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A new report from law firm TLT says many retailers are considering increasing their prices to pay for new tech to help deter crime. However, forecourt operators are taking a different approach.

Petrol filling station owners that Forecourt Trader spoke to said that they are taking steps to prevent shoplifting in the first place by increasing staff numbers.

Priyanth Yoganathan from Top 50 Indie JP&S Services, says he has no intention of increasing prices at this stage: “We have taken steps to try and prevent shoplifting by having an adequate number of staff in-store. Having a member of staff on the shopfloor can massively reduce the problem because most people don’t want a confrontation and a staff member’s presence puts them off from attempting to steal anything.”

However, staff safety is Yoganathan’s priority: “We don’t want staff getting into a confrontation which could escalate. If a member of staff wants to say something to a suspected shoplifter they can but that’s it. Sometimes it works, sometimes the shoplifter carries on regardless.”

He adds that the type of people doing the shoplifting has changed over recent years.

“My managers tell me that, rightly or wrongly, you used to be able to tell – just by looking at someone – that they might be likely to shoplift. But nowadays it could be anybody. It could be the middle-aged man in the smart clothes, for example. You just can’t tell.”

He says shoplifting is up across all his sites and as such it has now become regarded as an additional cost.

“We tried having a security guard at one site but the costs were prohibitive. It cost us say, £100 per shift, for the guard but we weren’t losing that level of stock so it wasn’t worth it.”

At another site Yoganathan made changes to opening times to protect staff.

“We have a busy site in London that operates 24/7 and the shop was open all night. However we switched to serving via a hatch from midnight because there was a lot of shoplifting going on through the night and the staff felt vulnerable.”

Meanwhile, Kumar Sharma from Top 50 Indie Sharma Garages says they are waiting to do their end of year stocktake to see what the actual figures are.

“We know shoplifting is happening; we see this through our normal checks but we will wait to see the figures from the stocktake before we take any further action.

“However, we have already doubled staff on sites where there was just one member of staff working. Staff safety is our priority and we didn’t want a single member of staff feeling vulnerable on their own so in that sense our wage bill has doubled.”

The new report from TLT is based on a survey of the UK’s top 100 retailers. Key findings included:

• 100% of retailers surveyed reported experiencing some form of crime in the past year

• 88% reported incidents of shoplifting, 86% reported cybercrime, 81% reported physical abuse and 86% reported verbal abuse

• 43% plan to invest in technological solutions as a proactive measure against rising expenses

• nearly half (48%) of retailers report that they will have to pass the increased expenses incurred onto consumers through higher prices.

The report also highlights the heavy toll that retail crime is having on workers, with 44% of retailers reporting increased employee turnover and 42% facing recruitment difficulties due to safety concerns.