How supermarkets can solve the coin shortage problem

By MUNGAI KIHANYA

The Sunday Nation

Nairobi,

25 October 2009

In January this year, I wrote about how supermarkets make decent profits by giving sweets instead of cash for change. The calculation revealed that through this practice each cashier can easily earn enough a profit of about Sh38,000 per month – enough to cover his/her salary.

This habit died away for a few months but it has returned again. I did some shopping at Tuskys, Pioneer House, on Moi Avenue, Nairobi recently and was offered sweets instead of Sh4 change. I looked at the cashier with very kali eyes and told him “No” in a calm but firm tone. He retreated and gave me Sh5, thereby losing one shilling.

If I had agreed to the sweets offer, I’d have lost Sh4 instantly (by buying something that I did not need) and probably more money later when I visit the dentist for a check-up! By giving me an extra shilling, the supermarket lost only one shilling, and I think it was fair for two reasons: first, it was their fault not to have the relevant coins, and second, it is better for one person to lose one shilling than for another one to lose four.

That got me thinking: If the supermarkets are facing problems getting one-shilling coins, how can they go around the change problem? I came up with two solutions. The first one would be to simply round of their prices to the nearest Sh5. This way, an item currently going for, say, Sh33, would be increased to Sh35 and another one going for Sh32 would be cut down to Sh30.

Would that affect of their competitiveness significantly? I doubt it; because the total cost of a shopping load would remain virtually unchanged.

The second method would be to simply give more change when the one-shilling coins are not available. This would translate into a small loss for the supermarket, but, if the cashiers are not honest, the shortfall can be significant.

To hedge against dishonesty, the point-of-sale (POS) computer software can be re-programmed to track down the number of shilling coins received by the cashier as float and the number that he/she pays out as change.

For example, if the cashier started off with, say, 200 one-shilling coins, this number would be keyed in by the supervisor. If he/she the makes a sale of say, Sh432, the balance will definitely come with three one-shilling coins.

Thus the system would deduct three coins from 200 and record a balance of 197. This process continues until the balance is less than 5 coins. At that point, the system would evaluate the number of one-shilling coins required for the next customer and if there not enough in the till, it would instruct the cashier to give out more change than necessary – rounding upwards to the nearest Sh5.

What if the customer whose bill was Sh432 handed over Sh502 to the cashier? We do that often to help the cashiers, don’t we? Well, the POS would record the additional 2 coins bringing the total to 202 and then deduct subsequent transactions from that figure.

I know, it sounds complicated; but don’t forget that once the software has been reprogrammed, that’s end of the matter. From where I stand, it boils down to whether supermarket managers are concerned enough by this annoying problem.