Customer Fraud
Pawn shops are too often prey to customer fraud. A customer presents a false identification, thus misrepresenting themselves to the pawnbroker. That customer is trying to conceal his actual identity in order to pawn a stolen item or to retrieve someone else’s property. They could be using the false ID to support a stolen credit card and purchase something under another person’s identity and credit. The end result is the same; the pawnbroker is left holding the bag.
Yet another challenge pawnbrokers too often encounter is store theft. Sometimes it’s one person, and other times, a team. One person causes a distraction while another has the opportunity to walk out with stolen merchandise or remove an item from the shelf and attempt to pawn it back to the store. Often a pawnbroker suspects a customer but, either does not have a surveillance system nor the means to verify his/her suspicions quickly or completely through the software in an automated fashion.
Product Fraud usually involves supposedly high value items like watches that are fake or the mixing and matching of lower value items with genuine higher value pieces such as a real Rolex watch with a fake band or movement piece.
The reality is that individuals committing fraud are constantly seeking to find craftier ways to accomplish their goals. What pawn software a pawnbroker uses and what data they have to make informed decisions can be the difference between a struggling business and a successful one.
| Customer Fraud | Employee Embezzlement | Managing Inventory | Growing Pains | Multi-Store Management |