"Tesco knowingly delayed payments to suppliers", 26 Jan 2016

The Grocery Code Adjudicator, Christine Tacon, said the supermarket seriously breached the industry's code of conduct to protect grocery suppliers.  She found extensive evidence that Tesco had acted unreasonably when delaying payments to suppliers.  Tesco apologised for the practices, saying they had harmed its suppliers...Chief executive Dave Lewis said Tesco had changed substantially: "Over the last year we have worked hard to make Tesco a very different company from the one described in the GCA report."The absolute focus on operating margin had damaging consequences for the business and our relationship with suppliers. This has now been fundamentally changed."Mr Lewis said that material changes were made in January 2015 that addressed the majority of the historic practices referred to in the report: "We have changed the way we work by reorganising, refocusing and retraining our teams and we will continue to work in a way which is consistent with the recommendations."...Ms Tacon has set a four-week deadline for Tesco to say how it plans to implement her recommendations. She will then require regular reports from the company on its progress....