I knew shop lifting was a problem but I didn't imagine it was like this..

[SunShow]

DS is working in a Tesco Express. He personally makes around 8 shop lifting reports every day. Obviously these are just the one he sees.

I imagined that shoplifting was kids/teens stealing a chocolate bar or desperate people stealing food and that does happen, but most of it is much larger scale. Yesterday he had people arrive with rucksacks and literally sweep the contents of a shelf into their bags.

Staff are taught not to confront them (good as far as his mother is concerned!) and police take no action even when there is good CCTV.

This is a small supermarket in the nicer bit of a perfectly pleasant suburban town.

I believe supermarket profiteering costs me more than people who steal food. Not sure about the UK but supermarket profits are massive. They squeeze suppliers and growers by buying at very low prices and then not paying them for 3 months. There has been quite a lot in our media about this.

I believe the recent increase in food theft is a reflection of growing poverty and inequality in our society unfortunately and I expect shoplifting is increasing worldwide. I am not excusing it and there’s definitely opportunism there but many also can’t afford to eat. I was just driving past the local Salvation Army church recently and saw a big long line of people queuing for food handouts. You never used to see that.

If you look at the stuff people are generally stealing I'm pretty sure it's not because they're hungry or poor. Lots of people are doing it because they can.the person I know of, who admits to it, doesn't need to steal he just gets a buzz from it.

In our local supermarket you have to scan the receipt to get out of the self checkout area but if you didn't buy anything there's an exit gate near the entrance. The scanning the receipt method is only a partial deterrent though because potentially you could scan 1 item but steal 20, you'd still have a receipt to prove you bought something...

Really? National Service? And who is going to introduce that and who would pay? No one on here is going to let their children do National Service.

usually get the response that ' a nonce/paedo is recording us'.

Apparently prolific shoplifters make around £1k a day. They describe it as effortless.

😂😂 I know! I gleaned this info from the wise people of mumsnet & seeing as none of the big supermarkets near me has it - it’s Poundland for the win! (FYI so does Iceland, apparently)

I work in a shop. Apparently we lose 20% of our value of stock to theft. We've upped our security guards. Either way the customer has to pay extra! An extra security guard costs money. Also, less theft means lower prices, money better staff training, more working hours which make shopping a better experience in terms of help available.

I live in Downham (huge council estate, though not so much all council now)
When I first moved here in 1997 we had an Off Licence like that ,, Everything, including the cashier, behind a cage .

And mine would be "sorry lads, you are too ugly for me" 😆

Yes, Switzerland too. Although as someone said, I guess you could pay for one item but walk out with a lot more.

i was so shocked to see young boys taking armfuls of hairspray from boots, the staff shouted at them to stop, they just ran out of the door

@mathanxiety I agree with you. Turning a blind eye to low level criminality damages society.

Allowing the backdoor selling/buying of stolen groceries damages the local convenience shop which is paying cash & carry prices for its stock.

It does create a slippery slope. If it's okay to buy stolen groceries is it okay to buy a stolen television or laptop?

How much violence or threat of violence becomes acceptable to steal groceries? Is it okay for innocent shoppers to feel menaced by organised shoplifters?

Is it okay for kids to be used to make the deliveries? Does that make it okay for kids to be doing the theft itself? If it is okay, is it okay for it to be your kids.

The shops know the issues but they need the Police to respond. Of course the idea of not stealing/being honest is the first stop.

Yep. That was the point of that story. 🙄

Just a cage? Where I lived in Manchester everything in the off licence was behind bullet proof glass!

But these are just people driven to the edge to feed their starving families……. /s

Yep, just a cage

There is an answer. A system where customers have to scan their payment card before they enter. No card scanned, no entry.

My DD work in a coop and daily get shop lifters in, they won't employ security guards, they much loose thousands, they come in and take either lots of big jars of coffee, big boxes or bottles of washing stuff, sometimes they take the frozen beef joints and there's nothing the staff can do.

When the gulf between the rich and the poor grows to the extent that it has, what can we expect.
Society has money, more than ever but the distribution has gone wonky. It’s like a race to the bottom and it’s only the poor who get consistently hammered.

NS offers lots of opportunities to young people that they would never otherwise get, it isn't all about war. TBH if the country needed people to fight they would have to whatever parents said or did.

My local Tesco Extra has so many issues with shoplifting they now have two, sometimes three, security staff on the door. They are constantly on their radios and Saturdays are so bad now that I do my shopping online. It's like the wild west and I don't feel safe in there. I really pity the staff.😳😬
A couple of months ago whilst I was stood waiting at a checkout there, there was a security incident involving four men, who when apprehended, one of the guys pulled a knife and tried to stab one of the security guys and another staff member. Luckily the other two security guys managed to pull the guy away and get him and the others out of the store. The whole incident made me feel sick and made me wonder how we ever got into this situation. No one in power seems to care about the breakdown in society 😕.
For context this store is on the edge of an affluent suburb, not in the middle of a large city.

Someone has to come up with opportunities not litter picking or car park attendant. But no way is anyone on here going to agree. People who pay for private schools aren't letting their children mix with the great unwashed in some Govt scheme and certainly not the children of politicians and celebrities unless there is a scheme for nepo babies. Different in eg Switzerland where it's in the culture. Not in the UK.

High crime area the police will be dealing with stabbings and drug gangs shop lifting is well down the list, hence why stores employ security staff to stop it happening.

National Service? Why would anybody go to fight for this country? All it does is take take take until nothing works anymore.
now the way out of this is to take from disabled people, not billionaires, oh no, it’s the people struggling to survive on PIP that’s obviously the problem.
the song ‘Kill the Poor’ by the DK is now looking prophetic.