Shoplifters are getting away with it more than ever - here is how
11 months, 1 week ago

Shoplifters are getting away with it more than ever - here is how

The Independent  

The thing is, do they really need my money?” asks Sophie*, who is not using her real name for obvious reasons. “With the reduction of service you get in a lot of shops, a lot of people go in and think, ‘Well this didn’t scan,’ or ‘It’s very difficult to scan these things through and I shop here all the time’; ‘It’s not my fault, I’m owed it.’” “At the moment, to be honest, they’re all busy seasons for us,” says Lauren Paver, commercial director at Triton Security, which works with some of the biggest businesses in the UK. They’re thinking, ‘Well, I spent enough money in here, and I’m only taking back £2.’ They’re justifying their attitude.” Sophie says her mum – a white, middle-class, well-spoken woman – would often hold products in her hand while paying, and when asked to pay for them would simply say “I think we’ve spent enough money in here” and walk off. “In Waitrose, for example, Mum would scan half of the products through the till saying: ‘One for me, one for you, one for me, one for you.’” Have they ever been caught? “Now it might be a ‘professional’ thief, or someone hungry – or just someone who walked into a store and fancied a lobster on Christmas Day.”

History of this topic

Britain's most brazen shoplifters: Experts say high streets have turned into Wild West with staff helpless to stop tide of thieves targeting their stores
4 weeks, 1 day ago
I'm a professional shoplifter and I can make £5,000 a day - if shops go out of business that's not my fault, they should have better security
4 weeks, 1 day ago
Britain has turned from a nation of shopkeepers into a nation of shoplifters – and we’re all paying a shocking price
1 month, 1 week ago
Inside Surrey's shoplifting capital: From the mother-daughter duos working in tandem to well-heeled women stashing goods up their jumpers, how traders in Haslemere have been forced to install panic bu
2 months ago
Shoplifting soars in England and Wales by staggering amount
2 months ago
Inside Britain's new shoplifting capital: Interactive map reveals pilfering 'havens' where light-fingered locals are ransacking stores the most - so how bad is YOUR town?
2 months, 1 week ago
Police failure to share shoplifters' details costs retailers €4m
2 months, 1 week ago
Well-spoken woman, 50, accused of shoplifting a bottle of white wine after walking out of east London store with it under her coat blames 'memory problems' when she's confronted
2 months, 4 weeks ago
Shoplifting in my store is so bad I've had to make 50 citizen's arrests myself - it's the only way I can get the police to turn up!
3 months, 2 weeks ago
Shoplifting epidemic adds 10p ‘crime tax’ to every transaction as minister vows end to ‘shameful neglect’ of retail crime
4 months, 3 weeks ago
The UK's shoplifting hotspots: Interactive map reveals areas with highest number of store thefts - as inquiry finds number of reported crimes are a just a 'drop in the ocean'
4 months, 3 weeks ago
Stop trivialising ‘devastating’ high street thefts, police urged
4 months, 4 weeks ago
Britain's shoplifting shame: Stores are suffering two thefts every minute as retail theft hits highest level since records began
5 months, 1 week ago
Shoplifting at an all-time high with 1,300 offences recorded every day, new figures show
5 months, 1 week ago
I lost a baby over stress of thefts from my store: Shoplifting costs Scottish retailers more than £60m a year but why DO shop owners like Natalie feel so utterly abandoned by the police, courts and MS
6 months ago
Northumbria shoplifter banned from all but three shops after racking up 171 convictions
6 months, 2 weeks ago
Revealed: 12 organised crime gangs are behind a quarter of all shoplifting in England and Wales, with some brazen offenders flying into the UK to steal before fleeing on the same day
8 months, 1 week ago
The theft epidemic and ‘terrifying’ violence plaguing Britain’s shopkeepers
8 months, 2 weeks ago
Inside Britain’s ‘out of control’ shoplifting crisis as even pound shops are targeted
10 months, 1 week ago
Britain's police 'aren't interested' in tackling shoplifting anymore, Marks & Spencer's boss claims - as store theft offences surge to the highest level ever
10 months, 2 weeks ago
M&S boss says police no longer interested in tackling shoplifting
10 months, 3 weeks ago
Keir Starmer pledges to toughen laws on shoplifting and scrap the £200 theft threshold
11 months ago
Keir Starmer puts shoplifters ‘on notice’ in crackdown on epidemic of thefts and assaults on retail workers
11 months ago
Met has worst rate for solving shoplifting cases
11 months, 1 week ago
Shoplifting offences rise to highest level since records began: Store thefts jump by more than a THIRD compared to 2022 - with 430,104 offences recorded in last 12 months, figures show
11 months, 1 week ago
Thieves ransack a Boots store just round the corner from a police station while staff watch on - as shoplifting wave sweeps lawless London
11 months, 1 week ago
Labour blames ‘shoplifter’s charter’ for rising store thefts
11 months, 2 weeks ago
Moment shoplifter punches Tesco worker in car park after she's caught stealing four bottles of vodka
11 months, 2 weeks ago
Police urged to crack down on violence against retail workers amid record shoplifting offences
1 year, 1 month ago
UK gripped by epidemic of another kind as shoplifting at record high while police turn blind eye
1 year, 3 months ago
Is YOUR area a shoplifter's paradise? Shocking interactive map reveals where thieves are getting away scot-free… with just a 5% conviction rate in worst region
1 year, 3 months ago
Don't beg or borrow, just steal: European gangs exploiting trafficked women and children in UK shoplifting epidemic
1 year, 3 months ago
Private force prosecutes 300 shoplifters
1 year, 5 months ago
Police pledge shoplifting crackdown with facial recognition to make ‘hostile environment’ for thieves
1 year, 5 months ago
Police resist demands to respond to every case of shoplifting
1 year, 5 months ago
The shocking rise of shoplifting: Map reveals retail theft hotspots across Britain after 365,000 cases in the past year - so is YOUR area on the list?
1 year, 5 months ago
Shopkeepers take the law into their own hands in war against shoplifting epidemic
1 year, 5 months ago
Shoplifting hits record high of 1,000 offences a day
1 year, 5 months ago
Home Bargains set up ‘confidential hotline’ to report shoplifting with £500 reward
1 year, 5 months ago
The brazen shoplifters now targeting charity shops: CCTV captures thieves stealing clothes, a TV and even a WIG from stores - as new national police unit is launched to crackdown on Britain's shoplift
1 year, 6 months ago
Suella Braverman must stop the shoplifters, says RUTH SUNDERLAND
1 year, 6 months ago
We live in the shoplifting capital of Britain... it's completely LAWLESS, we've given up on the police
1 year, 6 months ago
UK's shoplifting capitals: Interactive map reveals the places where light-fingered locals are ransacking stores the worst - so how bad is YOUR area?
1 year, 6 months ago
‘We kept him for two hours. But the police never came’: the reality on the shoplifting frontline
1 year, 6 months ago
Scotland's hidden epidemic of crime as shoplifters, domestic abusers and even sex criminals escape with a slap on wrist
1 year, 6 months ago
Shoplifting is now an epidemic, says John Lewis boss
1 year, 6 months ago
Thieves target stores every TWO seconds in Britain, costing retailers more than £1billion last year alone, shocking figures show - as Suella Braverman backs a Mail campaign to end the shoplifting epid
1 year, 6 months ago
Arrest shoplifters even if they steal goods under £200, says policing minister
1 year, 7 months ago
Mapped: Areas of the UK with the highest levels of shoplifting
1 year, 7 months ago

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