To be upset about security guard following me?

[Astressedmumoftwo]

Before Christmas I set off security alarms going INTO my local supermarket. Later found out it was makeup in my bag. On the way back out they went off again and security stopped me and searched my bag.

I go in to grab lunch from work every day and the security guard now follows me around quite obviously and watches me pay for things at self checkout. I find it off putting. I know he's only doing his job but as some one with social anxiety it makes me dread going in because I'm made to feel like I'm doing something wrong
.
There aren't any other shops I could grab lunch in.

I'm lucky it's never happened before, I know. I'm a young looking white 20 something, but even as a teenager I can't recall being followed. I wear nice ish work clothes. No pushchair with me but carry a handbag.

Am I being super unreasonable?

I get followed in evvvvvery store I go into! I dress smartly etc but I cannot wear make up and I'm naturally fair haired. Therefore I look like Casper the friendly ghost meets the Jeremy Kyle show. No matter what I do, even if I sashayed into Boots/Hoopers/Waitrose in a Vera Wang special or a Chanel suit & red carpet-worthy hair, I'd still be followed. Nobody believes me when I say this but honestly, me without make up = ROUGH LOOKING. Upsetting but true.

I would sneak a few friends in to nick some stuff while he has his attention focused on you..

I just think that if they can't run a self-service shop without making all their customers feel like known criminals, they'd do better having a shop where everything is behind the counter.

One question for me is that ine:
if the security haurd is doing his job by following the OP like this, until when is it OK for him to do that?
A week,
A momth
A year??
When does it become stalking and creepy behaviour when he hadnjt found ANYTHING at all when he first searched her bag? (aka she proved she was innocent in the first place!)

@phishy

Speak to him. Tell him that you appreciate he's doing his job and that there was that unfortunate make-up misunderstanding incident, but as he knows, you're there every day and are unlikely to steal from somewhere that you rely on heavily. That you understand he needs to do his job but can he do a bit more inconspicuously as it's making you a feel a bit besieged.

I wouldnt speak to him. I'd say it would be more likely to make him more suspicious etc... If anything I would talk to the mnaagement.

@elelel

Yes she set the alarms off because there was something in her makeup bag that set them off, that was established, he found that she wasn't stealing so now he's following her around like she was, its unacceptable.

It's a common theif tactic, that's why she aroused suspicion; coupled with the frequent trips to the toilet straight after self scan - of course she is on his radar.

so... now we also need to know and understand the tactics used by thiefs to be sure we don't actually do the same very normal things as they do.

• Like going to the loo
• Going to pick up lunch at the same time everyday in a shop etc...
• Oh be aware that you should never set off the alarm with someting forgotten in your handbag - whihc has happened to everyone of us at some ppint....

Anything else?

Because we might as well all know what thiefs are doing so we can avoid looking suspicious

at people saying do lunch at home and use the loo at work as a solution to this problem.