Tesco and their alcohol policy!

DrScotsman

You've really got it all mixed up Pont. Supermarkets can only be found guilty (not negligent, that's tort law ) if it would be reasonable to suspect it is being passed onto a minor. If an 18 year old with proper ID (who didn't come in with a 12 year old half an hour ago) tries to buy alcohol there is no way the store could be found guilty of supplying alcohol to a minor no matter what that 18 year old does it. If a woman with a child and loads of shopping and a bit of wine comes to a till then it would be completely reasonable to assume it's parent and child and the alcohol was for the parent, so even if the child wasn't her son and the alcohol was for him, the supermarket would not be found guilty.

The problem is the grey areas where the supermarket would obviously like to err on the side of caution. And since this has been going on for a while, I'm guessing that not enough people vote with their feet for the supermarkets to consider relaxing the restrictions to risk the fines or having their licence taken away.

And yes, any shop can refuse to serve on grounds of colour, race, religion, age (isn't that what we're talking about?) and sex (don't Ann Summers do that?). Of course they could be found guilty of inciting racial hatred for the first three depending on how they went around doing it, but otherwise all they'd face is bad publicity. And of course, it'd be pretty hard to prove WHY you were refused the sale of something.

oldone_2

JoeyG wrote: »

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

It is just not going to happen. Supermarkets are moving towards a total one stop shop under one roof driving small independent competitors out of business.When that happens you will have no choice but to shop in the way they dictate.
Take away their right to sell alcohol, and the policy will breathe life back into pubs and wine merchants. It just cannot be right for a supermarket to sell a can of beer at less than the wholesale price an independent outlet pays.

JoeyG

oldone wrote: »

It is just not going to happen. Supermarkets are moving towards a total one stop shop under one roof driving small independent competitors out of business.When that happens you will have no choice but to shop in the way they dictate.
Take away their right to sell alcohol, and the policy will breathe life back into pubs and wine merchants. It just cannot be right for a supermarket to sell a can of beer at less than the wholesale price an independent outlet pays.

Nonsense, any consumer who cares about independent competitors will use them... and any competitor who gives value for money will survive, i'm not just talking about price but also convenience and service.

Pont

SS Dr - I bow to your superior knowledge of English Law - was merely suggesting that a supermarket was 'negligent' in terms of not exercising a reasonable duty of care to their customers. I take on board that they would be found 'guilty' if it could be proven that they knowingly sold alcohol to an adult knowing it was to be passed on to a minor. However, clearly many posters have stated that they were refused alcohol sales despite falling into one or more of the examples you give when 'the supermarket would not be found guilty'. There are many more examples of over zealous policy here.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-566340/Tesco-bans-parents-buying-alcohol-OWN-children.html
Additionally, when looking at the ID situation with carding those who appear to be under 21 or 25, there is the ridiculous example of an 87 year old being asked for ID when buying a bottle of sherry at Morrisons (google it!)! I revert back to what happened to plain, old-fashioned commonsense?

oldone_2

JoeyG wrote: »

Nonsense, any consumer who cares about independent competitors will use them... and any competitor who gives value for money will survive, i'm not just talking about price but also convenience and service.

You live in a drem world if you think this happens. I once owned two shops, and gave the staff a discount on the product we sold that meant they were paying less than in a nearby supermarket. Some of the staff still bought the identical product,at a higher price, from the supermarket when doing their weekly shop.

JoeyG

easy, they put convenience ahead of price

JoeyG

I shop at local independent stores because it happens to be convenient for me to do so, and because I value their service ahead of saving a few ££ at the supermarket

roguetrooper74

Having worked on checkout's I can understand the person refusing to sell. At the end of the day there is no law to say that a shop must sell anything to a customer. Shops have the right to refuse service to anybody for what ever reason they choose and they don't have to give a reason.
As with people saying about passing on to a minor, the law is 'knowingly' selling alcohol/age restricted product to someone who is going to pass them onto a minor.
Also the penalty for selling alcohol to a minor is upto £5000 to the member of staff that sold it and upto £10000 to the company as well as the company loosing their licence for 24 hours ( or permenantly for persistant offenders), which in some stores can equal a huge amount of money. So most chekout operators are on roughly £5.60-£7.00 per hour working part time. So a £5000 fine is close to a years wage and all because someone kicked up a hissy fit about being ID'd.
Personally I think stores should just ID everyone regardless of how old they looked. That way there is no doubt, no ID no alcohol.

jb66

Anyone had there Tesco.com home delivery refused yet?

DCFC79

roguetrooper74 wrote: »

Having worked on checkout's I can understand the person refusing to sell. At the end of the day there is no law to say that a shop must sell anything to a customer. Shops have the right to refuse service to anybody for what ever reason they choose and they don't have to give a reason.
As with people saying about passing on to a minor, the law is 'knowingly' selling alcohol/age restricted product to someone who is going to pass them onto a minor.
Also the penalty for selling alcohol to a minor is upto £5000 to the member of staff that sold it and upto £10000 to the company as well as the company loosing their licence for 24 hours ( or permenantly for persistant offenders), which in some stores can equal a huge amount of money. So most chekout operators are on roughly £5.60-£7.00 per hour working part time. So a £5000 fine is close to a years wage and all because someone kicked up a hissy fit about being ID'd.
Personally I think stores should just ID everyone regardless of how old they looked. That way there is no doubt, no ID no alcohol.

or just have a no ID no alcohol, baccy policy, why not just keep it simple, theres obviously going to be people who are of a suiatable age where you can tell they are allowed to drink and so they wont require any ID