It’s just theft isn’t it?

[HiRen]

Am back in the UK for my annual summer break. Just back from the supermarket. Stood behind a pretty old (going to guess at least 80yo) woman who was weighing fennel in the veggies aisle, to get a barcoded sticker that she could self-scan. She did one sticker, then a second, then a third. I moved over to the right a step, intending to lean over to offer help (I’m crap with tech, reasonable assumption she might be too). Immediately clocked she was holding the fennel up a bit, ie semi-lifting it off the scales. Then I watched her select “potatoes” on her fourth attempt. Saw her do it again on her fifth attempt - she’d lifted the fennel higher.

Basically, she was deciding what she wanted to pay for the fennel. She left four stickers behind, all decreasing in price, all for potatoes.

I’m normally all for being empathetic towards people on a budget, especially a fixed budget like an pension, and I know about the col crisis. But this was fennel, in Waitrose. She was LOADED with gold jewelry and had a small LV crossbody bag. She can afford 98p (the fifth sticker price) for a bulb of fennel. It made me half want to tell someone on my way out to double check her shopping scan.

No AIBU I suppose. I’m just properly cross. This isn’t the 80s anymore. Things cost more than they used to. Fennel shouldn’t be expensive - but it is. That’s how it is for everyone, and for more essential stuff than bloody vegetables. They don’t steal. She was blatantly stealing, and it was the repeated effort, and the sneakiness and slyness in the way she did it that made me so cross.

I genuinely don’t understand this response. Everybody is impacted by theft and the consequential price hikes it causes. Or is it just because it’s Waitrose that you think it doesn’t matter?

I agree with you OP and I would have said loudly “ do you want help with that? There is the symbol for fennel “

Hopefully that would shame her and make her think twice before doing it again.

Now that would serve her right!

TBF, fennel is really expensive in the uk. Like inexplicably expensive - it’s half the price in Europe, god knows why. I don’t go round pinching it, but I would buy it more often if it was cheaper…

Exactly. I’m amazed how many people are ridiculing OP and making sarcastic comments.

If shoplifting is no-one’s business, which other crimes does this go for? Just so we’re all straight. Presumably if you were being mugged in the street you’d want a bystander to do something about it right? But we’re not allowed to care about shoplifting so where is the line between the two?

I saw a man do this, he had spring onions but selected leeks, I was that 🤏🏻 close to telling him they were spring onions before I realised he was deliberately deceitful.
I don't agree with people doing it but I wouldn't challenge them.

So I guess you're saying you wouldn't want me to mind my own business with a serious crime then. But where do you draw the line? We should ignore shoplifting according to you, but what if I see someone stealing your wallet? Should I look the other way or not? And if not, why not? If it's ok (according to you) to steal from Waitrose, why isn't it ok to steal from you?

I had this happen once (in a Sainsbury's, with a man wearing nothing that was especially notable). At the s/service till. He passed something, an avocado possibly, off as an onion. I told him that I saw what he was doing and was going to tell security on my way out. He called me a bitch and then frantically waved the assistant over to say he'd made a mistake etc etc.

I think it’s quite enterprising tbh 😉

I wonder if the responses would have been the same of the person as male

Just read an article about this group in The Times.

https://youcanjustdostuff.com/

I think the world divides into people who will give up their weekend to clear graffiti on trains for free, and folk who think shoplifting fennel is fair game.

Of course it's theft. And why many self check outs have cameras and all sorts of other technology and security upgrades to try and prevent it. Although it's likely chain and area dependent.

Since the introduction of self check outs, some supermarkets have found they've apparently sold a lot more potatoes, carrots and onions and a lot fewer cherries, courgettes and yes, fennel.