American Retail Inks Pact with Brinks

American Retail Corporation, which operates three Chevron and Arco convenience stores, yesterday signed a long-term agreement with Brink's CompuSafe service, an electronic cash-handling system developed to provide greater convenience and security for retail operations.Brink's CompuSafe service also provides speed and accuracy of cash transactions from the time a customer pays to the time the money is deposited in the bank, and eliminates the manual recounting of cash deposits or safe drops."In the past, we had given serious consideration to CompuSafe service," said Lea Peterson, president of American Retail. "After having experienced a life-threatening hold-up personally, we realized how priceless good security is. Now we enjoy the peace of mind that CompuSafe provides our employees."Another key component of the system is it's easy to use, Peterson said. When store employees insert currency into the CompuSafe unit, it reads and validates the bills, placing them in secure cassettes. Brink's collects the sealed containers and transports them to a Brink's currency room where the deposits are verified and combined with deposits from all four American Retail units. Brink's then deposits the money to the company's bank. "Before installation, we were a little concerned about the ease-of-use, but our employees have found that the CompuSafe unit is very easy to operate and offers great reporting," Peterson said.