Despite US retailers continually investing to protect their businesses and customers against it, online fraud continues to grow at a rapid rate, according to the latest figures reported by the US Retail Fraud Survey 2015.
At the same time retailers expect online sales to increase from 6pc now to 15pc of total business over the next three years, as public demand for the convenience of omni-channel shopping, supported by an online infrastructure, continues to grow apace.
Published by Retail Knowledge and sponsored by the cash handling product company Volumatic, the US Retail Fraud Survey 2015, now in its third year, looks into the systems, processes and strategies of the US’s top retailers.
Paul Bessant, Founder of Retail Knowledge, publishers of the Survey said: “We are indebted to our sponsors Volumatic, and all those retailers who collaborated with us to produce this year’s US Retail Fraud Survey, and making it possible to share this sort of insight with the risk and loss prevention community. Fraud techniques constantly change. New methods for stealing from retailers are introduced regularly. Changing payment types, mobile commerce, international concerns, cross-channel operations and the challenges of increasing sales are all key considerations when developing a fraud strategy. So it is extremely important for retailers to have robust online fraud prevention systems in place whether they may or may not think they will be a target of fraudsters.”
James Harris, Commercial Director of Survey sponsors, Volumatic, added: “Retailers cannot expect their online sales to increase by 250% in the next three years and not attract increasing attention from organized retail crime gangs. Retailers will need to review their current systems and consider carefully how they balance the increasing customer demand for omni-channel retail experiences with the potentially damaging and expensive aspects of online attacks on their business.”
For the third consecutive year, analytics and monitoring was the highest ranked concern for retailers trading online according to 43pc of respondents. However, some 42pc of retailers with an online offering do not yet use systems for analytics and monitoring, the survey found.
