Violence and abuse against people working in retail has almost doubled compared with before the covid pandemic, according to the British Retail Consortium (BRC). Its annual crime survey of members found that incidents, including racial and sexual abuse, physical assault, and threats with weapons, rose from a pre-covid high of 455 per day in 2019-20, to 867 a day in 2021-22, or 316,000 incidents in total.
Helen Dickinson, Chief Executive of the BRC, said: “The pandemic has normalised appalling levels of violent and abusive behaviour against retail workers. While a confrontation may be over in minutes, for many victims, their families and colleagues, the physical and emotional impact can last a lifetime. To make the UK a safer place to work the Home Office must improve its reporting around the amendment to the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act, and the police must prioritise adequately resourcing retail crime. Surely everyone deserves the right to go to work without fear.”
You can read the 50-page survey at the BRC website. The survey estimates eight million thefts from shops a year.
The cost of crime against UK retail – including spending on crime prevention of £722m, almost the same as the previous year – is put at £1.76 billion a year; in other words, the loss to crime itself is put at £1.04 billion, which includes £953m from customer theft. The report also covers cyber; spending on cyber crime prevention accounted for £151m, or more than a fifth of the total spent on crime prevention, a larger percentage than previously.
Prosecutions of offenders remain low (albeit growing) due to an inadequate police response, lack of evidence, or insufficient reporting by retailers, according to the report, which found a sharp fall in the number of incidents reported to police. Retailers as in previous years complained that reporting to police was too difficult, or retailers did not bother in the belief that nothing would happen. Larger retailers in particular rate response by police as poor or very poor.
Lead for Business Crime for the Association of Police and Crime Commissioners (APCC) is the Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC) for Sussex, Katy Bourne. She said: “The experiences reported across the UK in the BRC Annual Crime Survey mirror those I have been hearing about from businesses in Sussex. Too many shop workers are being abused and assaulted every day. Where store safety policies guide staff not to challenge offenders, this can lead customers and people living near shops to feel that criminal and anti-social behaviour is becoming normalised.
“It’s clear that we will only drive crime down by bridging some of the gaps that still remain in reporting processes, police response, criminal justice sanctions and a partnership approach to prevention.”
At the retail trade union Usdaw, Paddy Lillis, General Secretary, said: “Violence and abuse is not an acceptable part of the job and too many shop workers suffer all too often. Our joint campaigning with the BRC secured new protection of workers legislation, but to ensure that this is properly enforced, there must be adequate police resources and retail crime must be taken seriously.”
More detail
The survey found that all retail settings felt that incidents had increased, whether inner city and town centre; retail parks and out of town; or shopping centres. Among concerns cited by retailers: shoplifters have become more violent and do not care if they injure staff; there’s a lack of consequences for offenders; the ‘cost of living crisis’ according to
some has changed the nature of shoplifting from a few items stolen to many; more offenders are making threats to attack staff outside the store; and there’s more anti-social behaviour.
Two common triggers for violence, physical or verbal, are staff asking for customer identification for age verification (where failure to carry out the check such as for purchases of alcohol is a criminal offence for the employee) and stopping someone who is believed to be stealing (which as the survey shows is a cost for retailers). Many retailers, the report admits, are advising staff against confronting suspects because of its potential as a flashpoint (which offenders may get to know and take advantage of).
As for what to do, the BRC says that it’s important that retailers report all incidents: “At the same time, it is very clear that an improved police response and prosecution rate would encourage them to do so.” A simplified reporting mechanism common to all forces could help, the report adds. The BRC proposes that Government should permit the use of digital age verification and estimation for age checks.
Background
See Usdaw’s Freedom from Fear Campaign: www.usdaw.org.uk/Campaigns/Freedom-From-Fear. Retail Trust runs a free helpline for retail workers; and has launched a ‘Let’s Respect Retail’ campaign to encourage more kindness towards the UK’s three million retail workers; visit www.retailtrust.org.uk.
The BRC with the personal safety charity the Suzy Lamplugh Trust produced an animation for use by any retailer that wishes to show staff how to defuse a potentially violent situation. The association is running a Teams session for members on the survey next Tuesday afternoon, March 14.
