Retail compliance: What it is and why it matters
Mention compliance in retail to a room of people and you’ll soon be greeted with wide-eyes, panicked faces, and puzzled looks. Unless our Head of Product Compliance, Prathibha Chandrashekar, is in the room.
With more than 11 years’ experience in fintech, a skilled business analyst, and an expert in fiscal regulations, Prathibha is on a mission to underscore the importance of compliance in retail in a reassuring way, that’s easy to understand and just makes sense.
We caught up with her to find out more about her story, why she loves compliance, and what compliance in retail really means.
First off, what was it that drew you into working in the world of tech?
When you think of tech, the first picture that springs into your head is coders and developers. But tech is a vast arena and there are many other roles and opportunities. I like working in tech as it is constantly changing and offers numerous opportunities to learn and stay current.
I have a technical background and through my career I’ve found I love working in the domain of risk and compliance - and it was compliance that stuck with me, especially as it’s something that’s evolving quickly in the retail space.
When we talk about compliance in retail, what do we mean by it?
Compliance in retail is fairly new compared to say compliance in banking and insurance. It's moving much faster now because technology is advancing much faster. For example, previously there would be a small black box on the counter of the checkout. Each transaction would be written onto that disk to be read by the relevant authorities. Now, among many other things, transactions are recorded and reported in real-time to the authorities.
Compliance in retail refers to an ongoing process of adhering to all relevant laws, regulations and industry standards. It includes things such as what the receipt should look like, how data should be stored from a customer perspective, how to keep it secure, what and how to report and so on.
From a retailers’ perspective, compliance is all about adhering to legal requirements of the market they operate in and ensuring consumer protection. It promotes a culture of ethics and fairness. It could be a business enabler for increasing transparency, building customer trust, improving operational efficiency, facilitating data collection that could be used to track and analyze business progress. Compliance also helps retailers ease into a new market, avoid hefty penalties or work stoppages, or worse store closures.
From a governmental perspective, the main objective of compliance in retail is to minimize the opportunities for retailers to avoid or evade tax and simplify tax procedures to encourage tax compliance.
What does compliance management look like at Sitoo?
With Sitoo POS and Unified Commerce Platform, we focus on ensuring that our product adheres to the compliance framework at all times by facilitating in-store sales compliance, providing secure storage of fiscal information and reporting it in a compliant manner.
I’m responsible for the entire process of compliance management which includes compliance monitoring, ensuring the product is adapted in accordance with the legal requirements and compliance maintenance, making sure we stay compliant with any new legislation or legislation changes, maintaining product certifications, and entering new markets.
When it comes to compliance, context is always key and that’s one of the biggest benefits of having an in-house compliance team like we do at Sitoo. External fiscal experts are good when it comes to compliance matters, but they often fail to understand how it translates to a product and where modern technology is - especially as much of the legislation is based around legacy systems. So, interpreting the statutory requirements for a product built with cutting-edge technology is really challenging and that’s where I come in.
What do you love about working at Sitoo?
Sitoo is in an accelerated stage of growth and it’s really exciting and fun to work for a company at this stage in their journey. It’s very cool technology underpinned by a future thinking mindset and with lots of global expansion happening which, from a compliance perspective, is something I love.
Sitoo is invested in compliance and focused on building an in-house compliance team. Things are done in a very systematic and structured way which is great for compliance where details are utmost important. For example, we use a tool called Vanta for compliance management while most companies just use endless spreadsheets and documents.
It is highly rewarding to work with inspiring and passionate individuals who thrive to challenge, innovate and excel in building the product of tomorrow. Sitoo’s diverse and flexible work culture makes it very refreshing.
My passion for traveling has helped me understand how culture impacts - and connects - everything. This is something I would say is true in all aspects and phases of life so, when you talk about work culture, I believe it’s deep rooted in the culture of the land, and this is why the culture at Sitoo is one that makes me very happy.
Sweden - and Stockholm in particular - is a real hub of innovation in Europe. I’m from Bangalore and I also spent four and half years working in Singapore.
I’ve been working in compliance for over a decade now and I feel like I’m in the right place at the right time now because Europe is the place where compliance and fiscalization in the retail space all began - plus Sweden is a really wonderful place!
What excites you about the future?
Sitoo is expanding quickly and I’m really looking forward to working in new markets.
There’s a lot of things happening in compliance that are also very exciting. What really strikes and impacts me is working in compliance echoes what I believe in as a person. I believe in living a principled and ethical life. That's what matters to me the most and compliance is one such thing where doing the right thing is the standard and I really hope that, in the future, the world would be a better place where doing the right thing is not forced on people but comes naturally to them.
Learn more about security in retail software with CISO Magnus Sparf
