Retail staff see the number of physical attacks rise by 50% as threats of violence rise by a third

I was a speaker at the British Retail Consortium's (BRC) Loss Prevention Conference and heard Dr Hawkins' poignant address.  He, like other speakers (who included Vernon Coaker, MP and Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Policing and Alan Brown OBE QPM, Group Security Director at Tesco), is trying to dispel the common assumption that retail crime is victimless.

I spoke at the conference session examining Employee Fraud.  In 2006, UK employees committed over £200 million of fraud against their own employers (source: BDO Stoy Hayward).  Retailers and other employers already take stringent efforts to protect their businesses from thieves and fraudsters who target them every day.  But are they unwittingly inviting potentially dishonest employees to work behind their counters or in their own offices?

In 2007, Monster.co.uk found that around two thirds of British workers would lie on their application forms to get a job.  Lies include fabricating work experience and concealing dismissals for gross misconduct, faking ID and qualifications, and concealing relevant criminal convictions.

I do hope that employers’ waning tolerance for fabrication, concealment and exaggeration on job applications, and their growing awareness of staff fraud, is motivating them to make life harder for the dishonest minority of employees.  After all, crime against businesses is far from "victimless".  When a member of staff steals money, goods, or customer records, everyone suffers the loss.  Honest members of staff fall under suspicion, lost revenue damages job security, and reputations collapse.

David Chernick

Head of Commercial Development

Reed Screening