Retail laws and consumer rights

alkaline_shuvvy

Hi, I would like to know if there is a law or legislation against employees 'hiding' reduced or sale items so that they can purchase them for themselves/
I worked at a well known supermarket for 5 years and was always told that this was not allowed and could be deemed as fraud if you yourself had reduced the item and then purchased it was a sackable offence. However, at my local supermarket, (a different company to the supermarket I worked at) the staff hide all of the reduced items- such as meats, cakes, etc, and purchase them for themselves at closing time. This means that the customers never get a look in! I think this is ridiculous, surely my original employer was correct in that customers always get priority over stock? If this isn't the case, surely there's no point in going to a store for sale items if all the staff have taken the offers for themselves? Surely this is Active Concealment and should be brought to attention?! Please let me know if I am wrong or if it is just individual company policies.

wealdroam

alkaline_shuvvy wrote: »

Hi, I would like to know if there is a law or legislation against employees 'hiding' reduced or sale items so that they can purchase them for themselves/
I worked at a well known supermarket for 5 years and was always told that this was not allowed and could be deemed as fraud if you yourself had reduced the item and then purchased it was a sackable offence. However, at my local supermarket, (a different company to the supermarket I worked at) the staff hide all of the reduced items- such as meats, cakes, etc, and purchase them for themselves at closing time. This means that the customers never get a look in! I think this is ridiculous, surely my original employer was correct in that customers always get priority over stock? If this isn't the case, surely there's no point in going to a store for sale items if all the staff have taken the offers for themselves? Surely this is Active Concealment and should be brought to attention?! Please let me know if I am wrong or if it is just individual company policies.

This is purely a matter between the employee and his/her employer.

I suppose something could be in their conditions of employment... who knows?

"Active Concealment"... is that against the law?

savemoney

My OH works at sainsburys and they cant do this, they use to years ago but some people abused it and they clamped down.

DCFC79

alkaline_shuvvy wrote: »

Hi, I would like to know if there is a law or legislation against employees 'hiding' reduced or sale items so that they can purchase them for themselves/
I worked at a well known supermarket for 5 years and was always told that this was not allowed and could be deemed as fraud if you yourself had reduced the item and then purchased it was a sackable offence. However, at my local supermarket, (a different company to the supermarket I worked at) the staff hide all of the reduced items- such as meats, cakes, etc, and purchase them for themselves at closing time. This means that the customers never get a look in! I think this is ridiculous, surely my original employer was correct in that customers always get priority over stock? If this isn't the case, surely there's no point in going to a store for sale items if all the staff have taken the offers for themselves? Surely this is Active Concealment and should be brought to attention?! Please let me know if I am wrong or if it is just individual company policies.

There is no law in any shape or form, it may be against the employers policy to reduce stuff (either yourself or get someone else to do it) to then put it to 1 side for yourself, if you were to reduce an item yourself you could sneekily reduce say an item that doesn't need reducing and if found out be in deep do do and 1 would be abusing the trust given to them by they're manager to do the job.

The staff at the other supermarket can do what they want if the employers dont have an issue with what they're doing.
Some employers are strict on it and others aren't, not much a general consumer can do. Why let it bother you ? I wouldnt.

Forwandert

There's not really that many perks working in retail, if the store allows the staff to buy some out of code bread or meat I say leave them to it, not exactly harming anyone is it?

McKneff

How do you know for sure that the staff at this supermarket hide the discounted items.

If you know for sure and youre that bothered about it, go and speak to the manager or write to their head office.

somethingcorporate

It would only ever be a breach of internal company policy, not of retail law. At the end of the day the goods they sell are private property and you have no right to buy any of them.

If they wish to retain to sell cheaply to staff then that is absolutely fine.

alkaline_shuvvy

Yes, know for sure they're doing it, seen them do it on several occasions. And i would know about perks of retail i have worked in it in retail jobs for most of my working life (I'm only 25, but now training to be a social worker) and I know that they already get staff discounts- which is enough for most of us. Being in the current climate everybody is looking for a bargain, but to PURPOSELY conceal items so that somebody else can't get it is beggars belief. I'm sure those of you that are saying 'why bother?' would have a different attitude if, for example, a TV was reduced to £50 from £300 and not one of you could have that item because the staff were all shipping them off to the back room for their own purchase. However, this would be somewhat different as a TV is not a neccessity but you catch my drift. What would be the point in selling things to the public at all....why not just hire staff to hide all the things away so that you could make a loss on their greed? Just gets my goat a bit really, they already have the perk of getting 10% or more off that product but people like us struggling to feed our families aren't entitled to the same products? I will be having a word with the store manager...if they want to buy it it's fair enough, but at least give the customers THE PEOPLE WHO PAY YOUR WAGES the chance to buy it first, after all, that is the point of retail!

DCFC79

alkaline_shuvvy wrote: »

if they want to buy it it's fair enough, but at least give the customers THE PEOPLE WHO PAY YOUR WAGES the chance to buy it first, after all, that is the point of retail!

the people who pay the staff's wages is the employer/company,

alkaline_shuvvy

who get their money from customers shopping at their store!

wealdroam

alkaline_shuvvy wrote: »

who get their money from customers shopping at their store!

And they get more money selling at full price.

Why are things reduced? Near sell by dates?

Retailers are perfectly at liberty to sell that type of product to their staff only.
They may take the stance that to sell those products might harm their image.

For whatever reason, the retailer has the ultimate choice on whether to sell you any particular item or not.