Tesco and their alcohol policy!

mustrum_ridcully

DrScotsman you don't know what the cashier is doing.

They could be taking dodgy banknotes from friends/family and then passing them onto customers.

They might not check the note the cute guy/girl has just handed them.

They might only have checked your note because you hadn't shaved and looked a bit rough.

They might only have checked your £50 note because they've been told to but haven't checked the £5/10/20 notes.

No I don't check because I'm too bone idle, but I appreciate why people would.

jb66

sciencegeek wrote: »

so a member of staff has to be 18 to serve the alcohol right?

so if (like me) you get really annoyed at being asked for i.d. even though they are only doing their job (im 30 by the way), how about asking to see their proof of age, after all perhaps that person is not old enough to serve you.

I do a similar thing with notes, if a shop assistant holds my £20 note up to the light to check if its a fake I sometimes make a point of holding up to the light all the notes I am passed as change. They are often really flustered and indignant about this... i guess they assume a note coming out of THEIR till could not possibly be a forgery. I find this hilarious.

If i were a checkout operator and you asked me for I.D i'd just say no.

DrScotsman

mustrum_ridcully wrote: »

DrScotsman you don't know what the cashier is doing.

They could be taking dodgy banknotes from friends/family and then passing them onto customers.

They might not check the note the cute guy/girl has just handed them.

They might only have checked your note because you hadn't shaved and looked a bit rough.

They might only have checked your £50 note because they've been told to but haven't checked the £5/10/20 notes.

No I don't check because I'm too bone idle, but I appreciate why people would.

Those are all valid points, so fair enough. I just think that what you've said it an argument to check ALL notes you get, not all notes you get from a cashier who checks your notes. And like I said I did think it was a good idea nonetheless.

It's also an argument to pay by card (in the very unlikely event the old lady who asked if she could leave her trolley with me so she could go withdraw some cash on her VISA card is reading this, HINT HINT HINT)

Oldernotwiser

DCodd wrote: »

I'm getting more and more depressed about the attitudes of this Country when it come to alcohol, we and the yanks are so "tough" on underage drinking yet we have the worst alcohol abuse! a large number of French and Italian parents allow there kids to have moderate and usualy watered down alcohol from a very early age and it seems to instil an understanding and respect for alcohol! maybe we should learn from the Countries that sucessfully deal with alcohol??

But France and Spain (don't know about Italy) have equally strict laws about young people actually buying alcohol.

oldone_2

It is obvious that these 'rules' are a knee jerk reaction to the growth of underage drinking. If this is a real problem, then the sale of alcohol should be restricted to approved outlets, i.e off-licences and pubs. Of course the supermarkets will squeal like pigs, but they are demonstrating that they are unfit to sell alcohol with their non-sensical policies.
Time for us to fight back and object every time a supermarket alcohol licence comes up for renewal. Will not get us anywhere of course, but if enough do it, it will send a clear message to those that are trying to micro-control our life.

Dave101t

i personally dont have a problem with being refused alcohol, i always carry id.
and if i was with my 6 year old neice they couldnt not serve me because your allowed to drink in your own house from 5 years old.

DrScotsman

oldone wrote: »

It is obvious that these 'rules' are a knee jerk reaction to the growth of underage drinking. If this is a real problem, then the sale of alcohol should be restricted to approved outlets, i.e off-licences and pubs. Of course the supermarkets will squeal like pigs, but they are demonstrating that they are unfit to sell alcohol with their non-sensical policies.
Time for us to fight back and object every time a supermarket alcohol licence comes up for renewal. Will not get us anywhere of course, but if enough do it, it will send a clear message to those that are trying to micro-control our life.

Whether or not you agree with the supermarkets' policies, it's undeniable that a smaller percentage of underage drinkers will succeed in getting alcohol from a supermarket than anywhere else. So in the eyes of people who care about underage drinking, they're clearly very fit to sell alcohol.

And hang on a second, what you're proposing wouldn't make anything better! You're proposing that only off-licenses and pubs should be allowed to sell alcohol. Well they already CAN sell alcohol, so how about you just not buy it from the supermarket anyway!

Far too many of you seem to have this impression that the supermarket doesn't have the right to refuse you sale if you're over 18, which they obviously do. I really doubt an alcohol license removes that right.

JoeyG

oldone wrote: »

It is obvious that these 'rules' are a knee jerk reaction to the growth of underage drinking. If this is a real problem, then the sale of alcohol should be restricted to approved outlets, i.e off-licences and pubs. Of course the supermarkets will squeal like pigs, but they are demonstrating that they are unfit to sell alcohol with their non-sensical policies.
Time for us to fight back and object every time a supermarket alcohol licence comes up for renewal. Will not get us anywhere of course, but if enough do it, it will send a clear message to those that are trying to micro-control our life.

Or just don't buy alcohol from the supermarkets... if everyone did that they would soon review their policies... at the moment they are free to refuse anyone they want on whatever grounds they want and all the public do is moan and keep coming back... so its about time customers exercised their ability to vote with their feet and went elsewhere

Pont

Volcano wrote: »

No, a supermarket can refuse to serve anyone, at any time, for any reason they choose to make up on the spot.

Refuse to serve on grounds of colour, race, religion, age, sex etc? I don't think so!

The common sense is the shop assistant doing as they're instructed by their management if they want to keep their job.

Whether this makes any sense to the customer is irrelevant.

Only until customers refuse to put up with absurd supermarket policy and vote with their feet.

As the majority of this thread is relating to underage drinking, my point is that ANY person purchasing alcohol legally (ie. over 18) can potentially be viewed as supplying a minor with alcohol. Therefore how does an assistant/manager judge who to serve and who not to serve? The type of drinks purchased? The ages of those served (a couple of 19 year olds as opposed to a pensioner)? What type of clothes they are wearing? What accents they have? Whether there are children present with the purchaser? etc. etc. etc. Commonsense maybe for the shop assistant, but certainly not for the supermarket as a whole.

lufcgirl

Apparently, some people on here work in supermarkets and will ID on grounds of what the person is buying.

So in my case I was buying something like chocolate, crisps, shower gel, shampoo, conditioner, juice and four bottles of Bacardi Breezer, a bottle of Jaques and a bottle of WKD. I got asked for ID and provided it but OH couldn't so they wouldn't let ME buy it with MY own money. My brother is 17 and not allowed to be present when I'm purchasing alcohol incase I pass it onto him which was what the store told me. So like I said before, I can't go in with anyone under 18, or anyone up to my age realistically (25) without ID because they'd refuse to serve me incase I was passing it onto a minor. It's not the assistants fault, it's Tesco's rules.