QUESTION $1[7$ MARKS$]$

Management Decision Problems

The Futuristic Inc. is a South African clothing store chain. The clothes are sold in their

different geographical stores in the nine provinces and also from their Web shop

$($Online store$).$ Each Tuesday, management needs sales reports from last week's

activities. However, work at the stores is hectic, so at least one store usually fails to

deliver the report, making it impossible to sum up the previous week's sales. The

reports, sent by email as spreadsheets, sometimes have inconclusive or erroneous

data, and following up means that employees cannot give their entire focus to the

customers. Some errors in the spreadsheets may also cause the purchasing manager

to place unnecessary purchase orders.

Required:

$1\mathrm{.}1$Based on the scenario above, discuss the main issues that Futuristic Inc. faces in

the absence of an information system. $(5)$

$1\mathrm{.}2$How could information systems help Futuristic Inc., and what issues did

information systems not able to solve here?$(2)$