ORC, retail crime, shrinkage,ebay

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Q&A Loss Prevention/Security
Tips For Combating ORC
Combined with technology, exceptional staffing and incident tracking help
combat organized retail crime (ORC).
by Erin Harris
Paul Jones, head of global
asset protection, eBay PayPal
E
Bay, an e-commerce marketplace, strives to ensure line work together on the issues.
that brands sold on its site are legitimate and that
posts from sellers peddling counterfeit goods are What loss prevention systems
quickly removed. However, stolen goods easily investments did eBay make in 2010? Why?
make their way to the Internet, where their origins are more dif- Jones: We’ve heavily invested in building state-of-the-art sys-
ficult to track. We caught up with Paul Jones, head of global tems to allow law enforcement groups, working on the ORC
asset protection at eBay PayPal, to discuss the best ways to pre- issue, to have a direct connection to our platforms for infor-
vent organized retail crime and how to use new technology to mation on suspects. We have also made a large investment in
identify and track crime rings. building a platform of exception reports and dashboards to
assist retailers with their ORC issues. Exception reporting is a
As an online marketplace and key ingredient eliminating online ORC. The exception report-
e-commerce website, how does eBay thwart fraud? ing and implementation of rules, filters, and risk models have
Jones: eBay utilizes state-of-the-art systems that deploy thou- truly helped our success.
sands of rules, fraud models, and exceptions that are built to
identify fraud and crime on our site. eBay also has built a plat- What loss prevention systems
form of exception reporting to assist retailers with issues relat- investments are you planning for 2011? Why?
ed to ORC. On our platform, you can find items and search for Jones: From a systems standpoint, we will continue to review
product with our robust advanced search function. You can adding filters and rules. We also will be focused on building
even program your searches using this function and have the additions to our internal tools and systems used to investigate
results delivered to you via email. eBay also encourages the use fraud.
of the feedback systems and allows all buyers and sellers to
review the history and ratings of eBay sellers. What are your thoughts/advice on how
to combat ORC? And, what solutions should
What is eBay’s general retailers invest in to cover their bases for ORC
philosophy on combating ORC? and other LP-related issues?
Jones: eBay has no tolerance for crime or fraud on our Jones: I believe ORC is best combated within the four
site. eBay believes the selling of stolen goods is wrong, walls of the store through great associate staffing and
places our sellers in an unfair competitive position, and also good data to track the incidents when you lose products.
reduces trust in our brand. For all of these reasons, it is Retailers have to support their LP organization by hav-
critical we ferret out bad actors engaged in criminal behav- ing the appropriate staffing models. The Loss
ior. Prevention department cannot do this alone.
We believe the issue of ORC is complex, and we all have As it relates to LP solutions, I recommend further
a shared responsibility in the solution, from the store where investment in EAS (electronic article surveillance) sys-
the merchandise was stolen to the mall that leases the retail tems to include systems that will detect booster bags
space, to the county and state law enforcement partners (i.e. a hand-made bag used for shoplifting) being carried
who protect these areas. into a store. I would also recommend investing in a
Our learnings have been that ORC is best attacked through video analytics package that can help you address ORC
very productive partnerships and having the folks on the front hits in real time. ■
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38 RetailSolutionsOnline.com December 2010