# Consumer & Retail

Multi-location retail, fuel and convenience networks, franchise systems, and consumer brands.

In high-volume businesses, small leaks become large losses long before anyone sees them.

Consumer and retail businesses run on thousands of small transactions across many locations, often with cash, franchise partners, and promotions that complicate revenue.

Finance has to see every location clearly, and quickly enough to act. We have rebuilt controls for a high-cash retail network running on very few systems, and we bring the same discipline to leases, revenue, and inventory.

## On the agenda

Cash and controls

### Cash handling at the edge of the network

Where sites handle a lot of cash with few systems, shortages and unexplained differences start to feel normal. The controls that work are designed for the field: counts at fixed times, dual custody, reconciliation of each shift to sales and to meter or point-of-sale data, and exceptions escalated the same day.

Controls that rely on a head-office review weeks later will find losses. They will not prevent them.

Leases

### Store leases under IFRS 16

Revenue-linked rents with minimum guarantees, renewal options, and frequent renegotiation make retail lease portfolios the most error-prone population under IFRS 16 (Ind AS 116). Minimum rents are fixed payments that belong in the lease liability, and store closures and renegotiations are modifications with accounting of their own.

Revenue

### Loyalty points, returns, and franchise fees

Under IFRS 15, loyalty programmes create a separate performance obligation and deferred revenue, and expected returns reduce revenue and create a refund liability. Franchise arrangements separate upfront fees, ongoing royalties, and sales of goods to franchisees, and each follows its own pattern of recognition.

Inventory

### Shrinkage, expiry, and the cost of running out

Losses found by a periodic count are found too late. Perpetual records reconciled at a frequency matched to risk, daily for fuel and high-value lines, catch shrinkage early and prevent stock-outs that cost more than the stock itself.

## How we help

[Finance Function Transformation · Site-level cash and inventory controls, faster closes, and managed finance operations.](https://soniassociates.in/service-finance-transformation)

[Financial Reporting & Technical Accounting · Lease portfolios, loyalty programmes, and franchise revenue under IFRS and Ind AS.](https://soniassociates.in/service-financial-reporting)

[Performance Management & Analytics · Store and channel profitability, and demand forecasts built with machine learning.](https://soniassociates.in/service-analytics)

[Audit, Assurance & Transaction Support · Risk-based internal audit of sites, cash, and inventory.](https://soniassociates.in/service-audit)

## Examples of our work

[All client impact](https://soniassociates.in/case-studies)

Consumer & Retail · Finance Transformation

### [Removing recurring cash shortages across a highway fuel retail network](https://soniassociates.in/case-fuel-retail-finance-transformation)

~99% Reduction in recurring cash shortages by the third iteration

## Featured insights

[All insights](https://soniassociates.in/insights)

Article · The Audit-Ready Company

### [What lease accounting demands after the adoption project ends](https://soniassociates.in/insight-ind-as-116-lessees)

July 8, 2026 · 10 min read

Article · The Audit-Ready Company

### [The month-end close as a design problem](https://soniassociates.in/insight-month-end-close)

June 24, 2026 · 9 min read

Article

### [Before the dashboard: agreeing what the numbers mean](https://soniassociates.in/insight-kpi-definitions)

July 22, 2026 · 9 min read

## Talk to us about consumer and retail

We work with a small number of clients in each sector, which keeps senior attention where it belongs.

[Contact us](https://soniassociates.in/contact) [LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/in-aditya/)

---

Soni Aditya & Associates, Chartered Accountants. Office No 502, Unit 507, 5th Floor, 45 Baner Street, Baner, Pune, Maharashtra 411045, India. aditya@soniassociates.in · +91 93400 75288 · https://soniassociates.in/contact

This website is published for general information, in keeping with the guidelines of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India on members’ websites. It does not advertise or solicit work, and nothing on it is professional advice. Publications reflect the law and standards at the date they were written, so please take advice on your own facts before acting. Client engagements described here are anonymised.

Site index for agents: https://soniassociates.in/llms.txt

Canonical page: https://soniassociates.in/industry-consumer-retail