Following the acquisition of a well-known furniture retail chain outside South Africa, Pepkor Lifestyle needed to integrate the new business's retail operations, accounting processes and loan book into its existing SAP environment. This was a critical step in supporting the group’s broader strategy to consolidate platforms and scale efficiently across the African continent.
The integration spanned multiple work streams and business functions, but the migration of the loan book presented one of the most complex challenges. The new business brought approximately 70,000 active loans. These loans were spread across five countries and just over 66 store locations and needed to be absorbed into Pepkor Lifestyle’s existing book of approximately 220,000 active loans.
The scale and complexity of the migration required precision and deep domain expertise and was not simply a matter of moving data. Each of the five operating territories had specific product configurations and regulatory requirements that had to be reflected in the SAP Loans Management solution.
Bancon worked closely with the Pepkor Lifestyle project team to address these challenges head-on. The existing secured loan product types were extended to new company codes and enhanced where necessary to meet the requirements of the newly acquired business. These five territories included new instalment-based product types, which were set up to support the full spectrum of business processes from activation to settlement and collections. This included extending lending functionality into countries such as Lesotho and Zambia where Pepkor Lifestyle did not provide credit in the past.
Bancon supported multiple migration test cycles throughout the project, with each round of testing uncovering opportunities for data enhancement and improving overall data quality. This iterative approach ensured that the final data load would be both accurate and clean, reducing risk at go-live.
After nearly a year of intense work across business and technical teams, the final approval of the project was received late in 2025 and it went live just before the November/December peak trade period which presented unique challenges in itself, but the migration was completed within the required timelines with limited impact to customers.
“I think what makes this project stand out for the team is just how impactful Pepkor Lifestyle’s brands and capabilities are supported by a strong retail footprint and online presence . Their approach to offering accessible consumer finance has not only been significant within the South African market, but now expands into the rest of the African continent. Knowing we played a part in that brings a huge level of satisfaction.”
Freddie Nel, Senior Functional Lead, Bancon
