A newsagent in NSW was putting his instant returns into the wrong week. We estimate that every week about 35 magazines were physically returned but were not put into the return form. To a magazine supplier, if it is not on the return form it does not exist, so no credit.
35 (magazines) x 52.2 (weeks) x 7 years x $5.85 (average cost of a magazine) = $74,815.65
That is almost exactly what he is now asking from Gordan and Gotch.
One of our installers picked it up, while upgrading them to our latest windows software.
Ultimately, the blame is because they made an error but surely in the seven years they should have done an audit of at least one of their weekly return forms.
Here is a simple, quick and effective way to audit your return form.
Count the number of magazines you send back to the supplier while packing them up. To count 700 magazines assuming it took me three seconds each would take about 30 minutes. Actually, since you are packing them anyway, you can count while packing so taking almost no extra time.
Then when you finalise your returns in our software, there is a total quantity figure for the number of magazines. Confirm that your count agrees with this. Then once the magazine returns come back from the supplier, on the bottom they have a magazine quantity number. This is something we asked for and both the major magazine companies have done. Check that this is your count. You then have an audit trail.
I strongly suggest that you do this. It might save you over the next seven years $80,000.
