Over zealous security guard at Coop food Lordship Lane

[jazzer]

Beware of the over zealous security guard in Coop food Lordship Lane who stops people who have left the store, having paid for their goods, have a receipt and have used a re-usable bag.

Very unpleasant experience today and he has no understanding nor appreciation of social distancing.

Won't EVER be using that store again.

[Mops]

Still not as bad as the LL Coop security guy (who I haven?t seen for a few weeks actually) who casually has a wee outside against the coop sign by the ATM when he needs the loo mid shift. Man has amazing lack of shame; just wanders back inside to his job on the door whilst still doing up his flies and belt. So much for rigorous hygiene and hand washing in the times of COVID...!!

[Nigello]

I hope you reported it! That sounds almost unbelievable, but one never knows....

[Jules-and-Boo]

Never had any problem or rudeness there and the staff are lovely.

Quite a bitter post and surely not the right place to make a complaint.

I would suggest you contact head office and they can look into it.

[tiddles]

I don?t think I would ever describe the staff at the lordship lane coop as lovely!! Usually amusingly grumpy and sometimes rude. Staff at forest hill road branch ARE a lovely lot!

[Pugwash]

Rarely use LL Co op as I find products very pricey. Did go in before Xmas as could not be bothered to queue for Marks. I just wanted a couple of things to tide me over. Found aisles blocked with stuff waiting to go onto shelves, people leaving baskets on the floor whilst they browsed further down the aisle (trip hazard) Some fruit looking past it's use by date. It served my purpose that day but how anyone could afford to do their weekly shop there!

[jazzer]

No not a bitter post, I explained what happened to me. I don't take to being accused of being a thief when I had paid for my goods and had a receipt as proof of purchase. The security guard had clearly not been watching and made a rash and WRONG stop. And yes it has been reported to them.

Jules-and-Boo Wrote:

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> Never had any problem or rudeness there and the

> staff are lovely.

>

> Quite a bitter post and surely not the right place

> to make a complaint.

>

> I would suggest you contact head office and they

> can look into it.

[JohnL]

jazzer Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Beware of the over zealous security guard in Coop

> food Lordship Lane who stops people who have left

> the store, having paid for their goods, have a

> receipt and have used a re-usable bag.

> Very unpleasant experience today and he has no

> understanding nor appreciation of social

> distancing.

> Won't EVER be using that store again.

A clever thief would just send someone ahead with valid receipt to occupy the security guards time and then walk out with all the stuff straight past the fuss

False positives isn't it and they aren't good. I'd point that out but other than that couldn't really be bothered.

[spark67]

Ah yes we were there that day, & saw you in the store swearing and shouting abuse at staff, you may have a valid point, but lost the moral high ground with the way you were shouting and swearing at staff, REALLY loudly.

[JohnL]

To be honest the alarms go off regularly when I walk out of some stores - I usually get waved through.

Once I did have to use a junior hacksaw to remove the tag that a certain store didn't from a bottle :)

[sweetgirl]

Omg I am glad I have seen this post!

Same thing happened to someone I know.

The police were called by the person I knew & even they were shocked by the behaviour of the security guard & manager.

They were too close to him & he was asking them to keep their distance

The person was advised by the police to report it through the correct channels

[sweetgirl]

That's abit out of order!

If you've been accused of something that you haven't done I'm sure you'd be pissed too!

spark67 Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Ah yes we were there that day, & saw you in the

> store swearing and shouting abuse at staff, you

> may have a valid point, but lost the moral high

> ground with the way you were shouting and swearing

> at staff, REALLY loudly.

[jazzer]

spark67 Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Ah yes we were there that day, & saw you in the

> store swearing and shouting abuse at staff, you

> may have a valid point, but lost the moral high

> ground with the way you were shouting and swearing

> at staff, REALLY loudly.

Yes I did, as I had been wrongly stopped having been an honest PAYING customer with a receipt for the goods I had purchased. I paid for my Three items at the self checkout, thank God I printed the receipt. I then put the items in the carrier bag I was re-using, on top of the the shopping I'd done in another store earlier. I left the store and outside, I was "invited" to return which I happily did. The security guards excuse was he stopped me because I was using my own re-usable carrier bag. Really...................

I was extremely annoyed and angry at being incorrectly stopped, that's why I raised my voice, swore (incorrectly) and loudly and made a massive scene. If the guard had been watching properly he would have seen that I had paid by card for my goods.

I asked the security guard guard to get the store manager, I was initially presented with someone from bakery (not the store manager) who claimed to be in charge, then a team leader appeared again saying he was in charge (and again not the store manager), finally an acting manager appeared. Each time I had to repeat what had happened. If you had been stopped incorrectly having not done anything wrong, no doubt you'd be annoyed as well. And the alarms did not go off either.

I invited the store to call the Police which they naturally and unsurprisingly declined.

[KidKruger]

Perhaps an increase in shoppers stealing and/or not paying fully at self-service checkouts has prompted an over-zealous scrutiny of customers leaving the store.

[Sue]

This happened to us the Christmas before last.

I had preordered all the Christmas stuff from M&S, and we went to the store in Lordship Lane on Christmas Eve to pick it up. I put it all in my shopping trolley and we left the store.

OUTSIDE the store we were stopped by a security guard who, in full sight and sound of the very many passers by, asked me to show him what was in my trolley.

I was absolutely furious, I showed him the (very long) receipt and he still wasn't happy, I opened the trolley and showed him what was in it (not that he could see everything, because it was rammed) and said if he wanted to pursue this he should take me/us (my partner was with me) into a back office, not do all this in the street in full view of everybody.

Anyway, he didn't. He didn't even apologise, he just let us walk off.

To add insult to injury, when we got home we found some of the pre-prepared veg was open and leaking over everything, plus one of the starters and the stuffing for the turkey was missing. We had foolishly assumed that the staff on the till where the Christmas stuff was collected were checking it as they brought it out, as they do at the Walworth Road store.

We were in time to get the leaking veg replaced, as we found it as we were unpacking, but by the time we realised that stuff was missing M&S was closed and we couldn't get the stuffing anywhere else (a very kind person who posts on here gave us some stuffing on Christmas morning).

After Christmas, I went back to the store to complain about the missing stuff, and was just told oh well, if you weren't charged for it there's no problem, is there? (Er, it was our Christmas dinner).

I complained to M&S centrally, and to give them their due they were great, they apologised profusely for the security guard incident and said there would be staff training (I wouldn't have minded so much if it had all taken place in private, though I still don't know what caused him to pick on us) and gave me quite a lot of money - well, tokens - as compensation and also for the missing items.

[Spartacus]

Sue

Whatever you do, don't shop at PC world / curry's

They check everything on the way out.

Seriously if there is an issue with the security arrangements and staff maybe a word / email to the store manager will get it sorted or an explanation.

This forum is great for discussions but the coop manager may not read it.

[jazzer]

I assure you Coop have already progressed it to Area Manager level and I am awaiting a phone call once the wrongful stop has been investigated. I actually felt violated being stopped in the street as I had done NOTHING wrong, hence making a scene of it. The guard is not employed directly by Coop but by a large corporation called Mitie. Yes he made a mitie error of judgement.

[alice]

Metropolitan Police top and Search has a success rate of 9%.

Co-ops rate is probably better.

[JohnL]

You'd expect to be able to see a list of what suspicious behavior is in the security guys notepad to justify any allegation, and maybe be given the opportunity address it.

Maybe one way of fighting back is to spend a couple of hours going over every purchase in detail and verifying until everyone is bored. :) There should really be no embarrassment factor about being stopped - you're not guilty just because of security checks.

[DuncanW]

Met Police do have legal powers to conduct a stop and search. (However much we agree or otherwise with how they use them)

I'm not 100% sure of the legalities, but I don't think Co-op or their sub-contract security firm do have any such powers. I would guess they have the power of citizen's arrest, but would need to substantiate their grounds for doing so.

[ianr]

But don't be a tease. Tell us about your trolley snatching.

[KidKruger]

Trolley Snatcha Wrote:

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Hi Bob / Steven...!

[DuncanW]

I don't think they do have power of arrest - beyond citizen's arrest. They can just ask you to come back into the store. A citizen's arrest can be made if they know that a crime has been committed.

[JohnL]

I saw this aimed at security guys

https://www.inbrief.co.uk/employees/being-a-security-guard/

Seems to come down to "reasonable suspicion". Obviously all security staff are trained and know this.

[jazzer]

Really useful link, thanks for finding and posting this.