Got caught stealing today (£20 worth).

Horribly ashamed of myself.

Got taken in to a little room by 2 store detectives and there was another already in there.

As soon as I was stopped, one of them noticed my works ID round my neck and removed my pass which had my details on it.

The paperwork was completed quite quickly and as seems to be the norm on here,

no police were called,

I received a letter banning me from all B&Qs and told that my details would be passed on to the civil recovery people who would send me a fine (which I shall ignore, yes?).

However, one of the guards started saying that he knew my face (I haven't been stopped by security/ whatever before).

The other guy starts saying that I was also going to be banned from every shop in the local city centre (the B&Q is a mile or so out of the town in a retail park) and that my photo was going to be passed on to every shop in the city.

He then said I should tell my employer because it's better than they find out from me than when they see my picture on this city-wide banning order.

They then proceeded to take my photo with 2 separate cameras (one was on a phone which looked official, the other on a tablet which again seemed to be part of their office rather than any of their personal property).

A large part of me thinks this stinks of BS and they were trying to frighten me

- there were lots of inconsistencies in what they were telling me and when I asked for details of this banning order,

he just told me to google a 4 letter acronym (which I've since forgotten)

- but I do feel a bit uneasy and wondered what the people on here thought.

Thanks in advance.

Load of ole twaddle!! to frighten you.

city wide banning order what turkeys..no such thing, !!

and certainly NOT published anywhere.

so don't do anything stupid like telling your employer...

you'll get scary letters from RLP

totally ignore

and yes IT IS NOT A FINE.

Thanks for your response.

Jjust to clarify, they can't/ won't contact my employer, can't/ won't ban me from every shop in the city centre and can't/ won't email my photo to all those shops?

It's ironic as I always used to like gawping at the photos they publicised of shop lifters in the entrance to a particular shop near where I used to live but now I'm terrified that the same will happen to me or that shop assistants in all the shops that I frequent (some of whom I know) will all see the photo of me and know I tried to steal.

What company did the security people work for?

they will be contractors and may well not have the necessary permissions for their actions.

As for banning you from all the shops in a town centre

- well some places have schemes where information on persistent offenders is shared via a formal agreement between the council, police and shops and banning orders are given and enforced.

there is nothing in these agreements that will allow a banning order on their say so for one event.

It them follows that the rest of their statement is cobblers because that breaks the law as in all liklihood the processing of your data without your permission.

that is why I ask what company the security people work for so they can be looked up on the SRA and ICO databases.

Put your photo on public display saying you are what, a convicted shoplifter? You would hope in a way that they would do such a thing...you havent been found guilty of anything.

What images have you seen in the shops? The only ones ive ever seenhave been produced by the Poluce and have been for prolific shoplifters.

Since your photo is data i would put in a request after the 25th(?) of this month just to see what they plan to do with the images, they will, as i understand it, have clarify just what their intentions are.

Hi and welcome to CAG

I agree with everyone so far. It may be that the security company will pass the photo on to other stores which are part of a shop/store watch scheme. This photo cannot be placed in an area seen by the public. As for a town banning order. Nah! You can go into other shops but the store security may follow you around. The police do have different rules on what they can do but as they were not involved, nothing will come of that.

Anybody going into any shop/store is there by invitation only and any store can ask you to leave for whatever reason they want however many shops want your (legitimate) business.

I would stay out of B&Q for about 6 months and by that time they should have forgotten about you but you would be a trespasser and they can still ask you to leave.

From the 25th of this month, the new Data Protection rules come into place and no one is allowed to charge you the old £10 fee. They will also have only 30 days to supply your data instead of the old 40 days rule.

Ensure that if you do send the request , that you want details of the store security company. I don't know if B&Q have their own store security or whether they pay a private company to do this on their behalf.

As for any begging letters, ignore them. It is likely that the people contacting you will be RLP although there is another company that does the same and they are called DWF. The only time to react is if a 'Letter Before Action' arrives or if they bypass the Pre Action Protocols and send you court papers. Highly unlikely they will do anything at all but better be forewarned than ignorant.

After all my waffle:

1 Don't do it again as you will be more likely to get a police visit and makes us on CAG look silly.

2 Ignore RLP/DWF and any 'pet' debt collector

3 When you get the letters, post them here (suitably redacted of ALL personal data) in pdf format

4 Work out the reasons you felt that stealing was OK.

Thanks for all the responses, they've really reassured me. It was a stupid and wrong thing that I did and certainly won't ever even consider it again. Pretty disgusted with myself and am finding it hard to look my wife (who I haven't told) in the eye. I'm hoping this will pass as I hate keeping things secret from her.

What company did the security people work for?

they will be contractors and may well not have the necessary permissions for their actions.

I've had a bit of a google and it looks like a firm called VSG do a lot of work with B&Q, security-wise.

It them follows that the rest of their statement is cobblers because that breaks the law as in all liklihood the processing of your data without your permission.

I desperately hope so.

 

What images have you seen in the shops? The only ones ive ever seenhave been produced by the Poluce and have been for prolific shoplifters.

 

Since your photo is data i would put in a request after the 25th(?) of this month just to see what they plan to do with the images, they will, as i understand it, have clarify just what their intentions are.

There was a B&M near where I used to live and they had photos taken from their security cameras offering a reward for information leading to the arrest of their suspected shop-lifters. I always used to sneer and laugh at the 'low lifes' on display; now I'm no better then they are.

I'm wary of pressing matters any further as if the security were just trying to scare me, a) they have probably left it now and b) are potentially quite malicious and I don't want to tempt them to follow through with their threats.

 

After all my waffle:

1 Don't do it again as you will be more likely to get a police visit and makes us on CAG look silly.

2 Ignore RLP/DWF and any 'pet' debt collector

3 When you get the letters, post them here (suitably redacted of ALL personal data) in pdf format

4 Work out the reasons you felt that stealing was OK.

1. Not a chance in hell!

2. Will do

3. Ditto, although may need to just type what they say

4. Stupidity and the thought that I might save a few quid. I'm generally (and I know it might not seem like this) quite a moral and principled person. Work with the local food bank, politically active, work in social care. However, just had a stupid brainfade when it came to this. I wish they knew how sorry I am. Having said that, in all honesty I doubt I'd have felt particularly sorry if I'd gotten away with it, so that's something I'll have to have a long think about. I'd never ever steal from a small business or local shop and I guess part of me did think that big business is fair game. Totally wrong of me, I know.

sorry but googling an answer doesnt work in this case, you have to KNOW the answer for sure to progress any research or possible complaint. as for your comments regarding malice, there are laws that limit waht they do and protect you and your personal data. The law takes a long time to creak into action but these people would lose their jobs and the company would be fined about £100k if they did.

The company must be registered with the SRA and the individuals likelwise. They must have permission from the ICO for processing your data and specify what sort of data they holdand process and how they obtain that data. If they dotn have permission to photograph or film people they are in trouble. If they have permission to use CCTV that doesnt mean they can use mobile phones to film you. If they ahve a work tablet that doesnt ean they can use a mobile phone to film you and then process those images and so on.

Did you give permission for them to remove your pass? If not then that is common assault.

As B&Q employ them you might want to make a complaint to them if it turns out they security people dont ahve the necessary permissions as they will then be liable (they also need a SRA licence so they will ahve to take such matters seriously)

As for your other comments in the above post, you are not the moral and piricipled person as you state that in your mindset it is OK to steal. Telling us you do good deeds with a local food bank doesnt impress. If your thoughts and action are tied up with your politics then that may well explain why but you wont win many voters over and is of no relevance to this thread. you would have been better off saying nothing.

I got a letter through the post today from the Manchester BRCP.

As stated, I can't post a pdf or anything but the organisation do have a website (just google manchester brcp)

The letter has my personal details at the top and a line stating that "On this date you were involved in an incident concerning dishonesty/ criminal damage/ violence/ verbal abuse/ anti-social beahviour (Circle as appropriate) [dishonesty is circled]"

Underneath that there's a box and that states "DETAINED FOR THEFT"

It goes on to state:

"A record of this incident/ offence has been retained by the business and in addition passed to the Business Crime Reduction Partnership for collation on the partnership's database and may be disseminated to all member businesses in the scheme.

Cityco Business Crime Partnership maintains a record of all incidents concerning Dishonesty/ Criminal Damage/ Violence/ Verbal Abuse/ Anti-social behaviour and is designed to identify the most persistent offenders.

If you are not involved in any other incidents described above then your details will be removed from the database after a period of twelve months with no further action taken.

However, should you come to the attention of any members of the scheme or the Police then the details of this incident will be taken into consideration with a view to considering what appropriate action should be taken against you which may include Exclusion [their bold/ underlining] from all member premises for a period of 24 months.

If you wish to appeal against your details being detained by this company or on our information crime system then you should write to [name and address of business crime manager]"

It all seems a little vague regarding what they're actually doing with my details.

"A record of this incident/ offence ...may be disseminated to all member businesses in the scheme" doesn't really tell me much.

There are logos from the police, storenet and BCRP on the bottom of the letter and the website also has the logos of Manchester City Council, British Transport Police and Immigration Enforcement.

Will my details be passed on to all of these people as well as the shops?

I've not slept properly since this happened and feel physically sick.

I'm scared to take my son shopping now and have had to tell his gran/ my mum that I can't meet them tomorrow.

Also, my employer has links to the City Council; will they find out through this?

The hopeful part of me thinks that the council logo is on the site because the BCRP's parent company does lots with the council in terms of events and they're not going to email lists of names and photos of all Manchester's shoplifters to some worker at the town hall to cross check against people they have dealings with.

BCRP.pdf

ofcourse you ignore it

forget it ever happened totally

one tiny line in their data protection statement is cleverly hidden.

we will only communicate information we hold to third parties with your consent...says it all really :lol:

I could reach in to the screen and hug you!!!

thread tidied

well done

just remember all that is is a letter from some powerless shopwatch scheme.

Thanks so much.

merged to post 9 already so the info is in one post

all done

dx

I think that letter is all you will receive however, if any other letters arrive, let us know.

"They MAY disseminate" is a bit vague but nothing much to worry about. If they did pass it between other members of the scheme, they are duty bound to protect that data from falling into the wrong hands so although your employer has links to the council, this wouldn't show.

With these schemes, businesses liaise with the police and the councils to ensure that they follow the rules hence the logos at the bottom of the letter. All it means is that thepolice and the council have approved the scheme and share the values committed to by the stores.

12 months will pass very quickly and you will soon forget this ever happened. Another thing to note. If you change jobs in the future, if you are asked if you have a criminal record, you can honestly say no. Even if a job included an enhanced CRB check, this won't show.

Try to get on with your life and treat this single incident as a learning experience.

Good Luck

https://cityco.com/cms/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Privacy-Notice.pdf

https://cityco.com/cms/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/MBCRP_Leaflet_June2015_SINGLEPAGES.pdf

It appears this is a ‘storenet’ scheme, who can share intelligence, and have the support of the police and local council.

That said, that shouldn’t “blur the lines”, so there shouldn’t be claims for unrealistic “security costs”, but they can lawfully share data providing it is in accord with their data privacy policy.