Being a rookie, by definition, means that you lack certain experience that more seasoned players have. As a new entrepreneur with a new business, it’s only natural that you’re going to make some so-called “rookie mistakes” because, sometimes, you just have to learn from experience.
But some rookie mistakes are more costly than others. Cash handling mistakes, for example, might seem small and innocent, but they can actually affect your bottom line, your productivity, your efficiency, and your security.
These rookie cash handling mistakes should be eliminated from your new business. It’s better to nip them in the bud now than to wait until they start to negatively affect your business.
1. Double Counting
In an attempt to avoid cash handling mistakes, you might make all employees double count your cash—when they’re making or accepting floats, when they’re processing transactions, or when they’re reconciling profits at the end of the night. Although this might seem like a sound business tactic to ensure accurate totals and avoid losses, it can be very costly. The more times your cash is handled, the more your cost of cash will go up due to higher labour costs. Double counting also reduced productivity and efficiency.
The fact is, there are better ways to ensure accurate totals than double counting. Automating your cash management process, for example, can be a better choice. You will reduce the average end of day count by a minimum of 5 – 10 minutes per person.
2. Manual Counterfeit Detection
Training your employees to detect counterfeit notes by manually checking the security features on authentic bank notes is one small step that should be taken in the fight against counterfeit fraud. But it’s not enough. Counterfeits are becoming more prevalent and sophisticated, and your employees’ counterfeit detection skills just aren’t enough to protect you. Instead, you need to invest in automated counterfeit detectors.
3. Sharing Registers
When your store is busy and an employee needs to remove himself from the register for a break, to help a customer, or for any other reason, it’s easy to just have another cashier take his spot and use his register to continue to process transactions without a break in customer service. But sharing registers leads to a lack of accountability. It can increase your internal theft rate and make it nearly impossible for you to figure out who was responsible for errors being made.
Your employees should be responsible for their floats, and only their floats—no one else’s.
4. Vault Transactions in the Back Room
Many business owners use vault drops when till maximums are met. This reduces the risk of lost, stolen, or misplaced money from overflowing registers. They also use vault transactions to get more change for customer transactions. But vault transactions require at least two people. And they require you to have registers closed while the cashier and manager drop off or pick up this cash, reducing customer service.
Instead, you can use a cash recycler to ensure that you always have cash on hand. This way, you’ll reduce your labour costs and ensure that all registers are open when they need to be.
5. Untimely Cash Management
When you’re busy, you might not have time to deposit your profits at the bank or balance the day’s cash throughout the day, every time money comes in or out of the cash room for new shifts. You wait until the next night or the one after that. When your cash management process is untimely, your risks increase. You won’t know who’s accountable for errors and you risk having cash go missing or get stolen. You must handle your cash in a timely manner.
Don’t wait until it’s too late to avoid these five rookie cash handling mistakes. They’re bad practices and they should be eliminated immediately before they can have an affect your productivity, efficiency, and bottom line.
