketing analytics to deliver a bigbox-style Marketing Robotics service.

Springbot integrates and simplifies the data, content and multi-channel marketing  tools (social, online, email, etc.) ecommerce stores need to drive more traffic, conversions and  overall revenue.

Springbot helps online stores grow their revenue by taking smarter, data-driven  marketing actions  in one easy-to-use dashboard.

Some of the specific features of SpringBot are:

Marketing Dashboard

• Data-driven marketing recommendations
• Revenue & ROI tracking
• Channel attribution
• Product conversion reports

Email Marketing

• 3rd party email integration
• Abandoned cart emails
• Welcome emails
• After purchase emails
• Win back emails

Personalization

• Demographic data
• Social data
• Customer segments
• Custom segmentation

Social Marketing

• Hootsuite integration
• Twitter
• Facebook
• Pinterest
• Social calendar

Service and Support from springbot

• Plug-in activation
• Onboarding and training
• Daily activity reports
• Continued support
• Online ads
• Retargeting with AdRoll
• Trackable links

How Does Springbot Work?

1) It links to your online store.

Customer, prospect, and purchase history data in your NCR Retail Online store is connected to springbot’s  Big Data engine.

2) Launches the smartest marketing actions.

The Springbots go to work and use "Smarter Marketing" predictive analytics to determine which marketing  actions will  provide your best revenue opportunity. springbot integrates with the numerous industry  standard online marketing tools.

What is Smarter Marketing?

Marketing Robotics is a technology solution that combines big data, predictive analytics, channel integration, and marketing mix optimization. Large enterprises, like Amazon and Target, have been  perfecting marketing robotics for several years. Now small and medium businesses can leverage these same solutions to grow their online businesses with springbot’s ecommerce marketing platform

3) Allows you to learn from springbot’s tracked results.

Springbot has integrated NCR Retail Online with the top ecommerce marketing tools to track each  marketing action from click to conversion, to revenue and ROI.

If you would like some more information on "Springbot",  please contact the CCS Retail Systems Sales Department

– John

NCR Counterpoint 8.5 – Tax Related Enhancements

Point of Sale – Tax Jurisdictions Totals in Ticket Entry – Certain countries require merchants to disclose the specific amount tax being collected by each Tax Authority or Tax Jurisdiction for each item sold.  For example, in most Canadian provinces, you must indicate the amount of Provincial Sales Tax (PST) and Goods and Services  Tax (GST) that applies to each of them.  NCR CounterPoint now allows you to display the tax collected by each tax authority or tax jurisdiction for each item sold in  both the Ticket Entry and Touchscreen Ticket Entry functions. 

Inventory –  Tax Inclusive Prices – You can now configure NCR Counterpoint to calculate and display price  values that include tax that will appear in the Ticket Entry and Touchscreen Ticket Entry, customer displays,  and on line displays,  customer receipts, Item Labels.

Purchasing – Value-added Tax (VAT) – Inclusion of tax in Purchasing transactions is now allowed. This means that merchants can now comply with regulatory requirements of countries that use a VAT or similar  tax system.

The means that the software can now calculate and  display tax amounts on each Purchasing document.  This includes purchase requests, purchase orders, receivers, purchasing adjustments, and returns to vendors.  This feature is also supported when using the new multi-currency purchasing option.

If you would like  to update your existing NCR Counterpoint software  to version, 8.5,  please contact the CCS Retail Systems Support Department.

– John

Using Giveaways To Increase Sales

As most of you know it’s normally harder to get new customers  than to keep you existing ones.  However, some entrepreneurs have recently come up with some creative marketing ideas.  One good example of this is the company "Ipsy".

Ipsy sells makeup and associated products over the Internet.  Most of their new customers are referred to  their site solely by word of mouth, and they routinely have people clamoring to get on their waiting list.  The  initial 2011 start-up involved customers signing-up for a $10/Month subscription.  For that monthly fee the  subscriber is sent a "Glam Bag" which contains a large sample of beauty items that are tailored to the
 particular subscribers tastes. Additional things that are included are informational links to beauty videos,   coupons, music, and offers to buy full-sized containers of the sample products and additional associated  products and beauty lines that were not in the Glam Bag.

In April of 2014, Ipsy is on track to ship 1 million Glam Bags in that month.  This represents an increase of 300,000  subscribers since October of 2014.  Assuming that current subscribers stay on the auto-ship program for a  full 12 months, this translates to a $120 million dollar revenue stream annually based solely on current  subscribers, and this  regardless of whether they purchase anything else or not. If even a small portion of the subscribers purchase up-sell items, these annual sales numbers could easily skyrocket.

Even if you aren’t planning on offering products or services with some sort of subscription, there are some other things that you can with your NCR Counterpoint system using the NCR Customer Connect feature such as:

• Tailoring auto-send emails to customers based on their personal preferences. – Example –  An automotive  accessories retailer sending coupons to owners of specific makes an models of vehicles.
• Offering discounts or coupons to customers who bought specific items or items in a  specific product category over a specific time frame – Example – An electronics retailer offering a sound  system add-on to all customers who purchase a wide screen TV within the last 30 days.
•  A Delicatessen sending out lunch special coupons.
• A pet food retailer offering free pet treats with the next purchase of a particular brand or size of pet food.

If you would like more information on linking NCR Counterpoint and Customer Connect to your customers, please  contact the CCS Retail Systems Sales Department.

– John

Do You Have Control Of Your Data?

After having been involved in doing computer software support for almost 30 years,  I have found that there are a number of things that have been recurring issues that are entirely end-user generated.  These often overlooked issues primarily involve improper software set-up  and usage.

Often, these issues create even bigger issues  for the business for such things as financial liability (Additional Taxes, Fines, and Penalties, etc.), and cost issues (over/understated  inventory quantities and costs, etc).  Some examples of this are:

Item Set-up

• Incorrectly entered Item costs.
• Missing item information that causes item based Sales Taxes to not calculate correctly,
• or not to calculate at all.
• Item Descriptive information not completely or consistently formatted.
• Categories, Sub-Categories, and Profile code fields not being properly assigned

I ran into a recent issue with a customer who had added a large number of items with improperly configured tax set-up.  This means that when the items were sold, taxes were not calculated correctly, resulting in monthly sales taxes reports being inaccurate. This situation was not corrected for well over a year.  This resulted in tax payments being made that were insufficient..

This same customer also had issue with Item Categories and Sub-Categories with not being assigned  properly.  This meant that when running Sales history report by item Category, the reports displayed incomplete and inaccurate information.

Customer Set-up

• Customers assigned the wrong category
• Improperly formatted customer addresses and email addresses.

Another recent customer issue involved sales reports by Customer Category that were inaccurate, resulting in poor reporting. Also, large numbers of email addresses were being bounced because the email addresses were entered incorrectly,  or were incomplete.  Catalog mailings that were returned because the street addresses were wrong. – This is primarily a  training  issue.

If you are having any issues that are similar to the above, please call the  CCS Retail Systems  Support Department in order to schedule a review of your system and training needs.
 

– John

Have Receipt… Will Shoplift

While shoplifting has always been a concern of retailers, in recent years criminals have been getting more sophisticated in their methods of operation.  Some of the latest techniques involve discarded  customer receipts that are obtained from various sources such as those found discarded in parking lots, external and internal trash receptacles, and via dumpster diving. 

The shoplifter’s use the receipts to compile a "theft list", and then walk into the various stores with the  receipts in-hand, gather up the items,  and then often head straight to the stores return department. As a recent example of this type of activity, the Bellingham, WA police recently recovered dozens of receipts in a backpack  that was tied to an ongoing shoplifting investigation that was using the same techniques referenced above

For more details, see the following komonews.com link:

Unless store security personnel are being vigilant, some of this may go undetected, especially in smaller businesses with  limited security capabilities.  Some examples of ways that help prevent this type of theft are:

• Customers being vigilant about not discarding their receipts on or near store premises.
• Store Policies that require items brought into the store to be returned, being tagged and verified, and then be brought directly to the return department.
• Requirements that Identification be presented on ALL returns.
• Limiting returns to the method of payment that was used.
• Stores keeping a list of "high Volume" returners for identification, if required. 

– John