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Hurricane Katrina takes its toll on cash management

November 3, 2005

Mostly, having a large influx of cash is thought of as a good thing. But having too much cash on hand and limited safe space to store it securely is creating problems for many c-store operators.

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Soaring gas prices as a result of Hurricane Katrina have added to the amount of cash coming into c-store registers. And the number of stores affected is significant -- 111,000 of the 138,000 c-stores in the United States sell gasoline, and the fuel purchases made at those c-stores account for three-fourths of all fuel purchased in the U.S.

"The nearly $1 per gallon increase in less than 12 months has increased the volume of cash c-stores are taking in by almost 30 percent," said Ed McGunn, president of Posen, Ill.-based Corporate Safe Specialists.

For an industry already plagued by shrinkage from internal theft and armed robberies, the additional cash is straining manual cash-counting systems, existing safes and smart safes that track deposits.

Safes sold before 1995 simply do not have enough room to house the current volume of bills, McGunn said. "And on the automated counting side, smart safes that were manufactured before 2002 came with a standard note acceptor of about 500 bills. When the acceptor is full, it just stops taking the cash," he said.

The additional cash onsite creates obvious security problems. "You don't want to have your money in a cigar box," said Jeff Lenard, director of communications for the National Association of Convenience Stores. "Operators need to minimize the potential reward for crooks."

Playing it safe

A new breed of smart safe has the capacity to store up to 2,000 notes and features integration capability to link to the back-office system so that financial officers have a live count of cash on hand at any particular store.

Operators looking at making capital investments and store improvements should consider systems that can track the money, Lenard said. "With margins so low on fuel, paying attention to where your money is, is important."

The new systems are set up as bill acceptors/readers that record the amount of each bill deposited, and they reconcile the register transactions with the sum deposited. Each employee has a unique PIN, so the systems offer tremendous accountability.

"If an employee records that he deposited $50 into the safe, the system can verify whether that is true," said Dennis Baker, distributor for Giant Eagle Supermarkets.

The software loaded into the acceptor units also is designed to catch some counterfeit bills.

The advancements in safe technology offer an efficiency that's crucial to an industry noted for its low margins. The technology eliminates or reduces the amount of time managers spend reconciling registers and deposits, depending on whether the c-store contracts with an armored courier or handles deposits on its own. No longer tied up by outdated manual counting systems, managers have more time to devote to the store floor and customer service.

This article appeared in theC-store Self-Service Executive Summary, Winter 2005.