Returns Policy along with Pricing and Poor Management

<p>On behalf of a store, when ABI was a listed company on the JSE, they use to have a good returns policy of taking defective and expired stocks, no questions asked. The proof is still eminent. However, since the take-over's by SAB Miller and now CCBSA, we had some unknowns called "the business" at top management level who always pass the buck over to lower management levels, to implement a policy of no returns or minimal returns, be it even if the product is defective. In this process, I have witnessed consumer's product switching to the competitor, which is not an effective solution in the long run. Aside this, competitors produce stocks which has expiry close to a year and can be proven, Coca-Cola produce stocks which land the store with only an average of 2 months shelf life and at times even less which has also been proven time and again and they hound the customer if he wants to return stock per order. They aware of products arriving where there is no CO2 gas and leaking, not filled to the capacity of the correct quantity and foreign objects floating in the content but yet they refuse to accept returns and in my case, they only want to accept a 72 unit quantity per order (claiming that it comes off their budget but try telling that to a fuming customer who used his hard earning money to buy a product he wants and expects to be of an exceptionally good quality) when my buying capacity is by far well exceed by exponential orders. And then, we have Rakesh Rajbally, Commercial Director, who signs a 50c price increase per can end of this month, like it already is not out priced in comparison to any other pack size and not to forget, how the company has cut costs by making the can structure an inferior quality which is not durable and breaks so easily as another person has written in these reports, all in the name of cost cutting in trying to show good bottom line net profits to the shareholders but to the dissatisfaction of the retailers and end-users. I also had one person from the Quality Control Department who states openly that the customer is not right. This is NOT good corporate governance practices that this company displays.</p>