I once called police about a car theft on a property I managed. We had had footage of the theft, the thieves, their getaway car, their license plates, their entry and exit, their faces visible on every camera. It took the cops two weeks to drop by to collect the footage and take a report, and they looked so annoyed, and didn't even pretend to care. They straight up told me nothing would come of it.
But if you're a corporation, they're all over that shit. Minor shop lifting? Cops are there in minutes. It's become clear over the last few years who the police work for, and it's not us, the little people who pay taxes.
That's nothing. I've heard of people getting the cops called on them because the cashier forgot to scan an item and they noticed after getting home and went back to pay for it.
I was physically restrained by 4 Walmart employees, and convicted based on blatant lies from the LP manager (who legally counts as a "professional witness," meaning her word is literally law) and a petty larceny effectively bars you from employment for 7 years.
What I "stole?" I was having a bad mental health day and missed a $5 pair of sunglasses on a $2-300 shopping trip.
When the judge started to say "no intent," she cut the judge off and hollared how she watched me remove the tag "and that's intent if I ever saw it."
Never mind that the picture SHE BROUGHT TO COURT still had it attached, because PrOfEsSiOnAl WiTnEsS hUrRdUrR.
"You've been interfering with domestic and foreign elections, abused your workers, and even appeared with a noted pedophile? What about you promise you won't do it ever again?"
Something, something, the law protects the ruling class, not the common people.
Wage theft is the biggest form of theft by far. The biggest perpetrator of wage theft is, unsurprisingly, Wal-Mart. They have the audacity to call anyone else a thief?
I absolutely HATE Walmart. I should hate them for their exploitation of workers, their shit products or any number of their shit corporation’s dealings. But the thing that drew the final blow for me was an incident dealing with their self checkout and their system of ascribing guilt for theft without any due process.
I went to a store about half an hour away from where I lived as they aren’t common near where I’m from. Bought several items including a marker board. Checked out using self checkout. Marker board was too big to fit into a bag, so I set it aside to bring with me after scanning everything. Well, as luck would have it, when I got home I realized I never brought my marker board home but I had paid for it and had the receipt to prove it. I called the store and explained the situation to the manager at customer service who assured me I could come to the store and pickup the item, no troubles.
So I drove back up to the store hour round trip. I get there and the customer service line is about 15 people deep at this point. Only one person behind the counter. After about 30 min waiting in line, I finally get up to the counter and explain my issue, showing the receipt and that I had spoken to a manager earlier and that they said to come in and it would be fine to pickup the marker board. Well, not only was it not fine, but then the woman behind the counter, after having a discussion with her security dept over the phone who “reviewed the footage” from my checkout, decided that I had actually attempted to put something into my pocket to steal something!? Incredulously, I asked her why on earth I would go through the trouble to come all this way back to the store for an item that I clearly paid for along with about $60 worth of other stuff which again, also clearly paid for, if I had stolen something!? She refused to budge and I was honestly shocked she had the audacity to accuse me of theft 100% seriously. I left that store and haven’t set foot in a Walmart since. It’s been 4 years and it’s the best consumer decision I’ve ever made.
I once had a Walmart employee follow me out of the building and start banging on my window screaming at me they're calling the cops
Why?
I, while using a cane in one hand and the other occupied by a bag of dog food that was making me regret not waiting for a scooter, didn't stop to chat with the old woman who was arbitrarily checking people's receipts.
I told him he's lucky I'm more level headed than most of my neighbors, because he would have been shot the moment he banged on glass and yelled, but if they want my receipt they can go watch the fucking cameras because I have somewhere to be.
Could I have handled it more calmly and with more understanding? Probably. But if you follow me out into the parking lot and start screaming at me, consider all respect lost, all decency dropped. You get back what you came in with.
Literally, the only reason I even went to Walmart is because the pet store I get the good food from had their registers all crash and wouldn't start back up.
What's up I'm a employeed, tax paying, US citizen. And I would suggest that anybody take advantage of the limited oversight over the Walmart self checkouts
These cock suckers decided that they would raise the prices on everybody under the cover of inflation. They did this knowing that it would drive people to suicide, it would drive people to be homeless, it would break part families and crush the American dream for so many people but they did it anyway.
It's called plausible deniability... if you forget something in the self checkout, just be a nice person and say it was a mistake, and they will let you slide most of the time. Worst case scenario you have to go back in and pay. Best case scenario you get a bunch of free steak or something.
The scales. I bring my own bags and you have to tare the scale against your bags before you can start scanning and it only works right about ⅓ of the time. So someone has to come set it for me.
If I don't bring my own bags inside, my only option at self checkout is plastic. Paper bags are offered by cashiers. I like to know my bags can actually be recycled.
Self checkout is constantly populated by old folks who would have had IE jam packed with garbage toolbars 15 years ago. They can't work self checkout any faster than they could have waited in line.
There is a 25 item limit. I see people with 40+ items in self checkout all the time. It just bogs down what used to be a fast thing.
Finally, the biggest reason I stopped using it is because part of the cost of my groceries is to have a worker to ring me up and another to bag my stuff. By using self checkout, I'm saving the store owner money. I am being the customer and the worker. This is my way of fighting back. If the cost of my groceries is going up, I'm going to make sure that someone else has that little bit of extra job security. If we all stop using self checkout, they have to keep more cashiers on hand. I don't think I have to explain how more people having more available hours to work is a better societal alternative.
Those self checkout watchers are more intense on the food side than they are on the pharmacy side. Pharmacy: young employees may forget to give a fuck. Food: old employees, think they might be fired if they don't watch every item everyone scans.
I make it a point to forget scanning half of my shit there. It's less about self-checkout (I quite honestly don't mind it all that much), and more about the insane cost of living now.
I refuse to spend $30 on milk, eggs, cheese, bread, and butter.
I almost got arrested there because I dropped my receipt in the Urinal, and they wouldn't believe me. That was fun. I try not to shop there, but that really cemented it.
This is your daily reminder to steal anything you can from large corporations at every possible opportunity. Got five identical items? Whoops, you only seem to have scanned four of them. Are four of them the brand name, and one of them the cheaper store brand? Shit, it seems you scanned the store brand one five four times. They just looked so similar, after all. How confusing!
There's this old man who goes to my Walmart. On 3 separate trips, I've seen him standing snug against the candy aisle with both his arms in the shelves opening bags. I don't think he realizes how obvious he looks lol.
All the stories in this thread are ridiculous, not untrue, but very weird.
Product loss is a problem, and can threaten a store’s ability to operate, especially in disadvantaged communities where there aren’t many options for shopping. That said, what the fuck is everyone thinking? Why do people care about like one guy not scanning or accidentally taking one item, you’re wasting more resources dealing with it then if you just ignored it.
The actual solution?
Exit gates that open when you scan your receipt, maybe combined with some system that weighs the whole order to make sure it makes sense. Completely automated, no shouting, easy to implement because the technology already exists on transit systems and many other things.
I don’t get why this is a problem, though I’ve never seen anything like this at any nearby grocery store.