Apprehending a shoplifter might seem simple enough. You suspect someone of stealing from your store; you stop them and demand that they give you your merchandise back. In the most general terms, that is pretty much what happens. This is, however, a very glossed over view of a shoplifting situation.
When you are faced with an actual or suspected shoplifting incident in your store, there are so many potential variables that one must be aware of to be able to determine, within that moment, what you have a right to do, and what you legally cannot do. Loss prevention training from a loss prevention seminar can help you muddle through the myriad of possibilities that might point your decisions in one particular way or another.
Did you know that as a retailer you could exercise your right to verify a customer’s receipt? If you suspect that product has not been paid for by a customer- intentionally or by human error- you may politely ask to see their receipt. If a product was rung up incorrectly, or not at all, you may ask the customer if they would like to purchase the item.
They have the right to either make the purchase, or leave the merchandise with you. You cannot force them to buy any item. It is no different than forcing any other customer to make a purchase. You can only retain the product that was not paid for. If the item was rung up incorrectly, and the customer does not want the item at the correct price, you will need to give them a refund for the erroneous charge.
Keep in mind that you should exercise good decision-making during this process. Depending upon the situation (such as a bad price label, or an employee training issue) you may opt to let the customer go without validating their receipt and correcting your operational error on your own.
If you do make the decision that the customer needs to be involved and their receipt validated, you may ask to see their receipt, but they do not have to give it to you. The customer has every right to leave without allowing you to check the purchase. If you make an attempt to force them to stay, you can be charged with an unlawful detainment.
This is part of why it is important to understand why you are trying to validate a customer’s receipt. If you have a policy to validate every receipt, you need to make sure every single customer purchased is checked, so no one feels singled out. If you are using an EAS alarm activation as a reason, you are only looking to make sure an error did not occur in the purchase- such as an item accidentally overlooked.
If you truly suspect that this is a shoplifting incident, you should use your loss prevention training and make sure that proper steps have been made to validate the theft. You should not be making apprehensions off of a receipt validation. This will leave you exposed to the possibility of a bad stop and loss of potentially honest customers.
For more information on Loss Prevention Seminars, Loss Prevention Training, or Loss Prevention Workshop contact us or call 1.770.426.0547 – Atlanta Georgia
Visit the Loss Prevention Systems website for more information on Retail Employee Theft and Retail Shoplifting problems and view the Retail Loss Prevention Seminars, Retail Loss Prevention Training and Retail Loss Prevention Workshop we offer to help with your Employee Theft and Shoplifting problems.
Apprehending a shoplifter might seem simple enough. You suspect someone of stealing from your store; you stop them and demand that they give you your merchandise back. In the most general terms, that is pretty much what happens. This is, however, a very glossed over view of a shoplifting situation.
When you are faced with an actual or suspected shoplifting incident in your store, there are so many potential variables that one must be aware of to be able to determine, within that moment, what you have a right to do, and what you legally cannot do. Loss prevention training from a loss prevention seminar can help you muddle through the myriad of possibilities that might point your decisions in one particular way or another.
Did you know that as a retailer you could exercise your right to verify a customer’s receipt? If you suspect that product has not been paid for by a customer- intentionally or by human error- you may politely ask to see their receipt. If a product was rung up incorrectly, or not at all, you may ask the customer if they would like to purchase the item.
They have the right to either make the purchase, or leave the merchandise with you. You cannot force them to buy any item. It is no different than forcing any other customer to make a purchase. You can only retain the product that was not paid for. If the item was rung up incorrectly, and the customer does not want the item at the correct price, you will need to give them a refund for the erroneous charge.
Keep in mind that you should exercise good decision-making during this process. Depending upon the situation (such as a bad price label, or an employee training issue) you may opt to let the customer go without validating their receipt and correcting your operational error on your own.
If you do make the decision that the customer needs to be involved and their receipt validated, you may ask to see their receipt, but they do not have to give it to you. The customer has every right to leave without allowing you to check the purchase. If you make an attempt to force them to stay, you can be charged with an unlawful detainment.
This is part of why it is important to understand why you are trying to validate a customer’s receipt. If you have a policy to validate every receipt, you need to make sure every single customer purchased is checked, so no one feels singled out. If you are using an EAS alarm activation as a reason, you are only looking to make sure an error did not occur in the purchase- such as an item accidentally overlooked.
If you truly suspect that this is a shoplifting incident, you should use your loss prevention training and make sure that proper steps have been made to validate the theft. You should not be making apprehensions off of a receipt validation. This will leave you exposed to the possibility of a bad stop and loss of potentially honest customers.
For more information on Loss Prevention Seminars, Loss Prevention Training, or Loss Prevention Workshop contact us or call 1.770.426.0547 – Atlanta Georgia
Visit the Loss Prevention Systems website for more information on Retail Employee Theft and Retail Shoplifting problems and view the Retail Loss Prevention Seminars, Retail Loss Prevention Training and Retail Loss Prevention Workshop we offer to help with your Employee Theft and Shoplifting problems.
While there are many ways that you can shrink your liquor inventory through employee theft, bottle services are one such way where the inventory dollars lost can escalate quickly. Having secured controls on your inventory and the operating procedures for your host staff will help to reduce some of those potential liabilities.
When you evaluate the execution procedures for your bottle services, you might start to pinpoint areas where a breakdown can occur, making theft easier and far less detectable. Let’s explore some of the methods and breakdowns that we have seen in various nightclubs and entertainment venues that have lead to employee theft.
One of the easiest ways a waitress or hostess can sneak entire bottles out of your inventory without you realizing it is when these employees have a carte blanche access to the inventory. On one hand it makes logistical sense to allow these employees to bring out bottles for their tables at their discretion and time frame. Having to involve another bartender or manager to get the bottles not only makes the service take longer, but also eliminates the sales that could be made by that bartender if they were not caught up retrieving bottles.
Unfortunately, without that check and balance you have no way to monitor how many bottles are leaving your storerooms and if they are actually being paid for. We have found that losses of this nature occur even unintentionally. A waitress that is distracted during a busy service and forgets to charge for an additional bottle that was served still incurs a loss, even if it was not intentionally stolen.
The next part of having open access to full liquor bottles is that a waitress might take a bottle under the premise that it is for one table, but actually gives it to another party. This can happen with other tables that have paid for a bottle service, but it also can be given to other patrons that do not have the service.
When you work in a club over a length of time, you start to know and befriend your regular customers. Some employees may take advantage of open access to the bar’s inventory to help their new friends out.
Some ways this can be prevented is by limiting who has access to bottle inventory. There can be a policy in place that all inventory must be rung up, tallied, etc before it leaves a stock room. Wait staff can be limited to only one table, if they are seen at another table, which should raise questions as to their involvement. Finally, if patrons are seen with full bottles (instead of portioned cups) beyond VIP tables and areas, questions should be raised as to why they have a full bottle in their possession.
Managers, bartenders, and even security should keep an eye out for these potential signs of losses at the hands of an employee. It is one thing to have losses from a bartender over pouring, or handing out a few extra drinks. Having a wait staff hand out entire bottles of liquor for free is a completely different escalation of profit loss.
For more information on Bottle Caps, Bottle Lock, Bottle Locks, EASy Bottle or Bottle Services in your Nightclub please contact us at Bottle Service or call 1.770.426.0547
All of the most prominent nightclubs, bars and venues in New York, Chicago, Miami, Atlanta, New Orleans, Dallas, Denver, Phoenix, Albuquerque, Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Diego, Virginia Beach, Washington D.C., and Las Vegas use Bottle Services for their best clientele. Don’t let your nightclub miss out on this VIP experience.
While there are many ways that you can shrink your liquor inventory through employee theft, bottle services are one such way where the inventory dollars lost can escalate quickly. Having secured controls on your inventory and the operating procedures for your host staff will help to reduce some of those potential liabilities.
When you evaluate the execution procedures for your bottle services, you might start to pinpoint areas where a breakdown can occur, making theft easier and far less detectable. Let’s explore some of the methods and breakdowns that we have seen in various nightclubs and entertainment venues that have lead to employee theft.
One of the easiest ways a waitress or hostess can sneak entire bottles out of your inventory without you realizing it is when these employees have a carte blanche access to the inventory. On one hand it makes logistical sense to allow these employees to bring out bottles for their tables at their discretion and time frame. Having to involve another bartender or manager to get the bottles not only makes the service take longer, but also eliminates the sales that could be made by that bartender if they were not caught up retrieving bottles.
Unfortunately, without that check and balance you have no way to monitor how many bottles are leaving your storerooms and if they are actually being paid for. We have found that losses of this nature occur even unintentionally. A waitress that is distracted during a busy service and forgets to charge for an additional bottle that was served still incurs a loss, even if it was not intentionally stolen.
The next part of having open access to full liquor bottles is that a waitress might take a bottle under the premise that it is for one table, but actually gives it to another party. This can happen with other tables that have paid for a bottle service, but it also can be given to other patrons that do not have the service.
When you work in a club over a length of time, you start to know and befriend your regular customers. Some employees may take advantage of open access to the bar’s inventory to help their new friends out.
Some ways this can be prevented is by limiting who has access to bottle inventory. There can be a policy in place that all inventory must be rung up, tallied, etc before it leaves a stock room. Wait staff can be limited to only one table, if they are seen at another table, which should raise questions as to their involvement. Finally, if patrons are seen with full bottles (instead of portioned cups) beyond VIP tables and areas, questions should be raised as to why they have a full bottle in their possession.
Managers, bartenders, and even security should keep an eye out for these potential signs of losses at the hands of an employee. It is one thing to have losses from a bartender over pouring, or handing out a few extra drinks. Having a wait staff hand out entire bottles of liquor for free is a completely different escalation of profit loss.
For more information on Bottle Caps, Bottle Lock, Bottle Locks, EASy Bottle or Bottle Services in your Nightclub please contact us at Bottle Service or call 1.770.426.0547
All of the most prominent nightclubs, bars and venues in New York, Chicago, Miami, Atlanta, New Orleans, Dallas, Denver, Phoenix, Albuquerque, Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Diego, Virginia Beach, Washington D.C., and Las Vegas use Bottle Services for their best clientele. Don’t let your nightclub miss out on this VIP experience.
If you are aware of library asset theft, then you more than likely have fielded an increasing number of complaints from students who have had things stolen from them while inside the library. If you take a closer look at the situation, you will probably discover that the root cause of your issues comes from not having a library theft detection system.
If students or administrators are aware of theft issues of “monitored” library resources, can they be convinced that the student body population will not also become victims of theft?
When resources like magazines, reference materials or electronics start to go missing, students start to view their library as unreliable. They are forced to seek outside resources to complete school projects, research assignments or just enjoy the quiet a library provides.
If the library is slowly becoming unreliable, but also is deemed unsafe, the reputation of the school is also damaged. The perception of an unsafe library can make the entire school deemed as unsafe, or seedy.
This can create a downward spiral as student enrollment drops, and alternative sources of funding are no longer available.
The nice thing is that this situation can easily be avoided through the installation of Checkpoint Systems for library theft prevention.
Visit the Loss Prevention Store to purchase Library Theft Detection System devices and your Electronic Article Surveillance or EAS system from Checkpoint Systems to stop inventory losses.
For more information on a Library Theft Detection System, Library Theft Prevention, or a Checkpoint System and how they can work with your Electronic Article Surveillance or EAS system contact us at Retail theft prevention to stop inventory losses in your library or call 1.770.426.0547
