Retail Reporting Case Study
Controlled Transaction-Level Reporting Package
Download Workbook - retail_reporting_package.xlsx
1. Objective
This reporting package presents retail transaction activity from August 2024 through January 2025 at the transaction line level.
The structure standardizes revenue and rate calculations, reconciles completed-line revenue to executive summaries, and provides visibility into operational status consistency across the transaction lifecycle. All source system values are reported as recorded.
Key monitoring outputs show elevated non-completion volume (~67%), concentrated category revenue (top two categories ≈51%), and stable discount ranges across categories.
2. Dataset Context
Dataset: Simulated retail transactions
Period Covered: 2024-08-03 to 2025-01-30
Volume: 1,000 transaction line items
Structure: 32 fields
Grain: One row represents a single product-level transaction line item
Source dataset: Retail Sales Dataset (Kaggle)
Key reporting fields:
- TransactionStatus (Canceled, Completed, Returned)
- PaymentStatus (Paid, Pending, Refunded)
- ShippingStatus (Delivered, In-transit, Pending)
- SalesChannel
- Region
- Pricing and discount attributes
Status conflict monitoring flagged 399 line items (39.9%) for cross-field inconsistencies across transaction, payment, and shipping statuses. These items were logged and carried forward without modification.
No recoding, hierarchy adjustments, or status overrides were applied.
3. Reporting Definitions & Controls
Definitions were fixed prior to aggregation and applied uniformly across all reporting views.
Revenue
- LineRevenue = FinalSalePrice × SalesQuantity
- NetRevenue includes only completed line items
- Executive summary totals reconcile to completed-line revenue
Rates
- CancelRate = canceled line items ÷ total line items
- ReturnRate = returned line items ÷ total line items
- ReturnRate (Completed Basis) = returned line items ÷ completed line items
Denominators are fixed and labeled consistently across tables.
Status Handling
- Transaction, Payment, and Shipping statuses reported as exported
- No cross-field hierarchy logic imposed
- Cross-field inconsistencies retained and disclosed in diagnostics
4. KPI Definitions
LineRevenue
FinalSalePrice × SalesQuantity
NetRevenue
Σ LineRevenue where TransactionStatus = Completed
CancelRate
Canceled line items ÷ total line items
ReturnRate
Returned line items ÷ total line items
ReturnRate (Completed Basis)
Returned line items ÷ completed line items
5. Reporting Package Structure
The Excel reporting package contains five sheets, presented below in workbook order.
Executive Summary
Monthly Performance
Mix Contribution
Operational Monitoring
Data Quality & Status
6. Key Monitoring Observations
The reporting package shows:
- 67% of line items classified as Canceled or Returned
- NetRevenue reconciles exclusively to completed-line revenue
- Revenue concentration of 25.49% in the top category and 50.72% across the top two categories
- Discount levels ranging from 4.73% to 5.35% across categories
- Channel-level CancelRate ranging from 32.42% to 36.39%
- Channel-level ReturnRate ranging from 43.43% to 47.83%
Status Distribution
| TransactionStatus | LineItemCount | PercentOfTotal |
|---|---|---|
| Completed | 331 | 33.10% |
| Canceled | 342 | 34.20% |
| Returned | 327 | 32.70% |
Revenue by Status
| TransactionStatus | Revenue | RevenuePct |
|---|---|---|
| Completed | $447,902.72 | 32.31% |
| Canceled | $500,860.59 | 36.13% |
| Returned | $437,326.16 | 31.55% |
Values represent gross transaction value prior to NetRevenue filtering.
7. Data Quality & Guardrails
Dataset is simulated and used for reporting structure demonstration. Source values were preserved without modification, and KPI definitions were fixed prior to aggregation.
8. Workbook Access
The complete workbook is available
here.