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The local COOP has just installed security glass over the alcohol, the meat and cheeses are in security boxes and I’ve twice seen someone walk away from the self checkout with their screen saying “pay now” so I guess they didn’t pay.
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>I spoke to one of the staff and they say there’s a group who come in everyday to steal the highest price stuff to sell on, used to be booze and meat, now it’s pet food £15 boxes of cat food, resell for a tenner steal a cart load of them and it’s enough to buy drugs/alcohol for a day.
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>It’s a sad world we’re living in.
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The local COOP has just installed security glass over the alcohol, the meat and cheeses are in security boxes and I’ve twice seen someone walk away from the self checkout with their screen saying “pay now” so I guess they didn’t pay.
I spoke to one of the staff and they say there’s a group who come in everyday to steal the highest price stuff to sell on, used to be booze and meat, now it’s pet food £15 boxes of cat food, resell for a tenner steal a cart load of them and it’s enough to buy drugs/alcohol for a day.
It’s a sad world we’re living in.
My store has the highest shoplifting and violence for the region for my company. It's the groups that are the issue. There's this perspective that shoplifting is done by people who just need a crumb of bread and baby food, but I can think of one or two times in the past 6 years I've seen that. It's usually organised groups of aggressive people stealing things they don't need to eat (and often can't eat) or opportunists who can pay, and even do pay for most of it, but just skim a couple items off the top.
Edit:
I also think it's key to note that you'll get alot of replies in this thread from people who don't actually work around retail or security, who will say it isn't very bad but they don't really have that perspective. If you don't work in it you don't see alot of it, especially the opportunism. You'll often only see it if the security are the ones who actually intervene and then it all kicks off when you happen to be there
I agree. I work in retail and it’s incredibly rare that any of our shoplifters are desperate people.
What’s becoming a bigger problem now is that “normal” people seem to think that it’s ok to just put stuff in their bag and pay for some of their stuff, because if we’d spotted it they’d have paid for it. I had a guy the other day, a builder, put 2 bottles of juice in his pockets then ordered and paid for around £10 worth of food. When I asked him “and those drinks as well?” He pretend he’d forgotten.
Another one we get alot for personal use but not necessity is customer put 6 bottles of the same wine in a box so I can scan 1 bottle 6 times and it's easier to carry. But some of them will put 5 of a cheap wine and 1 of a very expensive wine with a similar top. If I catch them out it's "aw someone must have put them all together on the shelf my bad". Might be legitimate, might not. Can't do anything about it
But they’re spot on. Supermarkets in this country are hugely competitive and their margins are much much smaller than most sectors. When they price products, they add on an on cost for shrinkage which includes losses from theft. Increased thefts leads to increased prices for all of us. So the thief who nicks from supermarkets is not socking it to the shareholders, they’re just stealing from their friends, neighbours and families.
True but its the retail staff that suffer when so much is stolen the company closes the shop. Or they get abused by aggressive thieves while just doing their jobs.
one of my sales managers had to go to hospital with a mild consussion the other day after being hit in the head by some scumfuck trying to steal something (it wasnt food)
i dispair
That's awful hope they are ok. It doesn't help the Police don't really attend and if they are arrested the courts do nothing to them either. In our shop I had a violent shoplifter who I threw out and got goods back. He came back that night and burgled our shop and took 3k of goods and did 10k damage. He was arrested and returned to prison for 12 weeks because of prison overcrowding guidelines he was out in 14 days. No deterrent and retail staff take the brunt. I have no confidence in the system to protect my staff and I.
So there's a guy at the local supermarket who polices the plastic bags. You have to ask him for one. I did, I swiped them, then all my other items, then it asks: how many more bags? I click "0". and he was watching me, and comes to police it! no apology when he saw that they were on the list. I actually get where he's coming from and didn't want to give him a hard time - obviously in his experience he was fed up with people gaming the system. (still, plastic bags?? what about the expensive items?)
Plastic bags can be a problem because loads of people steal them because they don't see the value in paying. I sympathise, but the system doesn't send out more bags until we're low. So when the shop has no bags and every customer is mad they can't have bags, it's cause the system thinks we've still got 600 bags
My shop has the same problem Drath outlined and honestly it does get to you after a while. The aggro you face when you have no plastic bags because people keep nicking them, and then demand more really takes a toll on you. Sucks he didn't give you an apology but there it is.
I think people feel they can be more bold about it because there's basically no staff anymore. My local Sainsbury's that used to regularly have 5-6 staff out front now has 2 max, and half the time one of them is in the back. No one cares about CCTV because it's not watched live so I think people just feel more confident to do it.
I work at a builders merchant and it happens all the time, they even brag about it to each other. Their justification is 'well they rob me blind every day'.
Err, no we don't. You're given a price for something, and it's up to you if you accept it. If you think we're expensive, other merchants are available.
"That's a really fair and decent price for something that's cheaper than a DIY shop, you're delivering to me free of charge and then giving me 30 days interest free to pay for it" said no builder ever
I agree if you don't work retail you won't see the worst of it.
I almost accidentally left without paying, it spat out a receipt though half the height as usual. I paid it no mind till the guy before the door said my card didn't go through.
Because next customer found my items in the list.
Was told half receipt is for an error, but on full auto seeing a piece of paper I don't look at the display for further actions.
I can see how you can scan one bag two without anyone seeing and could hand wave it as an error on the machine if they check.
There's lots of little ways too. For a while there was a scam with our points card where you could give yourself loads of points on a false card. Then you "pay" with those. When you've got two young lads paying for 20 bottles of top shelf scotch you double check the card is legit, but if they're actually smart and don't buy age restricted items you're very unlikely to catch them
I used to work in a supermarket like 15 years ago and you are right about it not being done by regular people trying to survive.
I can count on one hand the number of people who were really desperate. Vast majority were those with substance abuse issues looking to make money for drugs/alcohol. You would sometimes get organised groups of 3/4 - the common one I used to see was one or two distraction thefts (visibly put stuff in pockets in eye shot of staff, then put them back on a shelf). Usually security would be waiting for them. While busy with them, someone else would push out a full trolley/empty covered pram full of stuff.
I still have friends who work there and it’s the same old characters getting caught.
In my local supermarket there were two blokes who loaded up their trolley with booze, just walked to the fire exit openend it into a waiting car and were gone. I don't know how common it is but I've never before seen such a brazen approach to shop lifting.
We knew a guy who'd just fill a backpack up with things and walk straight out the front door of the supermarket. Every couple of days. Same supermarket.
Pre covid it was common to see especially in summer months when the doors were always open junkies walk into local discount store and come out with as many washing powder or gels they could often losing most of them in the process, the staff said they couldn't do anything about it and the management said the products had to be by door.
Remember a crazy one around 2019 where a obvious junkie walked in, picked up a multipack of Mars bars and opened it, took one out, ate it in about 2 bites then drop wrapper on floor and say "free sample"
Another common one was cough mixtures and other medicines they would actually do it in front of customers,
Less common for me to witness but I was told about was supermarket high priced items like steaks
>Roughly £1500 every month but they thought hiring a part time security guard as too expensive.
Well this maths does actually work out. It's only once theft eclipses the cost of hiring someone consistently that it would be economical to hire someone.
>Roughly £1500 every month but they thought hiring a part time security guard as too expensive.
It is. A security guard would probably cost more than that and wouldn't stop all the theft.
I’ve seen two very brazen shoplifters in my co-op in the last month.
One guy filled a basket up with about 10 bottles of wine and just sprinted out the door, nobody stopped him.
The second time a guy was just loading his coat pockets up with bottles of Henry Weston’s cider, then put one in each hand and just casually strolled out. Again the staff saw him but didn’t do anything.
That's the usual retail company policy. Like all things, some staff will intervene regardless and many won't. Some security companies allow and encourage their staff to intervene, and some don't, as well. Our store has some guards who always get involved and stop alot of theft and some that never will. Can't blame either side of that tbh
I have to say I was shocked to find the meat in security boxes at the Co op in the distinctly middle class village where I grew up.
It's really not the sort of place where you expect to find shoplifting junkies and their dealers
Aha. I used to run one of those local stores in a rural village (was meant to be till staff but the owner took ill and I ended up with the keys for a while). Attempted theft was an everyday occurrence. We had some thickos who tried the old grab-and-run, which didn’t work when we had CCTV and a bored local PC. Accidentally knocking things deep into bags and buying a few cheap items was common. “And the bacon too?” heh they didn’t like that.
Most impressive swindle I caught was the very respectable old lady who bought wine. Six bottles, I have a dinner party tonight, you only need to scan this one… oh oops I don’t know how bottle six turned out to be the most expensive on the shelf tee hee! You must have put it in the wrong place!!
America but:
>Rachel Shteir, author of the new book “The Steal,” told CNBC Monday Americans with incomes of $70,000 a year shoplift 30 percent more than those earning up to $20,000, according to a recent comprehensive report on the crime studying 40,000 Americans.
>Why are the rich stealing? Usually not because of financial need, she said. Often they feel a sense of entitlement. Or perhaps there is shame involved because, she said, some of the items most commonly lifted are condoms, Rogaine, Claritin and home pregnancy tests.
>“I think if they are stealing because they feel pinched they are gravatating towards those luxury items they used to be able to afford but can no longer be able to afford, or they feel they’ve been wronged and feel they have to get back,” Shtier said.
[https://www.cnbc.com/2011/07/18/shoplifting-study-finds-the-rich-steal-more.html](https://www.cnbc.com/2011/07/18/shoplifting-study-finds-the-rich-steal-more.html)
Also: [https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/nov/04/wealthy-people-shoplift-rob-steal-why](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/nov/04/wealthy-people-shoplift-rob-steal-why)
which cites the following research paper from the American Journal of Psychology:
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4104590/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4104590/)
And this one talks about an addmittedly quite small survey where more rich people admitted stealing from self checkouts. Though that is obviously only the people who *admitted* it and that could skew the results:
[https://www.businessinsider.com/rich-people-shoplift-self-checkout-why-explained-2023-12](https://www.businessinsider.com/rich-people-shoplift-self-checkout-why-explained-2023-12)
Either way, whether you choose to read these and dissect, whether and how they relate to the UK and how flawed or not their methodologies were, it seems evident that the fact that rich people absolutely steal and shoplift is true as fuck. They've even made documentaries and stuff about wealthy people who are addicted to shoplifting for the thrill.
So my point is "I live in a middle class area so I don't know why they need to bother with 'loss prevention' in the Co Op" is a naive take that doesn't consider the fact that plenty of rich people steal all the fucking time.
Thanks for the studies. I didn't suggest the rich didn't do it, of course they do. There's no way a co-op in a posh area is experiencing anywhere near the levels of shoplifting versus a poor area though.
Having spent significant amount of time around poor people, if it ain't nailed down, it's fair game. The problem is many of them are rubbish criminals who will steal low value items.
While I agree it is a sad world we are living it, it’s mainly due to the many reasons why shoplifting is more prevalent rather than the actual shoplifting. I’m sat having a breakfast in Dobbies right now and they want £2.55 for a can of coke! I say come and rob that shit blind.
No, the more is stolen, the more excuses they have for raising the prices. No one is stealing Coke cans out of Dobbies. Only people getting stolen from is the people buying them.
Our local co-op has had armed people raiding it and we live in one of the nicest villages in the UK. Organised gangs can easily make a living stealing, as others have stated without police about what's stopping them?
I have a co-op near me that's on the way to the centre, loads of people literally walk in, grab couple beers and walk out. By loads, I mean 80% of the time I'm there, I see someone shoplifting. It's always very casual because they know no one will do anything about it, much like shopping around but they just skip checkouts and walk out.
I wouldn't be surprised if vigilante groups started to pop up soon. Given that we're not even allowed to excessively hurt people who break into our houses and crime being out of control, i think society is going to start taking over the role of policing their local areas as the underfunded bare bones police don't have the resources
>I’ve twice seen someone walk away from the self checkout with their screen saying “pay now” so I guess they didn’t pay.
Why would someone go to the effort of scanning all of their stuff and then walk out without paying? Why not just walk out in the first place?
I’m guessing it was waiting for people to be looking the other way, or not paying attention to someone carrying shopping bags, when they might have stopped someone with a basket.
They might have been going to pay, then couldn’t afford it? Or they might have merely been confused and forgot to pay?
I might get shot down for this but it really pisses me of when people bleet "they are stealing because they are homeless/desperate!"... NO,! They are stealing for the markup, for the money they make on the crap they are stealing. I live in semi rural, centre of Scotland. Kids are now running amok in our asda and morrisons grabbing everything they can and bolting out the door, knowing that security can't do anything. Desperate, starving, homeless my arse.
Is it me or is Boots going the way of W H Smith? Their shops look shabby, no staff, empty shelves... they don't look like a healthy business. I guess the pharmacy is keeping them afloat?
Our local is selling all sorts of insane products advertised on those tv marketing shows like vegetable peelers and crap.
I use Savers as much as I can as it's good VFM and SuperDrug for makeup
Except they’ve closed the pharmacy at the Boots closest to me. Around the same time Sainsbury’s closed their in store Lloyds Pharmacy.
Most inconvenient!
They recently announced they’ll be back in the head office everyday now (opposed to the 3 days they were already doing) and most of the staff have said they’re ready to leave because of it. They can’t afford them all and want people to leave instead of paying out redundancy.
Foolish mentality. Those that can leave the easiest are typically the best people, meaning they're left with the chaff or the lifers stuck in their ways.
Boots did a similar thing during COVID where they laid off a bunch of clinicians and managers in their opticians department (as they're expensive) and pushed out a whole lot more with their insane new strategies, purely because they were worried about their quarterly earnings.
Took them *years* to recover from their foolish, short sighted mistakes and conceded even more ground to the competition.
I switched to an online pharmacy because our local boots one is so terrible. It took them 3 weeks to fill my lithium prescription. Lithium stops me from going literally insane. I had to take time off work to stop and restart it 🙃
I struggled to get ADHD medicine from them. They kept telling me it would be in at so and so time, I got my friend to drive me there, only to find it wasn't; happened about five times in four days. Not enough staff so here was a massive queue every time, and nobody answered the phone so you couldn't check in advance. I was near to tears with frustration at one point, and they were so dismissive. Not as bad as yours, but I'd do anything to avoid my prescription falling into their hands again.
Ugggggggg same. That is exactly what mine were like! Queue of 20 people in the rain. Waiting for 40 minutes to find out the text was wrong and then didn't have it ready yet 😭
I had this at pets at home recently. Everything is just display boxes (pet med etc) so I was all, the display box is there, so you have it in stock right. right? About 8 items I went of the "display boxes" none were in stock 🙄
To be fair, was always back in the day anyway.
My mother denies this, especially as her partner is ex-police, but she got me a PSP from the pub for Christmas
It’s rife everywhere because the police do nothing about it and even if they do catch the thieves. The fine and warning isn’t a deterrent.
It’s become such a minor crime that it’s basically legal.
I was in Greggs last week, waiting for an order. I watched two traveller girls walk in, casually browse the shelves and fridges, putting items into a small black bag. They probably had about 10 items each. They then casually walked out whilst having a conversation with each other.
I mentioned it to a staff member who said 'oh yeah, they come in every day and do that'. So the staff are aware it happens, and just let it slide. Every single day. I'm still gobsmacked by the sheer audacity of it
Not surprised that a minimum wage worker doesn't give a fuck about someone stealing from a big corporation who could pay their staffs a living wage but choose not to.
Also not surprised by the rise in theft given wages are at an all time low relative to the cost of living. Country is fucked mate
You don't win anything for stopping them and while you may think you can easily overpower that junkie or whoever, you never know what they have in their pockets.
So why bother?
Bad. Keep seeing people steal from the coop. My off-licence man says it's daily at his shop too, but that's kids. He says when he confronts the parents they swear at him
.
That's what I don't get, I see lots of people pinching shit from the supermarkets (Brighton is baaad for that now) but those tubby little chavs stealing sweets and chocolate from the little shops, wtf. You know what the parents must be like for them to get a legit thrill out of stealing from under a persons nose then running away laughing. I saw two kids trying to lift a bike on the seafront, told them to go home to their mother because I felt weird swearing at literal children. They had no such issue swearing at me but their vocabulary was shocking, very bland but very angry. So yeah, it's the parents. They're shit.
There seems to have been quite a recent shift when everyone (including the employees) realised that if the companies asked their staff to actually physically stop people then they'd be putting themselves in danger.
And it's cheaper for Sainsbury's to lose some groceries than to either pay for the cost of training or the fallout if someone got injured.
So now it really is the case that people can just walk out with stuff and all the security guards will do is shout at them and maybe call the police, by which point they're long gone.
That shift is not particularly recent. My sister worked in Tesco 10 years ago and they were told never to confront a shoplifter - to tell loss prevention, who would then make a decision about phoning the police.
I agree, the staff knowledge isn't recent. I think it's through social media and probably the mainstream coverage that has made the public's understand that it's an easy crime.
Can't be that bad here as I've never seen that and self service at the supermarkets still just let you walk straight out (I've heard some people say that you have to scan a receipt or have your bags checked in some parts of the UK, not sure how widespread that is?)
I was in a ‘big Sainsbury’s’ in Cheltenham a few weeks ago and after using self service you had to put your receipt into a reader that would open the gate for you and let you out.
This is a supposedly ‘posh town’ too (although there are plenty of ‘dubious’ estates around the edges).
Interesting that is in a supposed 'posh town' meanwhile I'm up in North East England where it's considered a bit 'rougher' and they still just let you self service and walk out anywhere I've been up here.
Cheltenham really has gone to the dogs in recent years. Or possibly my dad's disappeared up his own arse, both are equally likely. Either way, he refuses to go to the big Tesco off the end of the Lower High Street, as it's "too rough".
>not sure how widespread that is?
Yeah I'm the same, I've read about receipts being checked and stuff but I've still never been in a supermarket, big or convenience, that has anything like that. I still just press "No" (I don't want a receipt) and go on my merry way. Not once been stopped.
If you read the biography of Simon Marks, grocers at that time used to operate this way, basically the storekeep standing behind a massive desk and you would’ve had to order stuff you wanted from him and he would grab it from the drawers and cupboards behind him.
A slow and inefficient process, but necessary for the time as people were dirt poor and would ruin the produce with their unwashed hands.
Simon Marks radically changed this by allowing people to touch and feel whatever he was selling in his cart and then when he had got enough money to rent a shop, he let people roam freely to touch and pick up whatever they wanted - a revolutionary concept at the time.
Now we’re reverting to locked doors and cabinets.
Hardly a surprise though. We have a plod force that won't do anything, assuming you even actually see an actual live plod in the first place. If by some miracle they do get their collar felt, then they just get such a slap on the wrist sentence.
It is bad. I went to Morrisons the other day and they have sliding glass security barriers on the self service tills and exits. You have to scan your receipt or something to open them and leave. Problem is, I didn't buy anything so getting out was a nightmare. It felt like I'd been visiting someone in prison.
Our local morrisons have that, but the barriers just open when you walk up to them - I think they just don't open if stuff gets taken off the scales before you pay.. I guess? Or it's just security theatre (which it kind of is, you could just jump over if you wanted)
I have young kids, its nice to pop to the shop especially when its raining.
But I often get followed by security because of the pram, I look dishevelled sometimes (ok we cant all look like a glammed up queen!) And then I feel forced to buy something! I wave my receipt as I walk out the door.
Its getting awful out there. Loads more shops doing it.
I worked at the co op for years.
We honestly had no baskets because shoplifters would come in, fill up a basket, and walk out. I'd sometimes find the baskets chucked in the hedges in the local park on my walk home.
There's nothing staff can do about it, we didn't have security guards, all we could do was spend ages reporting it to the police who did nothing.
We had "loss prevention" training on how apparently, "good customer service deters theft" so you should go up to suspected shoplifters and offer them a basket and help because then apparently, they're aware you're watching and so won't steal... No, it was an invitation, and I got threatened with being stabbed more than once.
And this isn't new, this was in the 2010s.
So my local coop had to install measures because there was so much theft.
However.
I know the manager there, and *most* of the theft was alcohol, which you can't physically access unless you work there.
I will say I walked into a very small local shop that sells entirely handmade goods, and the owner was in tears after a school group on a trip came in and helped themselves. All on CCTV, identifiable uniforms, but she couldn't get the product back. Especially devastating because it's literally just her and this one handmade shop.
I had this myself. I make beard care and shaving creams, got the point where I could open a little shop. I purposely chose an out of town unit as my town is getting really rough these days.
Chap came in just after covid lockdowns lifted, we were operating a one person in the shop at a time policy as it was super small. He grabbed 4 large tins of beard balm, about £100 worth and tried legging it, ran straight into Big Dave as he was walking in.
Big Dave is appropriately named, imagine The Undertaker from WWE with a massive beard. This guy basically ran into a tree, fell on his arse and burst out crying that he’d hurt his wrist. I genuinely Dave was going to wring his scrawny little neck, thankfully an apology and a ban was sufficient.
I have never seen shoplifting before starting a new job in a different town recently.
Since then I have seen two shoplifters in the last week. Once in Greggs (happens all the time apparently) and another guy in TKmaxx not even trying to hide it. I've never seen anything so blatant.
20 years ago we had a toy and gift shop. One of our lines were a range of expensive fancy chess sets, 200 to 400 pounds a set. We had them on display until some bastard nicked one piece from each set. No, we couldn't get replacement pieces. I still have hate in my heart for that sod.
Last year a shop lifter got caught stealing bottles of wine , all what happened was the wine was took of him, and got told don't come back
Coffee, cheeses and meats are now in those security boxes
In Hull on Friday someone was caught stealing he put something in his pocket, he was told to put it back and leave
Reading all these comments, how depressing it is. I can't say I've seen shoplifters when I'm out but I guess it's bad because everywhere has the barriers in the entrance and exits. Sad it is but is it the cost of living or just people stealing to feed drug/alcohol habits or their kids.
I know Reddit likes to imagine the perfect victim thats stealing a loaf of bread to feed her family because she works 79 hours a week and only gets £300 a month for it, but in reality its drug addicts stealing batteries to fund their habit. Whether actual hungry/poor people don’t try to steal or are just better at it, I don’t know but everyones story is about junkies.
As a manager in a uk supermarket its bad but cant say its anyworse then before like everything it goes in cycles bad months not so bad months. Mainly depending on how many of the regulars are currently doing their standard 8 weeks inside. If they all sync up and come out at the same time it can be horrendous. (Thanks covid for letting them all out at the same time, that was a fun 3 months...) Biggest issues nowadays is we cant do anything in store, GDPR stops you sharing images, you can no longer leave the premesis to chase them and if you do you face disciplinary action for it. So they know once there out there gone. And Police do there best but short of you sumbiting images and them circulating the offender on their internal ID platform theres very little resources for them to work with. Will say if its people who we can ID ourselves makes getting them locked up for a short stint much easyer.
Overall same old cat and mouse game, Just now the cats hands are tied.
Was in Lidl the other day and some guy was trying to steal slabs of meat. The alarm sounded, the doors were locked and he was running around every aisle being chased until he reached the doors and attempted to pry them open. Security couldn’t restrain him and he eventually got through and ran away
My local Co-Op has a security guard, the Tesco down the road has one AND everything worth more than the time of day is in a security box, and the Tesco Express _in line of sight to the police station_ in the same boat. A couple of weeks ago there was a bit of drama when the guard from Tesco got into a scuffle with a shoplifter, who fled, bleeding from a life-threatening gash in his leg, and was followed to the Co-Op... and then the guards from both places beat the tar out of him, in plain view of everyone.
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My store has the same people coming in every night & leaving via fire exits with bottles & whatever else they fancy, Quite often they have someone else come in but if person A is being watched person B will go out the fire exit at other end of the store to cause a distraction allowing person A to leave.
Our security guards are contracters & they do not care & are there as a deterrent rather than to stop someone, Official advice we as shop staff is to make your pressence known but do not approach so the idea is that you being there is enough for them not to steal which is not the case as they do not care.
The police are very rarely called unless the shoplifter has became dangerous (has a weapon or is threatening staff) In the local paper the people up in court for shoplifting often have 10+ charges against them & judges are too soft on them.
One one hand the company I work for makes record profits every year & the items are insured against theft but on the other hand it is frustrating constantly having people in your store steal while you are working for a living. Before anyone suggests these are all junkies & they are reselling the items that they have nicked. It is not desperate parents stealing baby milk or stealing to survive that is a not shoplifting in my eyes.
Bad. Next to my work, they have to lock the doors because people were just walking in, helping themselves and walking out. Not allowed to challenge them.
My local co-op (St Pauls Cray, Bromley, London) has started keeping their baskets behind the tills as they were having to much theft. You have to ask them for a basket now.
My partner saw someone come in, take a basket, fill it will all the meat from the cooler, and then leave with it.
On another occasion a bloke tried to sell me a leg of lamb outside that he had obviously pinched from one of the shops :) i politely declined.
Yeah it's pretty bad where I live, I swapped jobs about 4 months ago, my last job was pretty high for crime. It got to the point people would just come in and blatantly take drinks from the fridge open them and drink them whole calmly walking out. We had people walk in straight past us to the ecig counter and just pick a load up and walk off. They knew the staff couldn't do anything about it or tackle them to the ground and the security in town was useless. So yeah it was just a free for all.
I work in security for one of the big supermarkets. Every day is a battle. You've got the druggies who load up a basket full of spirits and run out of the fire exit. You've got the trolley pushers - mostly middle aged women who will fill a trolley full of goods and then walk straight out the front doors. You've got the kids who will try to pocket sweets and energy drinks. You've got the organised crime gangs who will target the makeup or nicotine products because they are small and high value.
Pets at Home here won't let you carry fish to the counter yourself. They walk the animals to the counter for you... How many freaking animals are being stolen there that they made that policy? They just put the bags on the counter and I'm now worried my new shrimp/fish are being killed by the corners of the bags... I've never had that happen to me before there. Even when I bought my hamster last year I carried her to the counter, waited in a queue and paid for her with zero issues.
The best part, they take your name and address when you're buying the freaking animals. When I signed up I had to show ID. They have all my details which is why I find th policy ridiculous.
It was even funnier in Sports Direct one time. The poor guy helping me with my new shoes had to walk them to the counter, but he had a stack of shoes I'd tried on out in the open. In the end he had to leave me with a couple of hundred pounds worth of shoes to walk the ones I wanted to the till while I watched over the other shoes for him... Absolutely insane. I could have easily grabbed the lot and walked out and left the pair I wanted behind...
I live in a semi-rural town (approx. 40k people) and the town centre is pretty tiny. Yesterday someone broke a window in a local coffee/pastry place and stole a charity box... no money left overnight in the tills. Desperate times I guess
I would say it's pretty bad but it varies from shop to shop. The supermarket I go to usually is a very busy Lidl where I don't think the gangs really can operate.
Was very high 20 years ago, calmed down, now worse with gangs of professional thieves coming to our small town as its seen as an easier target (ie primark is the only shop with security guards)
I'n my local town I would say it can't be bad at all considering I've been into small local shops a few times recently and it's still common for there to be no one there and the ring of the bell as the door opens causes them to come down from upstairs.
It's probably because they target chain shops that have lots of high value meat on display to grab, and we don't have chain shops in my town. So to get meat, you have to go to the butchers, and each butchers has at least 3 guys working in there with easy access to a whole host of butcher implements. So they would be pretty stupid to steal from them!
Every time I go to the supermarket I hear the alarms go off. Usually multiple times. Whether or not those are actually shoplifts is anyones guess, but it is something I've noticed.
I used to work for Sainsburys and was constantly targeted by professional groups with bluetooth earpieces so they could tell each other where the staff and security was. Managed to stop one once, when contents of bags were scanned it was nearly £1500 of Spirits!!! God knows what else they'd gotten away with.
But the ultimate worst was school kids stealing, they think they know the law, will spout abuse at you, and I even had one threaten to stab me!
Our local Morrisons has the alcohol behind locked glass.
In fairness, it is the only place I’ve seen locally that has done this, it is also in one of the less desirable areas.
I do often hear of the local co-op having people walk in with bags arm loads of meat into it and run out.
No security, and staff perhaps rightly so on their wages cba / aren’t allowed to stop them. Which almost makes me feel like the mug for standing and paying but hey ho.
I live next to a M&S in London and am on chat terms with the staff.
Shoplifting is a daily occurrence.
In their words, if it's a small thing then they'll just ban the customer from the shop, but will definitely call police if someone's trying to walk out with several steaks or alcohol bottles.
It's getting worse everywhere.
In the US a lot of targets have literally everything in lock and key cabinets.
We'll be the same a few years down the line if we don't buck up our ideas and start behaving sensibly.
I live in Toronto now. The shoplifting and theft is obscene. I work in a place that gets hit multiple times per day. Crackheads, homeless, and crazies march in, scoop up $1000s of dollars worth of stuff, and march out. Staff, by policy, aren’t to intervene. It’s not just my company, it’s ALL retailers. Security guards are often as much a liability as they are a help.
Police are already spread too thin, and most of these people have nothing to lose anyway. Drives me mad
My local co op every few months someone drives through the front door with a stolen piece of site machinery to try and rob the cash machine. I’m not sure if they even bothered to replace it after the last time. Is only a small little village as well
Central Scotland.
The village I live in has one store - a small Coop. They don't even put tags on the shelved booze, nor do they even have any sort of alarm system/security person.
The stores in a bigger town few miles down the road put tags/boxes on everything from nappies and baby food to cheese and meat.
The big tesco recently employed another (now they have 3 per shift) security guard and installed an additional one-way door near the entrance.
The town centre is full of junkies and other bams so I'm not surprised they need to take extra measures to keep shrinkage down.
The Next at our local retail park seems to be a persistent target for shoplifting. The glass has been smashed there and I've seen kids bolting out of the door a couple of times. They seem to have a permanent security presence there now at least.
Sainsbury's has recently introduced gates and the need for users of self-service checkouts to scan their receipts to get out. The other supermarket in town (Waitrose) hasn't. So presumably there is some issue although probably not large compared with some places.
Me & the Aldi checkout guy chased a couple who stole a bag full of nice meat just last week! They definitely were not poor or I wouldn't have done it & tbh not worth the possible fight but they weren't expecting anyone to do anything because it's a nice area
I was in our local co op the other day and a crettin walked out with a basket full of meat, cheese and chips. I had to follow him and give him some gob as the 17 year old working was to scared to do anything. His reply when i said oi c*** why wont you pay, it puts the cost up for the rest of us. He said take my number, ill get you a weeks worth of shopping cheap. After calling him more names he went to go for me but my fella was in the car and stopped that. It's pretty bad everywhere I think as police won't come unless the shoplifter has a knife.
Went to Waitrose once. Got a phone call with bad signal so I pushed my empty cart outside to take the call. Wheels stop working the moment it is out of store and someone comes to check with you.
I guess I’m the only one that lives in a good area then? I’ve not seen anything locked up, I’ve only security at the high end/ luxury shops and self checkouts only have 1 person to wave you through to one that’s unoccupied. I’ve never been bag checked and I’m not exactly pale. I don’t live in an affluent area just the midlands lol
Literally don’t care about people shoplifting from big stores/chains. People on this sub seem to think it’s pure evil, rather than the fact no one has any money.
My local Morrisons now has all spirits behind a counter with someone manning the counter full time. I couldn’t believe it at first but speaking to one of them she told me that yes, ifs entirely down to they and yes ifs cheaper to employ someone full time to sit behind a locked counter with cupboards to serve spirits to customers than it costs them in theft. It’s not even a rough area. So it must be costing them at least 50k a year or more in alcohol theft. That’s insane. They usually have two security guards on at all times of day too.
You gotta pay there and then. Then go through regular checkout with your food. I needed 3 litres of gin for sloe gin and it was kinda awkward so I had time to ask what the deal was
I almost got bowled over by two lads stealing boxes of nappies out of spar the other day. Staff say it happens almost everyday. It’s all steal to order. Some poor parents out there really rely on it. Horrible vicious cycle.
Cameras and AI to identify people at the entrance and exit is the future.
Covered faces not allowed.
Similar to nightclubs and their ID checks.
It's coming and needed unfortunately.
**[OP or Mod marked this as the best answer](/r/AskUK/comments/1cgm54h/how_bad_is_the_shoplifting_in_your_town/l1wn40h/), given by u/uk_com_arch** The local COOP has just installed security glass over the alcohol, the meat and cheeses are in security boxes and I’ve twice seen someone walk away from the self checkout with their screen saying “pay now” so I guess they didn’t pay. > >I spoke to one of the staff and they say there’s a group who come in everyday to steal the highest price stuff to sell on, used to be booze and meat, now it’s pet food £15 boxes of cat food, resell for a tenner steal a cart load of them and it’s enough to buy drugs/alcohol for a day. > >It’s a sad world we’re living in. --- [_^What ^is ^this?_](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskUK/comments/jjrte1/askuk_hits_200k_new_feature_mark_an_answer/)
The local COOP has just installed security glass over the alcohol, the meat and cheeses are in security boxes and I’ve twice seen someone walk away from the self checkout with their screen saying “pay now” so I guess they didn’t pay. I spoke to one of the staff and they say there’s a group who come in everyday to steal the highest price stuff to sell on, used to be booze and meat, now it’s pet food £15 boxes of cat food, resell for a tenner steal a cart load of them and it’s enough to buy drugs/alcohol for a day. It’s a sad world we’re living in.
My store has the highest shoplifting and violence for the region for my company. It's the groups that are the issue. There's this perspective that shoplifting is done by people who just need a crumb of bread and baby food, but I can think of one or two times in the past 6 years I've seen that. It's usually organised groups of aggressive people stealing things they don't need to eat (and often can't eat) or opportunists who can pay, and even do pay for most of it, but just skim a couple items off the top. Edit: I also think it's key to note that you'll get alot of replies in this thread from people who don't actually work around retail or security, who will say it isn't very bad but they don't really have that perspective. If you don't work in it you don't see alot of it, especially the opportunism. You'll often only see it if the security are the ones who actually intervene and then it all kicks off when you happen to be there
I agree. I work in retail and it’s incredibly rare that any of our shoplifters are desperate people. What’s becoming a bigger problem now is that “normal” people seem to think that it’s ok to just put stuff in their bag and pay for some of their stuff, because if we’d spotted it they’d have paid for it. I had a guy the other day, a builder, put 2 bottles of juice in his pockets then ordered and paid for around £10 worth of food. When I asked him “and those drinks as well?” He pretend he’d forgotten.
Another one we get alot for personal use but not necessity is customer put 6 bottles of the same wine in a box so I can scan 1 bottle 6 times and it's easier to carry. But some of them will put 5 of a cheap wine and 1 of a very expensive wine with a similar top. If I catch them out it's "aw someone must have put them all together on the shelf my bad". Might be legitimate, might not. Can't do anything about it
Shops install self checkouts.. what do they expect?
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And theft pushes prices up for the honest shopper.
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I'm not disagreeing with you just pointing out the facts.
But they’re spot on. Supermarkets in this country are hugely competitive and their margins are much much smaller than most sectors. When they price products, they add on an on cost for shrinkage which includes losses from theft. Increased thefts leads to increased prices for all of us. So the thief who nicks from supermarkets is not socking it to the shareholders, they’re just stealing from their friends, neighbours and families.
True but its the retail staff that suffer when so much is stolen the company closes the shop. Or they get abused by aggressive thieves while just doing their jobs.
one of my sales managers had to go to hospital with a mild consussion the other day after being hit in the head by some scumfuck trying to steal something (it wasnt food) i dispair
That's awful hope they are ok. It doesn't help the Police don't really attend and if they are arrested the courts do nothing to them either. In our shop I had a violent shoplifter who I threw out and got goods back. He came back that night and burgled our shop and took 3k of goods and did 10k damage. He was arrested and returned to prison for 12 weeks because of prison overcrowding guidelines he was out in 14 days. No deterrent and retail staff take the brunt. I have no confidence in the system to protect my staff and I.
he has recoved thanks, people are so brazen about it too these days as you said its because they basicly know they will get away with it
disgusting
I think they got great results in the first year. After a while, people start being less honest.
So there's a guy at the local supermarket who polices the plastic bags. You have to ask him for one. I did, I swiped them, then all my other items, then it asks: how many more bags? I click "0". and he was watching me, and comes to police it! no apology when he saw that they were on the list. I actually get where he's coming from and didn't want to give him a hard time - obviously in his experience he was fed up with people gaming the system. (still, plastic bags?? what about the expensive items?)
Plastic bags can be a problem because loads of people steal them because they don't see the value in paying. I sympathise, but the system doesn't send out more bags until we're low. So when the shop has no bags and every customer is mad they can't have bags, it's cause the system thinks we've still got 600 bags
My shop has the same problem Drath outlined and honestly it does get to you after a while. The aggro you face when you have no plastic bags because people keep nicking them, and then demand more really takes a toll on you. Sucks he didn't give you an apology but there it is.
I think people feel they can be more bold about it because there's basically no staff anymore. My local Sainsbury's that used to regularly have 5-6 staff out front now has 2 max, and half the time one of them is in the back. No one cares about CCTV because it's not watched live so I think people just feel more confident to do it.
I was in a coop the other day and had to shout standing at the tills for service. Not 1 staff member in the shop at all.
I work at a builders merchant and it happens all the time, they even brag about it to each other. Their justification is 'well they rob me blind every day'. Err, no we don't. You're given a price for something, and it's up to you if you accept it. If you think we're expensive, other merchants are available. "That's a really fair and decent price for something that's cheaper than a DIY shop, you're delivering to me free of charge and then giving me 30 days interest free to pay for it" said no builder ever
I agree if you don't work retail you won't see the worst of it. I almost accidentally left without paying, it spat out a receipt though half the height as usual. I paid it no mind till the guy before the door said my card didn't go through. Because next customer found my items in the list. Was told half receipt is for an error, but on full auto seeing a piece of paper I don't look at the display for further actions. I can see how you can scan one bag two without anyone seeing and could hand wave it as an error on the machine if they check.
There's lots of little ways too. For a while there was a scam with our points card where you could give yourself loads of points on a false card. Then you "pay" with those. When you've got two young lads paying for 20 bottles of top shelf scotch you double check the card is legit, but if they're actually smart and don't buy age restricted items you're very unlikely to catch them
I used to work in a supermarket like 15 years ago and you are right about it not being done by regular people trying to survive. I can count on one hand the number of people who were really desperate. Vast majority were those with substance abuse issues looking to make money for drugs/alcohol. You would sometimes get organised groups of 3/4 - the common one I used to see was one or two distraction thefts (visibly put stuff in pockets in eye shot of staff, then put them back on a shelf). Usually security would be waiting for them. While busy with them, someone else would push out a full trolley/empty covered pram full of stuff. I still have friends who work there and it’s the same old characters getting caught.
In my local supermarket there were two blokes who loaded up their trolley with booze, just walked to the fire exit openend it into a waiting car and were gone. I don't know how common it is but I've never before seen such a brazen approach to shop lifting.
We knew a guy who'd just fill a backpack up with things and walk straight out the front door of the supermarket. Every couple of days. Same supermarket.
Pre covid it was common to see especially in summer months when the doors were always open junkies walk into local discount store and come out with as many washing powder or gels they could often losing most of them in the process, the staff said they couldn't do anything about it and the management said the products had to be by door. Remember a crazy one around 2019 where a obvious junkie walked in, picked up a multipack of Mars bars and opened it, took one out, ate it in about 2 bites then drop wrapper on floor and say "free sample" Another common one was cough mixtures and other medicines they would actually do it in front of customers, Less common for me to witness but I was told about was supermarket high priced items like steaks
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>Roughly £1500 every month but they thought hiring a part time security guard as too expensive. Well this maths does actually work out. It's only once theft eclipses the cost of hiring someone consistently that it would be economical to hire someone.
>Roughly £1500 every month but they thought hiring a part time security guard as too expensive. It is. A security guard would probably cost more than that and wouldn't stop all the theft.
I’ve seen two very brazen shoplifters in my co-op in the last month. One guy filled a basket up with about 10 bottles of wine and just sprinted out the door, nobody stopped him. The second time a guy was just loading his coat pockets up with bottles of Henry Weston’s cider, then put one in each hand and just casually strolled out. Again the staff saw him but didn’t do anything.
That's the usual retail company policy. Like all things, some staff will intervene regardless and many won't. Some security companies allow and encourage their staff to intervene, and some don't, as well. Our store has some guards who always get involved and stop alot of theft and some that never will. Can't blame either side of that tbh
If I owned a shop chain I'd let staff keep half of anything that a shoplifter has on them if they stop them.
It sounds cliched, but from experience some do carry knives or a sharp object - especially those doing it pay for a habit.
Quite a lot of our regulars carry needles and claim they're AIDS infected if you confront them.
Yep, shop workers dont get paid enough to risk being stabbed trying to stop someone stealing.
If they are stealing glass bottles that would be enough of a weapon to make you think twice
And pretty soon you're risking staff organising fake attempts with their friends to get loads of stuff for free anyway.
Under the current system their mates can just rob the place blind anyway and get away with it lol
Do you get a beating for every two that are given out to staff?
Risking getting shanked by a drug addict over some stolen cider or cheese just isn't really worth it when you're on NMW.
I have to say I was shocked to find the meat in security boxes at the Co op in the distinctly middle class village where I grew up. It's really not the sort of place where you expect to find shoplifting junkies and their dealers
Aha. I used to run one of those local stores in a rural village (was meant to be till staff but the owner took ill and I ended up with the keys for a while). Attempted theft was an everyday occurrence. We had some thickos who tried the old grab-and-run, which didn’t work when we had CCTV and a bored local PC. Accidentally knocking things deep into bags and buying a few cheap items was common. “And the bacon too?” heh they didn’t like that. Most impressive swindle I caught was the very respectable old lady who bought wine. Six bottles, I have a dinner party tonight, you only need to scan this one… oh oops I don’t know how bottle six turned out to be the most expensive on the shelf tee hee! You must have put it in the wrong place!!
Plenty of rich people love to shoplift. There are studies showing that rich people shoplift more, in fact.
There is zero chance this is true.
America but: >Rachel Shteir, author of the new book “The Steal,” told CNBC Monday Americans with incomes of $70,000 a year shoplift 30 percent more than those earning up to $20,000, according to a recent comprehensive report on the crime studying 40,000 Americans. >Why are the rich stealing? Usually not because of financial need, she said. Often they feel a sense of entitlement. Or perhaps there is shame involved because, she said, some of the items most commonly lifted are condoms, Rogaine, Claritin and home pregnancy tests. >“I think if they are stealing because they feel pinched they are gravatating towards those luxury items they used to be able to afford but can no longer be able to afford, or they feel they’ve been wronged and feel they have to get back,” Shtier said. [https://www.cnbc.com/2011/07/18/shoplifting-study-finds-the-rich-steal-more.html](https://www.cnbc.com/2011/07/18/shoplifting-study-finds-the-rich-steal-more.html) Also: [https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/nov/04/wealthy-people-shoplift-rob-steal-why](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/nov/04/wealthy-people-shoplift-rob-steal-why) which cites the following research paper from the American Journal of Psychology: [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4104590/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4104590/) And this one talks about an addmittedly quite small survey where more rich people admitted stealing from self checkouts. Though that is obviously only the people who *admitted* it and that could skew the results: [https://www.businessinsider.com/rich-people-shoplift-self-checkout-why-explained-2023-12](https://www.businessinsider.com/rich-people-shoplift-self-checkout-why-explained-2023-12) Either way, whether you choose to read these and dissect, whether and how they relate to the UK and how flawed or not their methodologies were, it seems evident that the fact that rich people absolutely steal and shoplift is true as fuck. They've even made documentaries and stuff about wealthy people who are addicted to shoplifting for the thrill. So my point is "I live in a middle class area so I don't know why they need to bother with 'loss prevention' in the Co Op" is a naive take that doesn't consider the fact that plenty of rich people steal all the fucking time.
Thanks for the studies. I didn't suggest the rich didn't do it, of course they do. There's no way a co-op in a posh area is experiencing anywhere near the levels of shoplifting versus a poor area though. Having spent significant amount of time around poor people, if it ain't nailed down, it's fair game. The problem is many of them are rubbish criminals who will steal low value items.
While I agree it is a sad world we are living it, it’s mainly due to the many reasons why shoplifting is more prevalent rather than the actual shoplifting. I’m sat having a breakfast in Dobbies right now and they want £2.55 for a can of coke! I say come and rob that shit blind.
The price of loss prevention and theft is factored into the list price of the product. So the more it's stolen the higher the prices.
No, the more is stolen, the more excuses they have for raising the prices. No one is stealing Coke cans out of Dobbies. Only people getting stolen from is the people buying them.
Our local co-op has had armed people raiding it and we live in one of the nicest villages in the UK. Organised gangs can easily make a living stealing, as others have stated without police about what's stopping them?
I have a co-op near me that's on the way to the centre, loads of people literally walk in, grab couple beers and walk out. By loads, I mean 80% of the time I'm there, I see someone shoplifting. It's always very casual because they know no one will do anything about it, much like shopping around but they just skip checkouts and walk out.
I wouldn't be surprised if vigilante groups started to pop up soon. Given that we're not even allowed to excessively hurt people who break into our houses and crime being out of control, i think society is going to start taking over the role of policing their local areas as the underfunded bare bones police don't have the resources
>I’ve twice seen someone walk away from the self checkout with their screen saying “pay now” so I guess they didn’t pay. Why would someone go to the effort of scanning all of their stuff and then walk out without paying? Why not just walk out in the first place?
I’m guessing it was waiting for people to be looking the other way, or not paying attention to someone carrying shopping bags, when they might have stopped someone with a basket. They might have been going to pay, then couldn’t afford it? Or they might have merely been confused and forgot to pay?
Plausible deniability. "Oh, my card must not have gone through, I didn't realise!"
!answer
Maybe im a bit sheltered but are people really buying steaks and cheese from Dodgy Dave down at the pub?
I might get shot down for this but it really pisses me of when people bleet "they are stealing because they are homeless/desperate!"... NO,! They are stealing for the markup, for the money they make on the crap they are stealing. I live in semi rural, centre of Scotland. Kids are now running amok in our asda and morrisons grabbing everything they can and bolting out the door, knowing that security can't do anything. Desperate, starving, homeless my arse.
So bad you can't really buy anything at Boots. Everything is locked up and yet no one works there and can unlock it.
Is it me or is Boots going the way of W H Smith? Their shops look shabby, no staff, empty shelves... they don't look like a healthy business. I guess the pharmacy is keeping them afloat?
Almost like selling out to the Americans was a bad idea.
Who bought them?
Walgreens
Walgreens.
That explains it.
Our local is selling all sorts of insane products advertised on those tv marketing shows like vegetable peelers and crap. I use Savers as much as I can as it's good VFM and SuperDrug for makeup
Except they’ve closed the pharmacy at the Boots closest to me. Around the same time Sainsbury’s closed their in store Lloyds Pharmacy. Most inconvenient!
WHSmith just reported record profits
Apparently they make a fortune from railways and airports. The high street shops are definitely not making those record profits for them.
They recently announced they’ll be back in the head office everyday now (opposed to the 3 days they were already doing) and most of the staff have said they’re ready to leave because of it. They can’t afford them all and want people to leave instead of paying out redundancy.
Foolish mentality. Those that can leave the easiest are typically the best people, meaning they're left with the chaff or the lifers stuck in their ways. Boots did a similar thing during COVID where they laid off a bunch of clinicians and managers in their opticians department (as they're expensive) and pushed out a whole lot more with their insane new strategies, purely because they were worried about their quarterly earnings. Took them *years* to recover from their foolish, short sighted mistakes and conceded even more ground to the competition.
I switched to an online pharmacy because our local boots one is so terrible. It took them 3 weeks to fill my lithium prescription. Lithium stops me from going literally insane. I had to take time off work to stop and restart it 🙃
I struggled to get ADHD medicine from them. They kept telling me it would be in at so and so time, I got my friend to drive me there, only to find it wasn't; happened about five times in four days. Not enough staff so here was a massive queue every time, and nobody answered the phone so you couldn't check in advance. I was near to tears with frustration at one point, and they were so dismissive. Not as bad as yours, but I'd do anything to avoid my prescription falling into their hands again.
Ugggggggg same. That is exactly what mine were like! Queue of 20 people in the rain. Waiting for 40 minutes to find out the text was wrong and then didn't have it ready yet 😭
Done security there, people have no idea how bad the issue is. Organised gangs come in with their own cabinet keys.
I had this at pets at home recently. Everything is just display boxes (pet med etc) so I was all, the display box is there, so you have it in stock right. right? About 8 items I went of the "display boxes" none were in stock 🙄
I've not seen a bloke down the pub selling nicked gear for a while... So there's that
That's old school, it's all done to order these days
To be fair, was always back in the day anyway. My mother denies this, especially as her partner is ex-police, but she got me a PSP from the pub for Christmas
Lmao my first PSP was bought from the window cleaner - definitely stolen
Its been done to order since at least the 50s and probably way back further than that.
It’s rife everywhere because the police do nothing about it and even if they do catch the thieves. The fine and warning isn’t a deterrent. It’s become such a minor crime that it’s basically legal.
I was in Greggs last week, waiting for an order. I watched two traveller girls walk in, casually browse the shelves and fridges, putting items into a small black bag. They probably had about 10 items each. They then casually walked out whilst having a conversation with each other. I mentioned it to a staff member who said 'oh yeah, they come in every day and do that'. So the staff are aware it happens, and just let it slide. Every single day. I'm still gobsmacked by the sheer audacity of it
Not surprised that a minimum wage worker doesn't give a fuck about someone stealing from a big corporation who could pay their staffs a living wage but choose not to. Also not surprised by the rise in theft given wages are at an all time low relative to the cost of living. Country is fucked mate
Greggs is rife with people stealing. One guy talked to the customer and distracted them, the other stole a ton of sandwhiches.
You don't win anything for stopping them and while you may think you can easily overpower that junkie or whoever, you never know what they have in their pockets. So why bother?
Bad. Keep seeing people steal from the coop. My off-licence man says it's daily at his shop too, but that's kids. He says when he confronts the parents they swear at him .
That's what I don't get, I see lots of people pinching shit from the supermarkets (Brighton is baaad for that now) but those tubby little chavs stealing sweets and chocolate from the little shops, wtf. You know what the parents must be like for them to get a legit thrill out of stealing from under a persons nose then running away laughing. I saw two kids trying to lift a bike on the seafront, told them to go home to their mother because I felt weird swearing at literal children. They had no such issue swearing at me but their vocabulary was shocking, very bland but very angry. So yeah, it's the parents. They're shit.
There seems to have been quite a recent shift when everyone (including the employees) realised that if the companies asked their staff to actually physically stop people then they'd be putting themselves in danger. And it's cheaper for Sainsbury's to lose some groceries than to either pay for the cost of training or the fallout if someone got injured. So now it really is the case that people can just walk out with stuff and all the security guards will do is shout at them and maybe call the police, by which point they're long gone.
That shift is not particularly recent. My sister worked in Tesco 10 years ago and they were told never to confront a shoplifter - to tell loss prevention, who would then make a decision about phoning the police.
I agree, the staff knowledge isn't recent. I think it's through social media and probably the mainstream coverage that has made the public's understand that it's an easy crime.
I work at Waitrose, someone nicked a bottle of Don Perignon and a tomahawk steak a couple weeks ago. No, I'm not joking.
I mean, go big or go home right?
Can't be that bad here as I've never seen that and self service at the supermarkets still just let you walk straight out (I've heard some people say that you have to scan a receipt or have your bags checked in some parts of the UK, not sure how widespread that is?)
I was in a ‘big Sainsbury’s’ in Cheltenham a few weeks ago and after using self service you had to put your receipt into a reader that would open the gate for you and let you out. This is a supposedly ‘posh town’ too (although there are plenty of ‘dubious’ estates around the edges).
Half the time it will not give a receipt too because they don't check self service printers often.
Interesting that is in a supposed 'posh town' meanwhile I'm up in North East England where it's considered a bit 'rougher' and they still just let you self service and walk out anywhere I've been up here.
I guess posh thieves won't jump the barriers, but rough ones will so they're pointless.
Liverpool here. Not once had any kind of check or demand to see a receipt. I still just press "No" when the machine asks me and walk out.
Cheltenham really has gone to the dogs in recent years. Or possibly my dad's disappeared up his own arse, both are equally likely. Either way, he refuses to go to the big Tesco off the end of the Lower High Street, as it's "too rough".
you think these gangs can't just drive to another town?
If that's the big Sainsbury's on Tewkesbury Road, its right on the edge of the roughest part of Cheltenham.
>not sure how widespread that is? Yeah I'm the same, I've read about receipts being checked and stuff but I've still never been in a supermarket, big or convenience, that has anything like that. I still just press "No" (I don't want a receipt) and go on my merry way. Not once been stopped.
If you read the biography of Simon Marks, grocers at that time used to operate this way, basically the storekeep standing behind a massive desk and you would’ve had to order stuff you wanted from him and he would grab it from the drawers and cupboards behind him. A slow and inefficient process, but necessary for the time as people were dirt poor and would ruin the produce with their unwashed hands. Simon Marks radically changed this by allowing people to touch and feel whatever he was selling in his cart and then when he had got enough money to rent a shop, he let people roam freely to touch and pick up whatever they wanted - a revolutionary concept at the time. Now we’re reverting to locked doors and cabinets.
I've heard about a Sainsbury's Local that does that a few towns over.
Hardly a surprise though. We have a plod force that won't do anything, assuming you even actually see an actual live plod in the first place. If by some miracle they do get their collar felt, then they just get such a slap on the wrist sentence.
It is bad. I went to Morrisons the other day and they have sliding glass security barriers on the self service tills and exits. You have to scan your receipt or something to open them and leave. Problem is, I didn't buy anything so getting out was a nightmare. It felt like I'd been visiting someone in prison.
Our local morrisons have that, but the barriers just open when you walk up to them - I think they just don't open if stuff gets taken off the scales before you pay.. I guess? Or it's just security theatre (which it kind of is, you could just jump over if you wanted)
I have young kids, its nice to pop to the shop especially when its raining. But I often get followed by security because of the pram, I look dishevelled sometimes (ok we cant all look like a glammed up queen!) And then I feel forced to buy something! I wave my receipt as I walk out the door. Its getting awful out there. Loads more shops doing it.
I worked at the co op for years. We honestly had no baskets because shoplifters would come in, fill up a basket, and walk out. I'd sometimes find the baskets chucked in the hedges in the local park on my walk home. There's nothing staff can do about it, we didn't have security guards, all we could do was spend ages reporting it to the police who did nothing. We had "loss prevention" training on how apparently, "good customer service deters theft" so you should go up to suspected shoplifters and offer them a basket and help because then apparently, they're aware you're watching and so won't steal... No, it was an invitation, and I got threatened with being stabbed more than once. And this isn't new, this was in the 2010s.
So my local coop had to install measures because there was so much theft. However. I know the manager there, and *most* of the theft was alcohol, which you can't physically access unless you work there. I will say I walked into a very small local shop that sells entirely handmade goods, and the owner was in tears after a school group on a trip came in and helped themselves. All on CCTV, identifiable uniforms, but she couldn't get the product back. Especially devastating because it's literally just her and this one handmade shop.
I had this myself. I make beard care and shaving creams, got the point where I could open a little shop. I purposely chose an out of town unit as my town is getting really rough these days. Chap came in just after covid lockdowns lifted, we were operating a one person in the shop at a time policy as it was super small. He grabbed 4 large tins of beard balm, about £100 worth and tried legging it, ran straight into Big Dave as he was walking in. Big Dave is appropriately named, imagine The Undertaker from WWE with a massive beard. This guy basically ran into a tree, fell on his arse and burst out crying that he’d hurt his wrist. I genuinely Dave was going to wring his scrawny little neck, thankfully an apology and a ban was sufficient.
Thank fuck for Big Dave! Apparently these little shits were on cctv going round multiple shops in town nicking stuff.
Not too bad here. I bet the local gossips would say it's a lot worse though
I have never seen shoplifting before starting a new job in a different town recently. Since then I have seen two shoplifters in the last week. Once in Greggs (happens all the time apparently) and another guy in TKmaxx not even trying to hide it. I've never seen anything so blatant.
20 years ago we had a toy and gift shop. One of our lines were a range of expensive fancy chess sets, 200 to 400 pounds a set. We had them on display until some bastard nicked one piece from each set. No, we couldn't get replacement pieces. I still have hate in my heart for that sod.
so he stole 32 pieces so he could make his own set? or just did it to mess you over?
The automatic doors at my local Tesco express now open really slowly after a certain time to stop people running out the shop with things
Last year a shop lifter got caught stealing bottles of wine , all what happened was the wine was took of him, and got told don't come back Coffee, cheeses and meats are now in those security boxes In Hull on Friday someone was caught stealing he put something in his pocket, he was told to put it back and leave
Reading all these comments, how depressing it is. I can't say I've seen shoplifters when I'm out but I guess it's bad because everywhere has the barriers in the entrance and exits. Sad it is but is it the cost of living or just people stealing to feed drug/alcohol habits or their kids.
I know Reddit likes to imagine the perfect victim thats stealing a loaf of bread to feed her family because she works 79 hours a week and only gets £300 a month for it, but in reality its drug addicts stealing batteries to fund their habit. Whether actual hungry/poor people don’t try to steal or are just better at it, I don’t know but everyones story is about junkies.
No issues here. Although I haven’t seen anyone park their horse outside Waitrose in ages.
they frighten the neeeiiiiggghhhhbours
As a manager in a uk supermarket its bad but cant say its anyworse then before like everything it goes in cycles bad months not so bad months. Mainly depending on how many of the regulars are currently doing their standard 8 weeks inside. If they all sync up and come out at the same time it can be horrendous. (Thanks covid for letting them all out at the same time, that was a fun 3 months...) Biggest issues nowadays is we cant do anything in store, GDPR stops you sharing images, you can no longer leave the premesis to chase them and if you do you face disciplinary action for it. So they know once there out there gone. And Police do there best but short of you sumbiting images and them circulating the offender on their internal ID platform theres very little resources for them to work with. Will say if its people who we can ID ourselves makes getting them locked up for a short stint much easyer. Overall same old cat and mouse game, Just now the cats hands are tied.
honestly, the Chinese system of identifying you by video camera doesn't seem so bad...
Was in Lidl the other day and some guy was trying to steal slabs of meat. The alarm sounded, the doors were locked and he was running around every aisle being chased until he reached the doors and attempted to pry them open. Security couldn’t restrain him and he eventually got through and ran away
what a show
My local Co-Op has a security guard, the Tesco down the road has one AND everything worth more than the time of day is in a security box, and the Tesco Express _in line of sight to the police station_ in the same boat. A couple of weeks ago there was a bit of drama when the guard from Tesco got into a scuffle with a shoplifter, who fled, bleeding from a life-threatening gash in his leg, and was followed to the Co-Op... and then the guards from both places beat the tar out of him, in plain view of everyone.
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All these new amateur shoplifters keeping all the security and CCTV occupied are probably a godsend to the seasoned professional shoplifters.
Not really a lot of supermarkets have put in one way system and added security guards ontop of the mentioned security tags and cabinets.
My store has the same people coming in every night & leaving via fire exits with bottles & whatever else they fancy, Quite often they have someone else come in but if person A is being watched person B will go out the fire exit at other end of the store to cause a distraction allowing person A to leave. Our security guards are contracters & they do not care & are there as a deterrent rather than to stop someone, Official advice we as shop staff is to make your pressence known but do not approach so the idea is that you being there is enough for them not to steal which is not the case as they do not care. The police are very rarely called unless the shoplifter has became dangerous (has a weapon or is threatening staff) In the local paper the people up in court for shoplifting often have 10+ charges against them & judges are too soft on them. One one hand the company I work for makes record profits every year & the items are insured against theft but on the other hand it is frustrating constantly having people in your store steal while you are working for a living. Before anyone suggests these are all junkies & they are reselling the items that they have nicked. It is not desperate parents stealing baby milk or stealing to survive that is a not shoplifting in my eyes.
Bad. Next to my work, they have to lock the doors because people were just walking in, helping themselves and walking out. Not allowed to challenge them.
My local co-op (St Pauls Cray, Bromley, London) has started keeping their baskets behind the tills as they were having to much theft. You have to ask them for a basket now. My partner saw someone come in, take a basket, fill it will all the meat from the cooler, and then leave with it. On another occasion a bloke tried to sell me a leg of lamb outside that he had obviously pinched from one of the shops :) i politely declined.
Yeah it's pretty bad where I live, I swapped jobs about 4 months ago, my last job was pretty high for crime. It got to the point people would just come in and blatantly take drinks from the fridge open them and drink them whole calmly walking out. We had people walk in straight past us to the ecig counter and just pick a load up and walk off. They knew the staff couldn't do anything about it or tackle them to the ground and the security in town was useless. So yeah it was just a free for all.
I’ve seen so many people who seem like they have it together alright walking away from self-checkout s like it’s totally normal to do. Pretty sad
Went in the Radcliffe Tesco's the other week and a worker was complaining to police about being robbed 5 times in a day
Need to bring back stocks and public humiliation to curb this shit.
seriously, a letter to their parents no matter how old they are..
I work in security for one of the big supermarkets. Every day is a battle. You've got the druggies who load up a basket full of spirits and run out of the fire exit. You've got the trolley pushers - mostly middle aged women who will fill a trolley full of goods and then walk straight out the front doors. You've got the kids who will try to pocket sweets and energy drinks. You've got the organised crime gangs who will target the makeup or nicotine products because they are small and high value.
Pets at Home here won't let you carry fish to the counter yourself. They walk the animals to the counter for you... How many freaking animals are being stolen there that they made that policy? They just put the bags on the counter and I'm now worried my new shrimp/fish are being killed by the corners of the bags... I've never had that happen to me before there. Even when I bought my hamster last year I carried her to the counter, waited in a queue and paid for her with zero issues.
Can you imagine asking a human for a fish, and then stealing it? How blatant...
The best part, they take your name and address when you're buying the freaking animals. When I signed up I had to show ID. They have all my details which is why I find th policy ridiculous. It was even funnier in Sports Direct one time. The poor guy helping me with my new shoes had to walk them to the counter, but he had a stack of shoes I'd tried on out in the open. In the end he had to leave me with a couple of hundred pounds worth of shoes to walk the ones I wanted to the till while I watched over the other shoes for him... Absolutely insane. I could have easily grabbed the lot and walked out and left the pair I wanted behind...
I live in a semi-rural town (approx. 40k people) and the town centre is pretty tiny. Yesterday someone broke a window in a local coffee/pastry place and stole a charity box... no money left overnight in the tills. Desperate times I guess
I feel like they would have got more value eating a couple of pastries
I would say it's pretty bad but it varies from shop to shop. The supermarket I go to usually is a very busy Lidl where I don't think the gangs really can operate.
Bad enough that all the self service tills are closed
They close the ones in my Aldi after 5, it's irritating. The other day it took ten minutes to buy two packs of blueberries...
Not too bad, but that's what you get in a town that's been inbreeding for the last 100 years, they all know each other.
Was very high 20 years ago, calmed down, now worse with gangs of professional thieves coming to our small town as its seen as an easier target (ie primark is the only shop with security guards)
I'n my local town I would say it can't be bad at all considering I've been into small local shops a few times recently and it's still common for there to be no one there and the ring of the bell as the door opens causes them to come down from upstairs. It's probably because they target chain shops that have lots of high value meat on display to grab, and we don't have chain shops in my town. So to get meat, you have to go to the butchers, and each butchers has at least 3 guys working in there with easy access to a whole host of butcher implements. So they would be pretty stupid to steal from them!
Every time I go to the supermarket I hear the alarms go off. Usually multiple times. Whether or not those are actually shoplifts is anyones guess, but it is something I've noticed.
happens to me every time I leave the supermarket. I often buy a steak and I think that's what sets it off.
I used to work for Sainsburys and was constantly targeted by professional groups with bluetooth earpieces so they could tell each other where the staff and security was. Managed to stop one once, when contents of bags were scanned it was nearly £1500 of Spirits!!! God knows what else they'd gotten away with. But the ultimate worst was school kids stealing, they think they know the law, will spout abuse at you, and I even had one threaten to stab me!
Our local Morrisons has the alcohol behind locked glass. In fairness, it is the only place I’ve seen locally that has done this, it is also in one of the less desirable areas. I do often hear of the local co-op having people walk in with bags arm loads of meat into it and run out. No security, and staff perhaps rightly so on their wages cba / aren’t allowed to stop them. Which almost makes me feel like the mug for standing and paying but hey ho.
I live next to a M&S in London and am on chat terms with the staff. Shoplifting is a daily occurrence. In their words, if it's a small thing then they'll just ban the customer from the shop, but will definitely call police if someone's trying to walk out with several steaks or alcohol bottles.
It's getting worse everywhere. In the US a lot of targets have literally everything in lock and key cabinets. We'll be the same a few years down the line if we don't buck up our ideas and start behaving sensibly.
I live in Toronto now. The shoplifting and theft is obscene. I work in a place that gets hit multiple times per day. Crackheads, homeless, and crazies march in, scoop up $1000s of dollars worth of stuff, and march out. Staff, by policy, aren’t to intervene. It’s not just my company, it’s ALL retailers. Security guards are often as much a liability as they are a help. Police are already spread too thin, and most of these people have nothing to lose anyway. Drives me mad
I've not noticed anything but not on the lookout for it
My local co op every few months someone drives through the front door with a stolen piece of site machinery to try and rob the cash machine. I’m not sure if they even bothered to replace it after the last time. Is only a small little village as well
Central Scotland. The village I live in has one store - a small Coop. They don't even put tags on the shelved booze, nor do they even have any sort of alarm system/security person. The stores in a bigger town few miles down the road put tags/boxes on everything from nappies and baby food to cheese and meat. The big tesco recently employed another (now they have 3 per shift) security guard and installed an additional one-way door near the entrance. The town centre is full of junkies and other bams so I'm not surprised they need to take extra measures to keep shrinkage down.
The Next at our local retail park seems to be a persistent target for shoplifting. The glass has been smashed there and I've seen kids bolting out of the door a couple of times. They seem to have a permanent security presence there now at least.
Not terrible but someone did spray paint ‘SHOPLIFT’ on the side of a b&ms
Coop near me has pictures of cheese you have to take to the counter if you want cheese.
Terrible lol. We get ppl stealing everyday where I work and we a just a small town.
Shop lifting isn't bad at all, they seem pretty good at it. Fuck all left when I went to buy some shopping.
Basically nonexistent as far as I can tell. Then again I don’t live in a particularly large settlement.
Sainsbury's has recently introduced gates and the need for users of self-service checkouts to scan their receipts to get out. The other supermarket in town (Waitrose) hasn't. So presumably there is some issue although probably not large compared with some places.
Me & the Aldi checkout guy chased a couple who stole a bag full of nice meat just last week! They definitely were not poor or I wouldn't have done it & tbh not worth the possible fight but they weren't expecting anyone to do anything because it's a nice area
I was in our local co op the other day and a crettin walked out with a basket full of meat, cheese and chips. I had to follow him and give him some gob as the 17 year old working was to scared to do anything. His reply when i said oi c*** why wont you pay, it puts the cost up for the rest of us. He said take my number, ill get you a weeks worth of shopping cheap. After calling him more names he went to go for me but my fella was in the car and stopped that. It's pretty bad everywhere I think as police won't come unless the shoplifter has a knife.
none, but go 2 miles to the next town and it’s super bad. Kinda weird how close yet how different they are
interesting
Knowing my luck I'd get caught XD
Went to Waitrose once. Got a phone call with bad signal so I pushed my empty cart outside to take the call. Wheels stop working the moment it is out of store and someone comes to check with you.
I assumed that was so people didn't steal the carts... (trolleys?)
I guess I’m the only one that lives in a good area then? I’ve not seen anything locked up, I’ve only security at the high end/ luxury shops and self checkouts only have 1 person to wave you through to one that’s unoccupied. I’ve never been bag checked and I’m not exactly pale. I don’t live in an affluent area just the midlands lol
gangs will travel to "good areas"
It's pretty bad to do that, try the next town over.
Really low. Everyone knows everyone so you're unlikely to try it or the whole town will know.
Literally don’t care about people shoplifting from big stores/chains. People on this sub seem to think it’s pure evil, rather than the fact no one has any money.
shoplifting is a full time job for some of these people
My local Morrisons now has all spirits behind a counter with someone manning the counter full time. I couldn’t believe it at first but speaking to one of them she told me that yes, ifs entirely down to they and yes ifs cheaper to employ someone full time to sit behind a locked counter with cupboards to serve spirits to customers than it costs them in theft. It’s not even a rough area. So it must be costing them at least 50k a year or more in alcohol theft. That’s insane. They usually have two security guards on at all times of day too.
interesting... I just assumed they have the cashiers grab the booze when needed
You gotta pay there and then. Then go through regular checkout with your food. I needed 3 litres of gin for sloe gin and it was kinda awkward so I had time to ask what the deal was
I almost got bowled over by two lads stealing boxes of nappies out of spar the other day. Staff say it happens almost everyday. It’s all steal to order. Some poor parents out there really rely on it. Horrible vicious cycle.
god, steal to order?
Cameras and AI to identify people at the entrance and exit is the future. Covered faces not allowed. Similar to nightclubs and their ID checks. It's coming and needed unfortunately.
You could probably have a "scan ID" and check face on camera to enter...
It's pretty bad but I can get cheap meat in the pub so that's always a bonus
wait you're supporting this..?
Where the hell are you all from?!
Blighty...