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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To have stormed out of Netto in a huff because they wouldn't sell me wine

115 replies

LizzieMint73 · 20/09/2010 15:38

Ooh I am so cross. Today I made a special trip to Netto to buy Oyster Bay wine which is on special offer (is normally £9 but they are selling it at a fiver a bottle).

The checkout girl asked for ID on the instruction of the manager who was working on the next till. When I'd picked myself up off the floor (I'm 37 and probably older than both of them) I realised in horror, that no I could not prove my age. I had credit cards and a works ID with photo, but nothing with my date of birth on - they just repeated loads of nonsense parrot fashion over and over that if they let me buy the wine they would lose their jobs and get fined. Worse thing was that they probably accepted that I was over 18 but they would not allow me to buy the wine because I could not prove I was over 25. They would not accept my arguement that no law was being broken because they were happy I was legally able to buy alcohol.

At this point I just said that I didn't have time for this and stormed out leaving the wine and a few other bits on the belt.

I don't like carrying my driving licence because if my bag got nicked they would have my address and my house keys so would have to get the locks changed etc. Similiary, I dont want to have to carry my passport in case it gets lost/stolen.

I accept that I might look more like in my early 30s than late 30s but I think that is more due to many other people looking really old for their age, rather than me looking younger. There is no way that I look under 25 and I think it is a bit much that I have to prove my age. This is the second time this has happended recently and no, it is not a compliment, it is a bloody pain in the arse.

OP posts:

PinkieMinx · 21/09/2010 14:47

Exactly what I said - but you can't argue with idiots. It's like the 'health n safety' or 'data protection' mantras that keep being trundled out. They get 2 mins training and a line of what to say/do and do not engage brain at any point. Makes me so cross - I have taken to laughing now. As I did in local eatery when they refused to heat up friends homemade baby food due to 'health n safety' - utter utter bullshit!

dizzyblonde · 21/09/2010 14:50

I didn't realise that reading glasses are an age restricted item. I bought some in ASDA usung the self scan checkout and had to get the assistant to verify my age.Not quite sure what is so dangerous about a pair of plastic glasses. :)

Remotew · 21/09/2010 14:50

FGS they cannot lose their jobs if they sell alcohol to someone over 18 only to someone younger than 18. Common sense out the window, ID cards in.

funkychunkymunky · 21/09/2010 14:59

It is the person that sells the alcohol that gets the initial fine. It's £80. If the same shop gets caught a second time (not the staff member) the licence holder on site at the time of the offence will be reported on summons for the offence and faces a fine. Third offence and the licence holder will be reported again and faces a fine plus revocation of licence.

tokyonambu · 21/09/2010 15:17

"So when the supermarkets refuse alcohol to be sold to a parent in case they might then give some to their 17 year old offspring in their home, they are preventing them from doing something they are legally entitled to do."

Quite so.

"It is not the member of staff that gets prosecuted and fined, it's the shop, no matter what the employer in question threatens."

If you want to demonstrate this to shop owners, the relevant legislation I believe is Section 147A of the Licensing Act 2003, as inserted by the Violent Crime Reduction Act 2006. You can read it here.

A prosecution requires the same personal license holder to have supervised sales to under eighteens three times in three consecutive months. It only appears to apply to license holders (plus some stuff about temporary licenses). This is not about cashiers.

I have professional reasons to know that almost every jobsworth reference to the Data Protection Act is bollocks, and I've worked with enough H&S people and socialised with HSE inspectors to know that jobsworth references to Health and Safety legislation are usually bollocks too. Nice to see that licensing legislation is similarly misquoted.

Bramshott · 21/09/2010 15:18

This makes me so cross .

Whether or not you look under 25 is such a subjective thing, and its NOT the law to carry ID in this country. I have been asked for ID recently (I'm 36) and luckily had my driving licence on me, but I would have been so cross if it had meant I'd had to come home without my shopping.

Does anyone have a good response when they say "well we think you look under 25" other than to laugh hollowly and point at the crows feet around your eyes?!

ProfessorLaytonIsMyLoveSlave · 21/09/2010 15:27

"If you knew you were going to buy wine then why didn't you take your drivers license just this once?"

Erm... because she is thirty seven and over twice the legal age for being allowed to buy wine? Just a thought...

funkychunkymunky · 21/09/2010 15:36

Tokyo as per the policy you have provided a link to; the person selling the alcohol can be convicted of an offence, given a caution or given a fixed penalty notice. The licence holder is said to be supervising when they have authorised an employee to sell alcohol for them.

The person selling alcohol must believe the person to be unde 18 or have reason to believe they might not be over 18. Test purchases are done with 15 and 16 tear olds who look their ages. No one would ever be convicted etc if the person buying alcohol looked over 18 even if they were younger. For example, a very tall, muscular 16 year old with stubble that looked in his 20s Woolf not be cause for conviction.

funkychunkymunky · 21/09/2010 15:37

Sorry about typos - iPhone!

funkychunkymunky · 21/09/2010 15:42

Although, as rightly said before, a shop does not have to sell you anything. I do think it's rediculoud though when someone that is clearly old enough is asked for id then refused the sale. It's not good pr. By that I mean some of these examples like the 80 year old being refused and the man that was balding and had a beard. How could you have reasonable belief that a 70 year old is under 18?!

Challenge 21 was brought in to prevent Alcohol being sold to older looking teens, not to make it impossible to buy!

Having said that, some places in America make everyone show id irrespective of age.

funkychunkymunky · 21/09/2010 15:44

So to sum up - OP you are being very unreasonable to shop in netto

sickoftheholidays · 21/09/2010 16:45

YABU to be annoyed about being asked for ID.
At 35 (and I'm told I look younger) I live in hope of being asked for ID, although I suspect that if I am ever asked again, the ID in question will be my bus pass.

But seriously, I do think that having to prove you are over 25 is daft when the legal age is 18. The way it was explained to me is that if you LOOK 25 or under, you have to proove that you are in fact 18 or older....

Cammelia · 21/09/2010 17:01

On a slightly different, but related, note my 13 year old dd is always being offered wine in restaurants when the waiter pours the bottle because they think she's 18.
She doesn't look 18 but she is 5' 7" tall

I remember being refused child fares on buses when I was a child "because you're so tall" I, too am 5' 7"

Honeydragon · 21/09/2010 17:22

I get carded quite a bit, as I don't drink it saves me a few bob as dh has to go and buy his own wine .

However I was buying wine in a local co op and got asked for id this summer, I laughed said I don't have any (no drivers licence and refuse to carry my passport everywhere), so I said I'd send my dh in, who was outside with ds and the dog.

Dh came out and said she was really rude and scowly to him.

I went to the shop a few days later and she had a right go at me, saying it was wrong to send my Dad in to buy alcohol for me because I couldn't be bothered to prove whether I was 18 or not .

Dh was not amused when I told him

Nor was she when I took my Wedding photos and marriage certificate and passport to show her manager "to prevent any bad feeling over future purchases".

puddleofpiddle · 21/09/2010 17:38

I have to ID people at work, don't agree with it but I need the income, what can I do? I'm not intentionally being a jobsworth but I'm not paid to use my common sense or my judgement, I'm paid to implement company policy (but I do agree it's ID cards by stealth). However I was in a shop the other day with a think 30 policy...

tokyonambu · 21/09/2010 21:59

As well as being ID Cards by stealth (odd, given ID Cards are dead), it's also prohibition by stealth, and one thing we can be grateful for with Labour out is the "we don't dare make it illegal, so we'll make it painful to buy instead" (see also tobacco) lobby are out on their ear. Either products are legal, or they're illegal. If you think they should be illegal, have the courage to try to make them illegal. Otherwise, just introducing better restrictions (the Nordic model) is intellectually dishonest. The bizarre thing about this past Labour government is that they presided over a massive and, it is not admitted, harmful relaxation of on-licensing, whilst trying to be tough on off sales.

Cammelia · 22/09/2010 06:52

tokyo, wasn't the Labour govt just making any old laws to try to please all of the people all of the time......what about that one where they tried to bring in instant fines for public misdemeanours which would have involved marching people to the nearest cashpoint and forcing them to take money out for the fine

That was, until Blairs son Euan was found drunk and disorderly in the gutter in Leicester Square

The Labour administration reminded me of nothing so much as a badly run local small-town council

I don't get what Whitehall were doing throughout that period either

tokyonambu · 22/09/2010 07:44

"tokyo, wasn't the Labour govt just making any old laws to try to please all of the people all of the time......what about that one where they tried to bring in instant fines for public misdemeanours which would have involved marching people to the nearest cashpoint and forcing them to take money out for the fine"

Never got further than a conference speech, as everyone who knew anything about law, policing, due process and the ECHR pissed themselves laughing. As ever with Labour, their mouths were bigger than their brains.

"I don't get what Whitehall were doing throughout that period either"

Banging their heads on the wall, hoping it would stop.

Bramshott · 22/09/2010 09:40

"if you LOOK 25 or under, you have to proove that you are in fact 18 or older" - the problem with that is that it's a totally subjective statement.

I don't believe for a minute that I look under 25, but if some idiot with no sense shop assistant says "well I believe you do look under 25" and you don't have ID then there's no possible comeback.

massivemammaries · 22/09/2010 09:46

I was staggered to be asked for ID for cigarettes in a shop last year....ffs, I'm nearly 30! funny thing is, up until then, I've bought cigarettes with no problem since I was 12!

manchestermummy · 22/09/2010 09:59

It's only since I turned 31 that I suddenly look under 25. Am pregnant btw and usually have my DD in tow. I don't mind being asked - actually I find it really funny when the 17 year old behind the checkout cannot work out my age from the date of birth printed on my driving licence - but what irks me that in the UK, once you are 18 you are allowed to buy certain age-restricted products. If all retailers are signing up to this Challenge 25 thing, then just make the minimum age 25. Simple really.

By the way, my dad was asked for ID a while back. At the age of 77.

MoralDefective · 22/09/2010 10:01

I would go to the shop...fill a big trolley of expensive shopping including the wine(and lots of it),when they refuse to serve you the wine just walk away without any of your shopping...they lose a big sale and have to put it all back.......my DD got stopped by a policeman recently on her way to work and asked why she wasn't at school,she laughed,thinking he was joking whereupon he asked her for ID,she told him to mind his own business and carried on her way...she's 25!!

ALovelyBunchOfCoconuts · 22/09/2010 10:01

It is so annoying to be asked for ID. DH and I were buying a bottle a couple of months ago (26 and 23) I'm pretty sure I do look under 25 but we were doing the whole weeks shop with a 2 year old in the pushchair. DH paid on his card and got asked for ID for the wine. He provided said ID and was ok'd but then she back tracked and said she couldn't serve him as two people who were clearly underage were accompanying him

I was mortified! We had to put the wine back, me and DD waited outside and DH went back in an had to queue back up to buy the wine, same cahier, but she couldn't say anything as he was on his own with ID. again.

It would be great if there was an accepted form of ID out there that everyone could have. I have no driving license or passport and I can't afford to buy either just to provide ID for the very few occasions I buy alcohol

MoralDefective · 22/09/2010 10:05

Also,my 22 year old DS was refused a four pack of beer when he had 18 year old DS2 with him,even though he had ID,as the beer might have been for DD2.

tokyonambu · 22/09/2010 10:10

"It would be great if there was an accepted form of ID out there that everyone could have. "

www.pass-scheme.org.uk/

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