AIBU to ask if shoplifting has effectively been decriminalised?

[IsawwhatIsaw]

I know there have been previous threads about shoplifting.
here’s another one, as I just heard our small local supermarket lost around 50 bottles of wine in a few minutes the other night.
apparently 3 men came in with big bags and set about clearing the wine shelves. Then casually walked out.
This shop has continuous shoplifting but not usually on this scale. Think more sweets, sandwiches, meat.
And there are very few staff in there now because of self service tills . Maybe the supermarket feels slashing staff numbers still works out cheaper the man stopping any theft deterrent .
so my Aibu is to ask whether shoplifting has been effectively decriminalized.

Our local Boots closed down because of the shoplifting.

How do other countries deal with shoplifters? Or is it just as bad all over the world?

Yeah its pretty much a free for all in the UK now. Anything goes, EFF the business owners, F honesty!

I’m a former supermarket worker. Neither workers or security guards are to follow shoplifters out of the store-if you leave the store, you’re on your own-no support from the company and apparently no insurance. I used to work the late shift alone (very large store) from 10-midnight with no security, and people would walk out carrying televisions. I left them to it and recorded it for the morning.

Police are too busy dealing with hurty words, as in the case of Lesbian Nanna.

There are so many things shops can do to stop this. I don't understand why they aren't doing them.

I feel utterly stupid now, paying for stuff.

I was once in a boots whilst it was being robbed. A guy walked in with a bag I could fit in and emptied into it most of the contents of the cosmetics aisle. It was the second time in a week that the store had need done. There was an announcement over the tanoy that they were on CCTV, the staff stayed behind the counter as the previous week when a staff member approached the thief they had been assaulted.
He then sauntered out as if he was another customer. He must had taken £1000+ worth of products

Such as what? It’s not the staffs responsibility to follow/chase people and grab the stock back. No security guard anymore at my place haven’t had one since before Covid

Why don't the shops employ people to stop it?

Gates to block exit without receipts, making doors smaller/only opening certain doors, not keeping expensive stock out front or on display, employing shop assistants to be actual shop assistants and advise on purchases instead of actively encouraging the free-for-all we have now.

to be fair,thats what dp said
i only waited as i didnt want someone chasing me out and making a fuss in the car park
i had the receipt in my purse (it scanned a full £1.05! the ticket price was over a tenner)
not one person came near me but it wasnt for the lack of trying to alert someone

a friend of mine has a son who worked at budgins and he was forever catching shoplifters
the police asked (told) him to stop as he was making their figures look bad!
it shut down 6 months after he left

shoplifting is now lawless it seems

A friend is manager of a big tesco, and they are not allowed to approach shoplifters. The security guard is there for show only.
Apparently this rule was brought in because previously a guard did tackle a shoplifter, had his arm broken in the process, and promptly sued tesco for far more than their shoplifting losses.

It certainly seems that way.

I can sit in my local Greggs for 40 minutes, and see at least 2 instances of shoplifting in that time. Often the same faces, and then chancers who see them do it and think why not (one time it was 2 young teens who tried, but I pretended to film with them my phone and they gave up).
They are so brazen, and don't care. I feel like a mug for paying 20p extra to sit in and watch them get freebies all the time.

I work in loss prevention in retail.
Shoplifting has been a 'priority' for some local police forces & to be fair if the person is identified & the whole offence is covered by CCTV or witnessed then they do act - arrest that person, charge & court. Where I work there is about 60% of shoplifting offences result in prosecution.

They run stills from our CCTV through facial recognition tech which should pick up anyone who has come to police attention before. It tends to be the local small scale shoplifters who are caught whereas the large ORC 'gangs' evade prosecution as the cases are more complex & sophisticated. The major retailers collaborate to share info on ORC (organized retail crime) to identify those that pose the biggest threat to businesses.

There is a lot that goes on behind the scenes to tackle ORC & persistent offenders. It might not look obvious when you see someone run out with some booze but there is a lot of work being done.

Sentencing can be frustrating -we had a prolific shoplifter who received a 6 month prison sentence. She was released after 10 days!!

Sentences need to be much longer for shoplifters. Repeat offenders should get a minimum of one year, with no early release for "good behaviour". And that should be in a real prison, without the free playstations and range of free food.

We never chopped hands off in this country. We hanged people. A lot.

We also put people in stocks in the town square so everyone could see them, and throw rubbish at them, if they were so minded.

I don't think we should bring back hanging.

There is no room in prisons, and people are walking the street having committed worse because there is nowhere to put them.

I saw this happen once in Tesco's.
The guy strolled right past the Security guard with 3 bottles of Spirits and some other booze.
I shouted to the SG "That Guy just walked past you without paying, stop him".
He did not, and when I asked why, he replied, "What can you do he's known for it."
Flabbergasted, I said, "Right, I can fill my trolley, and walk out without paying , and you are not going to stop me.
He said of course not, that man is known for it, you are not.
Believe me the conversation went on for a long time, but the upshot was that a thief can get away with it, an honest person cannot. And "Yes", I did report it to management, but was more or less given the same answer as the SG gave me.
Apparently if you are a seasoned shoplifter you're not worth the hassle it would entail.
Makes you proud to be British doesn't it?

I haven’t seen it but all these posts sound terrible.

My sister worked in retail for years. She said the authorities weren’t interested unless the goods stolen totalled more than £100.

I was sitting in a rest area in our local shopping centre. A woman nearby was showing her mates the meat she had just bought from a shoplifter. Several nice pieces of steak. I thought you are worse than the shoplifter. They took a risk, and you have benefited from it. The receivers of stolen property are as bad, if not worse, than those doing the stealing.

So shops don’t bother to report because it seems like nothing is done, police don’t come out, prison sentences are jokes. I would call this a breakdown in law and order.
i can see shops closing because its not viable to deal with this level of theft.

As stated, there is so much tech that could be used to stop shop lifting.

Door entry with access meter card
Exit only allowed with scanned receipt or having to go through security
Deposit to enter shop paid
Higher price items behind a literal paywall - like a vending machine
Argos type of shopping where you scan what you want, pay before accessing goods that are robotically delivered to you.
Recognition of items in basket that tots up value as you shop

Payment areas to go from fresh produce to tinned to frozen you have to pay for what you have for each section

Would be interesting to see if there is a link between under-age shop-lifting and things like: smacking ban, single parenting, parents working/not working, truancy rates at the local school, local school teacher turnover rates, an interesting one would be the # of non parental older figures active in the childrens lives etc I suspect most issues are related to the general community rather than anything else.

There is no ban on adults hitting people smaller than themselves children in England and NI, but it is banned in Wales and Scotland.
If you're thinking of schools, corporal punishment in state schools was banned in the UK by 1987, earlier in inner London, so we're looking at close to forty years of very complicated data.

Here's a summary of a longitudinal study that is about teens and some crimes. Even the researchers said the variables were so complex that simple analysis was very difficult.

https://cls.ucl.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Shoplifting-and-neighbourhood-crime-at-age-17-CLS-Policy-Briefing.pdf