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.

Two main types of shoplifter, drug addicts and then large scale gangs who sell stuff on at places like car boots. Then to a lesser extent people who get a thrill from it and then the very least likely, people that are actually poor and steal to eat.

Yep, the bleeding heart media like to portray it as a cost of living thing whereas it’s mostly all organised criminal gangs. A tax on all the rest of us who have to pay higher prices to cover the cost of stolen goods.

Need a few vigilante mobs going round to police their own neighbourhoods.

In the US they get shot with a taser or pepper sprayed so we don’t have this problem as much. I didn’t feel as safe in Europe, lots of harassment of women. Then I found out my pepper spray was illegal there.

I work for HMCTS and the number of theft from shop offences I see is sky high. Almost as many as domestic violence cases.

I read a news article recently about women being trafficked to Britain specifically for shop lifting gangs. That, along with the sickening levels of poverty, is creating an astronomical problem. It makes me sad and angry and pretty sick to be honest.

Not to mention that these women - who have been trafficked and are probably living in abject poverty themselves - when they're caught, they are charged and prosecuted, and the men behind the operation get to carry on doing what they do. They just bring over more women to carry on with their sick game.

What could go wrong?

If our shrink was 20% we would all be fired and the store closed down! We get a budget of 1% and even the worst performance shrink stores are only 3%. So I think the 20% may be an exaggeration!

My husband is an ex cop. He witnessed a guy fill his pockets with perfumes. He grabbed hold of him and yelled at the staff to call the police. The staff replied "let him go". This was a small pharmacy and I was surprised they didn't want to have him caught.

Security are only their to observe and report. No more confrontation. You will risk acid and knife attacks.

I've seen the videos and wonder why, after the first or second incident there isn't any backup? Most likely because the scale in the areas targeted are so wide and unpredictable. Very sad and not right. Xxx

i saw that, it was really interesting, I seem to remember it was all going back to Romania, they had people over here that did the thieving in vast quantities, things such as painkillers and tootbrushes were very much in demand. There was footage of the thieves just sweeping armfuls of stuff off the shelves into these massive bags, it was blatant and shameless

And as in the States the worst hit stores will close leaving us all worse off. We have a busy Tesco Express nearby in West London, and I've seen it all from the junkie with an armful of roast beef joints for resale, to the trendy guy with selected lunch who walked straight past the tills and security guard.

Also the security guard is employed for the security of inside the store and around the door area.
The car park is unlikely to be included in the remit of the security guard.

Stores need to ramp up security as it is becoming a joke. Security guards need to be issued with batons and tasers and given the authority to use them on perps.

And the shoplifters will cry assault, and the security will be charged with it.

I have literally never stolen a thing in my life and yet have been trailed round Asda by a security guard and once round Sainsburys! I was extremely offended and the second time it happened I accosted the security guard and asked him why he had selected me to follow around the shop! He was unable to answer and just moved off mumbling!

In John Lewis today a family apprehended (2 adults and a boy of about 10 ) one security man was around 7 ft tall and also another security man and woman demanding they produce the goods on their person. No way they were leaving the shop. That’s the way to do it but JL items are expensive and probably include security costs in the prices.

The social contract has broken.

It’s so bloody depressing. Everything is getting more and more shit and it seems like no-one can do anything about it.

Change the law.

I can never understand it when I read about people going in supermarkets and literally sweeping the contents of a whole shelf into their bag and the staff doing absolutely nothing. I'm pretty damn sure if I tried that,they'd be on me in an instant! I remember about a year ago,I was in Poundland and I absent mindedly put a 4 pack of cat food into my bag instead of the shopping basket. Within 30 seconds,the shop's security guard was by my side saying 'Can you please put that in the basket,not your bag,Madame'. I was mortified.

I worked in a Tesco Express briefly last year and we were hit by two guys sweeping the shelves of meat, they'd been to another one earlier and did the same with washing powders/liquids etc. Police notified but not bothered, it's just what it is. Sad times.

My local Iceland has anti theft strips that set the alarms off on the £1 ham.

Also the co-op had photos of coffee in the shelves and you have to take the picture up to the till and pay first for the actual item

It just makes me feel sad that this is what the world has come to

Yes, my local Iceland has steaks and pork joints in massive plastic boxes. But, when a shop lifter is identified, they close the whole shop down until the cops arrive. I have known people to be stuck there.

Some of the big retail chains have been saying for a couple of years now that shoplifting is costing them millions per year. Apparently a lot of it is organised crime, and in a lot of cases they use junkies etc to do it for them.

If it is costing the stores millions a year why don't they beef up security?