Retail Anti Theft Devices

Merchandise Return Fraud

December 30, 2015 by Staff Editor Leave a Comment

Shoplifting during the holidays is a big problem for retailers in the United States. The holiday season brings more customers into their stores, but shoplifters know this and they take advantage of this fact to go into the stores and walk out with hundreds of dollars in stolen merchandise. But after the holidays, you are dealing with another kind of fraud. Merchandise return fraud has seen an increase over the previous year, and retailers now have to deal with this problem after the holidays are over.

For more about this and other topics, follow the links below.

Post-Holiday Merchandise Return Fraud

Retail theft statistics show that the vast majority of returns are legitimate and part of doing business as a retailer.

Returns and return fraud are a big issue—and getting bigger. In 2014, $284 billion worth of retail merchandise was returned in the United States,according to the Retail Equation. That represented a 6.2% increase over the prior year, and 2015’s numbers are expected to grow even higher. Brick-and-mortar stores report returns in the 5-10 percent range. E-commerce retailers report numbers averaging 10-15 percent, with returns of apparel running as high as 20-30 percent. The research firm IHL Group estimates that, overall, returns cost retailers 4.4 percent in revenue that is lost on items that can’t be resold or must be discarded.

Within the retail loss prevention community, when returns are mentioned, most focus on return fraud. To be sure, it is a huge issue with volume estimated at $9.1 billion, again according to The Retail Equation. When return abuse is added in, that number jumps to an estimated $15.9 billion. But, as large as these numbers are, it is estimated that return fraud and abuse only make up about 6.1 percent of returns. So 94 percent of all return transactions (equating to $245 billion) are legitimate.

Retailers Estimate Holiday Return Fraud Will Cost Them $3.8 Billion, According to NRF Survey

WASHINGTON, December 19, 2014 – Techniques and processes put in place to thwart criminal activity around retailers’ return policies continue to be put to the test, and with steadily improving retail sales, even more is on the line when it comes to losses from return fraud.

According to the National Retail Federation’s 2014 Return Fraud Survey* completed by loss prevention executives at 60 retail companies representing grocery, department, discount, specialty and small retailers, the industry will lose an estimated $10.9 billion to return fraud this year. Additionally, of those surveyed, retailers estimate $3.8 billion will be lost to return fraud this holiday season alone, up slightly from last year’s $3.4 billion. Overall, retailers polled estimate 5.5 percent of holiday returns are fraudulent, similar to last year’s 5.8 percent.

“Today’s sophisticated technology does well keeping criminals at arm’s length but often isn’t enough to completely stop the unethical practices of organized and individual retail fraud occurrences,” said NRF Vice President of Loss Prevention Bob Moraca. “Return fraud has become an unfortunate trend in retail thanks to thieves taking advantage of retailers’ return policies to benefit from the cash or store credit they don’t deserve. Additionally, many of these return fraud instances are a direct result of larger, more experienced crime rings that continue to pose serious threats to retailers’ operations and their bottom lines.”

Reflects on How a Shoplifting Charge Changed Her Life

Shoplifting consequences that ended a 35-year career in journalism.

On February 11, 2012, officers of the Tucson Police Department cited former Tucson KVOA news anchor Martha Vazquez on a shoplifting charge. According to the report that was filed, Vazquez was cited for shoplifting at the Dillard’s in the Tucson Mall after a loss prevention officer observed her conceal an Eileen Fisher jacket value at $338.00. After she was detained, a search of her belongings also yielded a pair of Kenneth Cole sunglasses valued at $30 that had also been shoplifted.

Vazquez said that after the shoplifting charges ended her 35-year career in broadcast journalism, her life hit “rock bottom.” She resigned her prominent position, sank into a deep depression and left Tucson for Washington State. Now, Vazquez says the time that she spent out of the public eye in Washington after her incident in 2012, was “a healing journey.” She is now back in Tucson; is being treated for depression and says that she wants to help others.

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Shoplifting Prevention and Tips

December 22, 2015 by Staff Editor Leave a Comment

The security of your store during the holiday season is often tested to the limits by the quantity of customers and employees that enter your store daily. Preventing employee theft and shoplifting during this time of year is not something you expect to accomplish 100% of the time, but if you have preventive measures and procedures in place, you can minimize your loses and keep your employees and customers safe. If you need more tips or information about this topic, follow the links below to read more.

Business Owner’s Rights for Shoplifters

Shoplifting is a major expense for many businesses. A retailer suffers a loss from the unpaid merchandise, and it has the added expense of surveillance equipment and personnel. Each state enacts its own shoplifting laws that should be read by the prudent business owner. While an employee may be justifiably angry when he witnesses a crime in progress, he must follow the store policy or face the possibility of the thief suing him and the store for a violation of his civil rights.

Surveillance

Most consumers realize that the majority of stores have security cameras installed inside and outside the building. In addition, loss prevention specialists walk the aisles looking for suspicious activity and responding to alerts from the monitors. What people may not realize is that the insides of dressing rooms are under surveillance in at least one major department store. On July 21, 2011 Channel 10 News in Tampa Bay, Florida, reported that Macy’s flips the doors to dressing rooms so the slats face downward. This allows anyone — or any camera — outside the room to see in, although that’s not obvious to the customer inside the room trying on clothes.

SHOPLIFTERS STEAL AN AVERAGE OF $134 EACH TIME

November and December are peak months for shoplifting. Not really a surprise. Shoplifting increases 10 percent or more during the holidays, according to security companies.

Retailers are getting better at preventing shoplifting and recovering some of their merchandise, but the losses are still staggering. The average value of items stolen per case is $134.

Over $10 billion in merchandise is lost annually, according to University of Florida research of the nation’s largest retailers, and just $159 million in stolen merchandise was recovered in 2014. Another $82 million was recovered when the shoplifter got away.

Nearly 1.2 million shoplifters were caught in 2014, an increase in apprehensions of 7.4 percent over the previous year, according to the annual retail theft survey by Jack Hayes International, a loss prevention consulting firm. The survey included 25 large retailers with over $700 billion in sales and 23,250 stores.

10 Tips to Prevent Shoplifting

Shrinkage, or retail theft, can have a serious impact on your bottom line. The National Association for Shoplifting Prevention says more than $35 million worth of goods are stolen from retailers every day. And while all businesses are susceptible to shoplifting, some — like clothing, book and jewelry sellers — are more so.

While teaching your staff to spot and handle shoplifters properly is a crucial deterrent, you can also implement store design tactics to help prevent stealing. Here are 10 of the best ways your retail small business can deter shoplifters today:

Maximize Visibility: Keeping an eye on merchandise is the first step in loss prevention. Place shorter displays close to the register and taller displays near the perimeter of the store so all merchandise is completely visible from your perch. Use mirrors to eliminate any blind spots, and be sure to keep your store neat and tidy, so employees can tell at a glance if something is missing or out of place.

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Employee Theft

December 16, 2015 by Staff Editor Leave a Comment

Shoplifting costs the retail industry million of dollars daily. The harm done to the businesses and the economy in general is socially and economically harmful, but employee theft hurts the company’s culture, damages trust between owners and employees, and financially are responsible for billions of dollars that companies lose due to this horrible crime. For more about this topic follow the links below.

A New Employee Theft Study

An Analysis of Employee Theft at a Specialty Retailer.

When I was a doctoral graduate student at the University of Minnesota during the late 1970s, I began conducting research on employee theft. At the time this was an area of criminology that was virtually unexplored. I found that it was very hard to study this subject then, since few retailers were willing to let a social scientist have full access to the records on this subject. Over forty years later, the scholarly literature on dishonesty in the workplace is still understudied and poorly understood despite the best efforts of a handful of researchers.

As such, I am always on the lookout for new and cutting-edge research on this topic. This month I wish to share the results of a quality employee theft study that was recently published as a doctoral dissertation. The author is Dana N. Baxter. She completed her research while studying under Dr. Dennis Giever at Indiana University of Pennsylvania. She finished her dissertation this past spring and graduated in May. She is presently an assistant professor at Davis and Elkins College in West Virginia.

A Snapshot of Employee Theft in the US

The majority of employee thefts are occurring in organizations with 500 employees or less. The sizes and types of thefts vary by industry, but smaller organizations across the spectrum exhibited high incidences of embezzlement overall.

The unfortunate reality of employee theft is every organization is at risk.

When we looked at the totality of federal actions involving employee theft over the calendar year, nearly 72% involved organizations with fewer than 500 employees. Within that data set, we found that four of every five victim organizations had fewer than 100 employees; more than half had fewer than 25 employees. Is there a connection between the size of an organization and the size of the loss? Our research suggests that there may be. While some of the largest losses occurred in organizations with fewer than 50 employees, in the aggregate, we note the following:

U.S. retail workers are No. 1…in employee theft

Light-fingered employees cost American stores (and consumers) more than shoplifters do.

It’s almost Groundhog Day, but for retailers, the holiday season is finally winding down.

“The four months from October through January are when stores see not just their biggest sales volume of the year, but also the most returns and exchanges,” says Ernie Deyle, a 30-year veteran of the retail loss-prevention wars who leads the business consulting practice at London-based data analytics firm Sysrepublic. “Unfortunately, the same four months account for about half of all annual shrinkage.”

That shrinkage, made up of missing goods from shoplifting and other causes, costs U.S. retailers about $42 billion a year, according to the latest Global Retail Theft Barometer, an annual industry study led by Deyle and inventory management firm Checkpoint Systems.

Shoppers pay the price for such theft. The cost of mysteriously vanishing merchandise comes to $403 annually per U.S. household.

Of course, retailers everywhere deal with shrinkage, but there is one big difference between the U.S. and the rest of the world: Globally, dishonest employees are behind about 28% of inventory losses, while shoplifters account for a markedly higher 39%. Not so stateside, the study says, where employee theft accounts for 43% of lost revenue. That’s about $18 billion, or $2.3 billion more than the cost of five-finger discounts taken by customers.

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Preventing Shoplifting This Holiday Season

December 14, 2015 by Staff Editor Leave a Comment

By now the holiday season has been in full force for a few weeks, and the stress your management team, employees and security personnel are feeling is a bit overwhelming. Shoplifters during the holiday season are abundant, and police and retailers try to be more vigilant and proactive by implementing security measures during this time than at any other time of the year. Follow the links below for more information about this and other topics.

Police step up efforts for holiday crime

As the holiday season gets under way, local police are gearing up for the all-too-predictable spike in property crime.

Hanford police Capt. Pat Crowe said officers will be stepping up their game over the next few weeks to deter vehicle burglaries, robberies and other crimes typical of this time of year.

“Every [patrol] shift was tasked with coming up with their own holiday project,” Crowe said.

Crowe said those projects include probation and parole sweeps focusing on individuals with known histories of gang activity, drug-related offenses and property crimes. Foot patrols and motorcycle units will also increase their presence at the Hanford Mall and other major shopping centers.

“Our main focus is to be visible and hopefully deter criminals from doing what they’re going to do,” Crowe said.

Lemoore Police Chief Darrell Smith said each of his department’s patrol shifts also devised a plan to tackle holiday crime. The result was a number of special operations that will unfold through New Year’s Eve.

Police offer tips to stay safe during holidays

If you’re tempted to share your holiday plans or photographs of Christmas loot on social media, local law enforcement officials want you to think twice.

“We live in an age where people put so much information out there about themselves,” said Cindy Kozerow, crime prevention specialist with the Lynchburg Police Department.

“Do not announce on Facebook, ‘Hey, we’re going to grandma’s for the holidays,’ because what that says is ‘Hey, my house is empty, so come and steal my stuff.’”

She explained how the holidays present a unique opportunity for thieves looking to capitalize on people’s good will and sense of safety in their own homes.

Checking in at stores on social media pages or opening window curtains at night to show off decorations lets potential thieves know when your home is empty, and gives them a glimpse of goods stashed under your Christmas tree.

‘Shoplifting Season’ for local businesses

Rogue River, Ore — The holiday shopping season can mean trouble for local businesses as big crowds come in but some say they’re sick and tired of getting ripped off. Sometimes it’s as simple as a Facebook post.

In Rogue River the police are working with one local business to make sure their products stay on the shelves and don’t fall into the hands of thieves.

“We’re a small store, and it really hurts us,” said Justin Norris.

At Rogue River Pharmacy and variety store shoplifting is something assistant manager Justin Norris has to deal with far too often.

“Lately we’ve had a problem with people from out of town coming in and shoplifting,” said Norris.

Rogue River police are looking to put an end to it by posting pictures online of suspected shoplifters and suspicious persons, one of whom confronted a uniformed police officer before leaving empty handed Tuesday.

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Shoplifter Quick Tips

December 11, 2015 by Staff Editor Leave a Comment

Since you are in the middle of your Christmas selling season and do not have much spare time I wanted to give you a very brief list of important shoplifting prevention tips:

Impulse, amateur and professional shoplifters are all deterred by customer service. If you suspect shoplifting, pour on the customer service. They will get the message.

Shoplifters tend to hit when you are busy and not paying attention. Do not give them the opportunity, they will exploit it.

Some shoplifters work in teams. One person will distract as many of your staff as they can allowing their partners time to steal.

Greet EVERYONE who enters your store! Well, established studies have shown that a solid verbal greeting such as “Welcome to XXXX” WITH brief eye contact will deter most impulse shoplifters.

If you see or suspect a person has concealed your merchandise, customer service them “to death”. Try one of these:

“May I help you?”
“Can I show you a _____________ to go with (concealed item)”?
“Can I hold (concealed item) for you at the register?”
“Will this be a charge or cash sale?”
“May I ring this purchase for you?”

At checkout EVERY CUSTOMER should be asked, “Is there anything else”. There are 2 very good reasons for this question:
- Legitimate customers may remember an item they forgot. Can you say “add on” sale!?!
- Impulse and amateur shoplifters may feel anxious or guilty about what they have done. Or they may fear that you know or saw them and produce a concealed item.

I hope this helps you this season. Please let us know, if we can assist you. FYI Checkpoint Systems has just released the new N10 EAS system that fits on your door frame. We have it! It is an awesome system at an awesome price.

Happy Holidays!

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HOW TO SPOT A SHOPLIFTER

December 11, 2015 by Staff Editor Leave a Comment

What does a shoplifter look like? How do you know if someone is going to steal from you? I get asked these questions all the time by store associates and mangers. The real answer is, a shoplifter doesn’t fit any specific demographic. There is no common appearance to a thief. I’ve personally apprehended 12 year old kids, soccer moms, grandmothers, lawyers, doctors, truck drivers, college professors in addition to the professional thieves. There are a few tips to look out for that you should share with your teams.

Looking around/up for associates and/or cameras

Most people shop by looking at the product in front of them. I always get suspicious when I see someone looking everywhere but in front of them. Subjects that are constantly looking up (for cameras) are pretty easy to spot; when’s the last time you looked at the ceiling at the supermarket? These people usually catch my attention rather quickly.

Grabbing items without regard to size, color or size

If I’m shopping for a pair of pants, I am looking for a specific style and size. Thieves who are looking to steal to resell usually will just take whatever they can get their hands on. If you see someone walk by a display of clothing and just start randomly selecting product, they may be planning on stealing that product from you.

Clearing pegs/shelves

If I’m buying *electronic item x*, chances are, I’m only going to buy one. If you notice someone clear an entire peg or shelf, especially if it’s a high risk product, which is another great indicator that their intentions may be less than honest.

Wearing unseasonal clothing

This one is my favorite. Every time I’ve seen someone wearing a coat in the summertime, I’ve ended up throwing them in jail for stealing from me. If it’s 90 degrees outside, someone wearing a thick coat should send up some major red flags.

Staging merchandise

Maybe you walk by a quiet corner of the store and see a subject place a few pairs of headphones on a back aisle. Perhaps they decided not to purchase them; or perhaps they’ve staged them to steal after they’re convinced that the area is clear. I’m always suspicious of buggies of product near fire exits. Often times, a thief will stage product prior to committing the theft. If you find product out of place, it’s best to simply return it to its home location

Removing/attempting to remove EAS devices

No brainer, right? If you walk by someone and they are really struggling to remove an EAS device, they probably don’t have intentions on buying the item. If you, or your team see this, the customer should immediately be given customer service. I usually ask if I can help them with the security device… it gets the point across that I am aware of their actions, without me actually having to say anything accusatory.

While not every shoplifter will demonstrate the same overt acts, if store personnel are attentive and engaging with all customers, these behaviors can be picked up on and properly relayed to store managers. Remember, there is no better anti-theft tool than a well-trained, attentive employee. By looking out for these subtle cues, your team can better protect your #1 financial investment, store inventory.

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HOLIDAY SAFETY TIPS FOR YOU CUSTOMERS AND YOUR EMPLOYEES

December 11, 2015 by Staff Editor Leave a Comment

It seems like the months of November and December are just ripe for criminal activity in our stores. These are the months that we see a spike in not only internal and external, but other, more serious crimes like burglary, armed robberies, car theft, and purse snatchings. Over the last decade, I’ve put together some holiday safety tips for my stores and I’d like to also share them with you.

One of the most common crimes that occur in our parking lots during the holiday season are vehicle burglaries. Busy shoppers are running from store to store and packing their cars full of goodies. Valuables left in plain sight attract criminals like a moth to a flame. What’s worse is that with all the hustle and bustle, often times, shoppers inadvertently leave their car doors unlocked. This one is simple to solve. First, leave all valuables and gifts in your trunk, out of sight. Second, LOCK your doors. I once partnered with local law enforcement in a store I had significant issues in and printed up some small reminders. We gave these out to every customer during checkout all season long. The customer’s appreciated the tips and we saw a reduction in parking lot incidents.

Another common theft for criminals this time of year is stealing from your customers while they shop. A busy mom sets her purse, or cell phone on the top of her buggy. In a split-second, she turns around to wrangle the kids, or to grab a hot deal. When she turns back, her purse or phone is gone. I’ve seen this happen so many times, and each time it could simply be prevented. Don’t leave your personal belongings out of sight, ever. I make it a point when I’m walking my stores, or even when I’m out shopping, to educate people on how to best protect their belongings. The last thing someone needs is to have their purse full of their hard earned money stolen right before Christmas.

We can talk about customer safety all day long, but what about your teams? We all have an obligation to keep them safe as well. Our early morning and closing teams are usually the most vulnerable. Remember that there is safety in numbers. When closing, it’s best that the entire team leave at once, with the manager, as opposed to allowing them to leave individually. This will help reduce the risk of personal crimes late at night, in addition to an after-hours robbery. The same should go with your opening team. Once the manager arrives, all employees should then get out of their vehicles, instead of waiting outside the doors. Closing and opening managers should also make it a point to drive around the perimeter of the store to look for signs of forced entry and any suspicious persons and/or activity.

Armed robbery. I dread this time of year because for my stores, every robbery we’ve ever had occurred during this time of the year. We’ve had a handful of robberies during business hours and about the same number after-hours. While it’s very hard to prevent a robbery, there are a few steps you can train your team to do in order to get out alive and unharmed. Thankfully, we’ve never had an injury as our teams followed the steps below each time. I’ll close out my holiday safety tips with these quick tips on how to stay safe during a robbery.

Stay calm.
Comply with all demands
Give them whatever they want, as quickly as possible
Get them out of the store as quickly as possible
Do not call the police with the gunman still in the store. If police arrive quickly, there could be a shoot-out, or a potential hostage situation
Try to remember as much descriptive information as possible (hair color, race, eye color, tattoos)
Do not touch anything after a robbery. You don’t want to contaminate the crime scene, as police may be able to obtain DNA or fingerprints from the safe, doors, or countertops

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How to Find a Good Security Consultant

December 11, 2015 by Staff Editor Leave a Comment

In today’s business climate it’s impossible for an owner or manager to have all the knowledge and experience needed to run a successful company. There’s too much new and changing information (i.e., technology, taxes, healthcare, government regulations, legal liability) for any one person to keep up, let alone have a working understanding.

That’s why even very small businesses are using temporary specialists more often than ever before. Outside experts fill the many gaps which any business has: lawyer, marketer, accountant, consultant, business analyst or web designer. Increasingly, one of the requirements for many companies is security consulting.

The growing need for risk assessments and security measures is an area of concern most companies have never had to face. It’s an area which requires expertise beyond what the average manager or owner can be expected to have. It just makes sense to outsource it.

But, how do you find a good security consultant? As any good security consultant will tell you — due diligence is the key. To get you started here are a few tasks to do and questions to answer for each candidate.

* Interview more than 1 person, 3 is usually enough to find the right one.

* Do they welcome or hinder your due diligence? A viable candidate will endorse your actions.

* Check their references and credentials. Also, depending on the project you have in mind, consider doing a background check.

* Evaluate and validate their work experience. Do they have the expertise they claim to have? There are many types of security issues. Does their knowledge fit your problems?

* Are they listening to you and your people? Are they offering solutions before they understand the problems? Are they trying to up-sell you?

* Do they demonstrate responsibility by following up when they say they will (i.e., bids, phone calls, appointments, texts, emails)? If they’re not responsible when they’re trying to sell you, it usually gets worse during the project.

* Is there a contract? There should be one that’s clear and easy to understand.

Security issues — workplace violence, cyber attacks and breaches, employee theft, shoplifting — are continuing to grow. It’s time to think about how they affect your business and take steps to address them. These are concerns that aren’t going to go away.

Nicole Abbott is a professional writer who’s had over 100 articles published. She’s a business consultant and former psycho-therapist with over 20 years of experience in mental health, business and addiction. She’s a coach, lecturer, trainer and facilitator. She has conducted over 200 workshops, trainings, presentations, seminars and college classes.

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What To Do With Your Customer Feedback

December 2, 2015 by Staff Editor Leave a Comment

For retailers around the country and business in general, customer satisfaction is very important nowadays. The internet has made customer complains known worldwide. An uploaded video can go viral without the company having control over it, and the damage it can inflict upon the company can be horrendous. What can you do to assure that you take customer complains or suggestions seriously? What can you do with them once you have the data? For more about this topic follow the links below.

5 Cool Things You Can Do With Customer Feedback

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Time was when getting feedback from a customer was a process so complex, it was akin to getting blood out of a stone. Thankfully, we don’t live in those times.

Today, not only is feedback nothing more than an email away, but customers actively come to you with suggestions and ideas. In fact, theylove sharing their insights with you because they understand that the more feedback they give, the better your product becomes.

However, most of this feedback just ends up cooling its heels in hard drives, which is, well, tragic, considering all the good it can do. A motivational tool, a wall of love. . . the ideas are limited only by your imagination. Here are our top five cool things that you can spin off with customer feedback, to wow your customers and your own employees.

Are Customer Reviews Promoting Your E-Business Like They Should?

Like it or not, customer reviews are a fact of life — and their impact on your business is huge. Columnist Jeremy Smith explains how you can use this to your advantage to promote your brand.

Unless you’re just back from an extended stay in some parallel universe, you know that customer reviews are valuable to e-commerce and increasing online conversions. Even negative reviews can be helpful to you, as the purveyor of a product or service.

The value of online customer reviews can hardly be overstated, though perhaps it approaches being over-documented.

4 Ways to Make Your Customer Satisfaction Surveys Actionable

To truly understand customer feedback, you need to ask an important question: “Why?” The only way to do that: follow up.

“Please tell us how we did.”

A question like that can roll the eyes of even your company’s biggest fan.

For years, customer satisfaction (CSAT) surveys have been the bread-and-butter strategy for getting feedback.

But the big question is, are these surveys useful?

Many companies are frustrated by their surveys, in large part because they don’t know how to derive consistently actionable insights from the feedback they collect. Thousands of responses go into a database, emerging only as a graph that nobody wants to admit doesn’t drive any change.

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Using Technology To Prevent Shoplifting

December 1, 2015 by Staff Editor Leave a Comment

The busiest shopping season has begun. Along the many customers you expect this holiday season, you can expect the shoplifters as well. Taking advantage of the many customers entering a store, the shoplifter sees this season as an opportunity to walk into a store and leaving with hundreds of dollars worth of merchandise without paying, and sometimes without getting stopped by security. It is difficult for a loss prevention officer to keep track of all the customers entering and leaving the store, that’s why the technology you use to protect your store from shoplifters is as important as hiring loss prevention officers in the first place. To read more about this and other topics follow the links below.

Using facial recognition to prevent shoplifting, workplace violence

Some retail stores in Kirkwood, Missouri are using facial recognition software supplied by Blue Line Technology to prevent shoplifting, according to a report by Fox2Now.

“If we recognize them as a suspicious character, we follow them around and we sort of hound them out of the store,” said Christopher Thau, the owner of a store called Christopher’s. “I hate to put it that way but that’s what we do.”

Since shoplifters often move from one store to the next, many store owners and managers help each other by distributing pictures of potential suspects.

Blue Line Technology provides facial recognition software to help police and businesses track potential threats of shoplifting.

The First Line Facial Recognition system alerts store managers regarding the presence of known shoplifters, providing advance warning for protection against shoplifting and fraud in checks and credit cards.

Blenheim businesses prepare for the shoplifting season

The festive season boom sees a surge shoplifters, shopkeepers and police say.

Shopkeepers and police are preparing for an expected surge in shoplifting during the busy festive season.

Farmers Blenheim store manager Karen Stevenson said the months of November and December were the worst time of the year for theft in department stores.

“Christmas is a bad time for it … It’s a huge problem in Blenheim.”

Police had received 23 reports of shoplifting in Marlborough since August 20.

Blenheim community constable Russ Smith said an increase in shoplifting was expected ahead of the holidays.

“Part of the reason is that stores are advertising flat out and have more stock. They’re a lot busier, the store staff are busier, and shoplifters take advantage of those factors.”

Police would patrol the Blenheim shopping district closer to Christmas in an attempt to deter shoplifters.

“That’s only part of what we do preventatively, and it’s as much to make sure people are behaving in the late nights,” Smith said.

Postie Plus Blenheim ex-employee Barbara Drummond said the size of department stores made it extremely difficult to keep an eye on customers, especially during busy times like the festive season.

Firm that teaches ‘life skills’ to suspected shoplifters extorts them, suit alleges

Debra Black insists she is “not a thief.”

She says she rolled her electric wheelchair out of the Goodwill Industries store in Tustin after inadvertently neglecting to pay for a few items. The pack of purple napkins, headband and small purse came to $6.97.

But once a security guard stopped her that day in March 2013, things got heated. Black, 64, said she was frightened into signing a confession and agreeing to complete a six-hour “life skills” course and pay a Utah company $500.

When Black did not pay, she received multiple calls and letters from Corrective Education Co., including this final warning: “Contact us immediately to prevent the filing of a criminal complaint.”

Black unsuccessfully sued the firm, which refers to itself as CEC, along with Monument Security Inc., contending they were debt collectors that had violated laws governing that industry.

On Monday, the San Francisco city attorney weighed in, filing a new lawsuit that alleges CEC’s practices violate the California business and professions code and amount to extortion and false imprisonment.

The suit seeks civil penalties as well as restitution for every Californian who has paid into the program. About 20,000 accused shoplifters are believed to have participated nationwide.

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