European legislation has firmly placed reverse logistics on the agenda of all retail organisations. Since August 2004 the EU Directive on waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) has forced retailers to take back returned and end of life cycle products such as computers, mobile phones and televisions and recycle them safely.

There is a great deal of waste in returned goods. We aim to minimise our customers' losses through controlled returns to one or more centres, accurate inventory, inspection and re-packaging, returns agreements with suppliers, and secure disposal. We offer therefore integrated return centre operations which are:

• Stand alone or networked solutions
• Dedicated or shared user
• One stop solution for all return flows
• A centralised point for waste recovery
• Return product inspection, packaging, return or disposal
• Finance

With retail supply chains designed to move products to consumers rather than backwards to manufacturers, reverse logistics is a major challenge that is currently estimated to cost UK retailers at least as much as £500 million per year. Effective management of reverse logistics therefore provides real bottom line benefits, as well as improving customer service levels, supporting environmental strategies and serving as a real competitive differentiator.

Christian Salvesen has a wealth of experience in the reverse logistics market. We were the first logistics provider to develop software that manages customers' returns. Developed over two years, BACTRAC is a custom built system that can deal with returned goods on an item by item basis. For more information on BACTRAC please click on the link to the left.