Minor Annoyances (Vol 2)

[Tamura]

The other Sunday at the Tesco where I work there were about six teenage lads about to go through the security alarm barrier when it went mental. They just did a runner while the security guard just stood behind his desk looking useless, despite the fact that if he'd been paying attention to his monitors he might have spotted them stashing what were presumably bottles of spirits in their clothes, and been ready for a more pro-active response. I've yet to see any wanted photos for these desperate criminals, so I'm guessing monitoring scan as you go is even less likely to happen. That said the last time I went in the local Sainsbury's it wouldn't let me check out my £4 basket of shopping without it being audited, and since there was nobody to actually do the auditing I walked out in disgust. I didn't even want to scan as I shopped anyway, but they make you do it to get personalised Nectar card discounts. So I wrote them a scathing review online and said it wasn't worth the effort involved to get a 20p discount.

[davertfnewman]

Although I'm sure there's a bit less danger from some teenagers, workers in shops do sometimes have some really unsavoury people helping themselves to stuff and if they went after them it would be more trouble than it's worth. I was in a shop in a pretty rough area and someone just picked something up and took it, with the assistant trying to get them. I said to him, as galling as it was, that he's better off leaving it and reporting it than getting too close and catching his hand on a needle and having to get tested and treated.

[Cousin Jim Bob]

Security staff in shops are meant to be more of a visual deterrent. They are getting paid minimum wage, so expecting them to tackle 6 people running out the door is a bit much. 

[Tim Healys Chutney Spoon]

The security guard in my local Tesco told me that they aren't actually allowed to chase after people stealing food and drink now. All they can do is stop someone if they see them stealing or check people's bags if the alarm goes off. 

 

Like you say, more a visual deterrent than anything else but if you know they cant do anything then what's the point really?

[Devon Malcolm]

When I worked in Sainsbury's in Redhill (you won't get a grimmer start to a story than that) we were told never to engage shoplifters (not that I ever would, especially if they have food) and leave it to the security guard.

One evening this girl just saunters towards the exit with armfuls of packets of meat. This jobsworth that I worked with decided, "Yeah I can have her". Puts his hand on her shoulder to turn her round, she judo throws him on the floor, knees him in the bollocks four times, picks up the packs of meat she's dropped, and walks out. The security guard was out back having a cig.

[BomberPat]

When I worked in a garage, my boss - a real small town fantasist and such a miserable moaning git that regulars used to ask for my shift pattern every week so they could avoid coming in when he was working - showed me on the first day how he kept a proper Big Boss Man nightstick under the till, and how if anyone ever tried to hold us up for cash I was to remember it was there.

Sod off mate, you're paying me minimum wage for a job I hate, if anyone tries to rob me I'm helping him empty the till and sending him on his way, and you can let the insurance sort it out.

Same place had signs up about CCTV, and when I had to do a witness statement from there for the police and was asked if I had access to to the footage, I had to explain that we didn't actually have CCTV at all, the boss just put the signs up because he thought that would be enough of a deterrent that he wouldn't have to bother actually paying out for it.

[Statto]

The security guard in the Sainsbury's over the road from me is Big f'n Joe of deathmatch fame. I like to think the light tubes come out whenever there's an issue.

[gmoney]

I absolutely would never have dreamt of engaging a shoplifter when I worked in retail, and would in fact turn a blind eye completely, even if I saw it happening. I wish I could say because I am some sort of revolutionary comrade, but in actual fact it was because I could not be arsed with any extra hassle, which reporting it would have inevitably caused.

[WyattSheepMask]

We’re instructed to not engage with anyone we suspect of shoplifting, just to pass on any info to mangers or Security if they’re in on the day. The company makes it very clear that it’s not worth the potential confrontation and that our safety is paramount.

Not that of that stops one woman that I work with. She can be a right nasty piece of work with anyone she “suspects” of being a shoplifter. At various points she’s uttered such gems as “Watch them, they’ve got a bag”,  “Watch them, they look Romanian” and “Watch him, there’s a bike outside”. No evidence to support any kind of reason as to why she suspects any of them, I don’t know how someone “looks Romanian” or why she just decided that this bike belonged to the first person she didn’t like the look of, or godforbid someone out shopping would have a bag with them, she just thinks everyone is on the rob at all times. 
She definitely has a type that she suspects and it’s not the ‘White British’ type, but she’ll always tell someone else to watch who she suspects, she won’t usually deal with it herself, but every now again she’ll pretend to get onto “plain clothes security” (which we don’t have) and make out that there being called to deal with a different shoplifter, one who doesn’t exist. 
One of these days someone’s going to call her bluff and we’re going to right in the shit because of her

Edited January 28 by WyattSheepMask

[davertfnewman]

I worked at Blockbuster years ago and we had a lot of drug addicts who would steal things to probably sell on. I was of the opinion then as I am now to let the police deal with them but we had a manager who looked like a tall version of Postman Pat who thought he was a policeman and eventually switched careers to be one. He went running after some one day and they got away but dropped something he could pick up and bring back. He attributed that to "I ROARED at them!".

[Accident Prone]

When I worked at Staples, the policy was to passive-aggressively engage the thief. So if you saw them pocket something, you were meant to hand them a basket and say something like "We have baskets for those sir!", or if you saw someone rip open a packet and empty the contents you were meant to hand them an unopened one and say something like, "Oh you'd be better off with this one here, it's packaging isn't damaged, I can take you to a till and get you sorted". This came from the same minds who thought the way round customers declining unwanted help from a store assistant was to greet them with "Hello! What can I help you find today?" as if it was utterly impossible for a human to comprehend a response to this dazzling question that wasn't "No I'm okay, thanks". And they PUSHED that line of thinking hard. Proper exec suit behaviour.

Just fucking absurd, and of course no one followed it except for the team leaders and sales managers.

Edited January 28 by Accident Prone

[SuperBacon]

6 hours ago, davertfnewman said:

He attributed that to "I ROARED at them!".

Wow, what a difference.

[Tamura]

Without security guards challenging shopilifters we'd never have had urban sprinting though.
 

 

Edited January 28 by Tamura

[Browser Brady]

Politely waited in an important Teams call to make a very valid technical point only for someone else to interrupt and make the same observation and receive all the verbal kudos.

 

I wanted to be metaphorically patted on the head and be told that i was “good doggie”..

 

 

Gutted. 

Edited January 28 by Browser Brady

[wordsfromlee]

I worked in a supermarket for ten years (because I was a real go-getting with high ambitions and a vigor for life) and I’m pretty sure more stuff was stolen by the staff than anyone else. 
 

One lad I worked with, one his last day, sold a TV to one of his mates who came in to buy one. He went in the back to get it, opened the box, stuffed it full of DVDs and Blu rays then taped it back up. 
 

There was another bloke who everyone loved. The sweetest bloke you’d ever meet who’d come in shopping on his days off with his heavily disabled son who he was also a full time carer for. He got arrested during work after he was caught piling boxes of FIFA games straight off the delivery lorry into his car boot. The police went to his house and found a bunch of unopened laptops, blu rays, tvs etc but couldn’t prove that they were stolen. Someone who drank in the same pub as him tipped the store off as he’d been selling tons of stuff in there so the security watched him like a hawk for a few days and caught him knicking the PlayStation games.