Ability solution eliminates pilferage at dot-com company

The processing and delivery of items ordered online has been vastly streamlined by dot-com company Tanua, since implementing the Ability - eCommerce Fulfillment solution, in a deal worth over R1 million.

The company is now able to monitor the full shopping and sales cycle associated with its B2B and B2C Web sites, including tracking orders to their final destination.

Tanua is a virtual company with no stockholding. It sells a number of products via its Web sites, StopQ (www.stopq.com) - aimed at the consumer; and The Corporate House (www.thecorporatehouse.com) - targeting SA business, as well as a host of others.

Marc Ackermann, CEO of Tanua, says StopQ.com is a B2C site offering products one would find in retail chain stores, with the exception of food items. StopQ.com also offers an auction facility. R1.5 million worth of vouchers are processed a month - Ackermann says this is equivalent to the total annual sales of other specialist voucher Web sites. StopQ.com also provides value-added services such as various delivery, installation and extended warranty options.

The Corporate House is a B2B site, which offers all the major categories of merchandise purchased by corporates: stationery, office furniture, business machines, alcohol and refreshments, corporate gifts, education, and legal services. It is a corporate one-stop shop, says Ackermann. The site gives customers full control and itemisation of expenditure. They can create customised ordering lists and monthly purchase budgets to ensure staff can only order the products selected and cannot exceed the set limit. If staff wish to order anything outside of those parameters, this first has to be authorised.

"Clients apply online for a Nedbank Procurement Card, giving them an effective 45 days for payment and the benefit of dealing with one account for the entire procurement function."

Prior to the Ability implementation, Tanua`s process was manually performed and extremely slow. "The sheer volume of orders and transactions that were being generated could not be handled. This had to change in light of the business growing, and customisation for our Websites was also required," says Ackermann.

Tanua needed a robust system with a solid back office component that was easy to integrate and would offer bricks and mortar stability. "The Ability products and personalities were the best option we found," says Ackermann.

He adds: "Ability has largely automated the system. It now automatically generates invoices, e-mails the courier, reconciles the back end, and updates the general ledger and cashbook. The accounts department only has to process and supply the invoice."

Ability - eCommerce Fulfillment allows the full shopping and sales process to be monitored, including tracking of the order. The system also allows for the monitoring of the courier/logistics services, as the end user can only be billed once confirmation is received that the product has been delivered. The ability to track parcels has eliminated pilferage and customers receive their orders within 72 hours.

Tanua can now operate as a virtual company backed up by solid internal systems that interface with external structures. It can deliver a 24/7/365 service and also gains from superior financial controls.

Implementation on the StopQ.com side took place over two months towards the end of last year. The Corporate House installation goes live this month.

Part of the Ability and Tanua agreement was a strategic partnership in which Tanua would try out all new e-commerce products and services developed by Ability Solutions.