Waitrose Sacks Employee After ‘Altercation’ With Shoplifter Stealing Easter Eggs
A veteran Waitrose worker of 17 years has been given the sack after stopping a thief trying to make off with luxury Easter eggs. The Mailhas more.
Shop assistant Walker Smith, 54, was approached by a customer in a Waitrose store in Clapham Junction, South London, who told him someone had filled a shopping bag with Easter eggs.
Mr Smith recognised the shoplifter as a repeat offender and “grabbed the bag” from him.
The thief snatched the bag back and a tug-of-war ensued between the pair before the bag ripped and Lindt Gold Bunny eggs, which retail for £13 each, fell to the floor with one smashing to pieces.
With his plan foiled, the shoplifter sprinted out of the shop whilst Mr Smith picked up a piece of broken chocolate and “threw it out of frustration” in the direction of some shopping trolleys, but did not aim it at the thief.
He was scolded by his manager and had to apologise, but his superior still decided to escalate the matter higher – leaving Mr Smith to go home “punching” himself and questioning why he stopped the thief.
A few days later, Mr Smith was pulled into a meeting with two store managers.
Having a feeling about what was about to happen, he pleaded with his bosses and told them Waitrose is like his “family”.
But they still decided to fire their staff member of 17 years over the incident.
Walker Smith, 54
Mr Smith previously admitted staff had been told not to approach shoplifters but said he was spurred into action after watching thieves get away with stealing from the shop every hour of the day for the last five years. …
He had recently moved into a studio flat on his own after only being able to afford to live in a flat share with other people for 25 years, now he worries he could become homeless and his confidence is “on the floor”.
Aldi are little better in this regard, a friend’s son is currently waiting to find out if he will keep his job after being assaulted by a drunk customer and swearing in frustration.
Defend your employer’s property, uphold the law, get the sack. I generally can’t be arsed to boycott specific shops or businesses because most corporates seem to be run by woke prats, but Waitrose and John Lewis are bottom of my list. Waitrose in particular seems to be full of sanctimonious looking twats every time I go in there. Didn’t the Korean shopkeepers defend their businesses with firearms during the LA Riots?
Things like shoplifting and fare-dodging might seem like almost victimless, “low level” crime to people, but in my experience often the perpetrators turn very aggressive when challenged and there is often the threat of or actual violence. It is really not pleasant to be around. They get away with it because most people don’t to challenge them, and as we see from this story, the employer doesn’t have their backs if they do. London public transport is rife with it.
Interesting, the Korean shop owners never got burgled during the LA riots. They stood on the roofs of their shops with their rifles. But in the US people have the right to protect their property, with guns. The police do not even have guns in the UK. Not sure why not?
Why not? I think we had the idea of “policing by consent” once. That has largely gone now. Lots of our police do now have guns, some all the time, some in particular situations. They have lot more in the way of body armour, batons, tasers etc than they used to. I wonder why that could be…
thechap
6 days ago
I feel immense sadness reading this. This man who tried show decency and honesty, who tried to make sure that right was done, is being punished for his bravery. A shoplifters’ charter is now in place.
Britain is lost. If you can afford to leave, you should leave.
Quite remarkable isn’t it. Don’t pay a speeding ticket, or your taxes, they are on you faster than flies on dead meat. But if you steal, burn, loot, murder, or car jack the BMW that is okay. No one cares.
Roll up roll up get your 200 quids worth of free stuff and not get prosecuted while stocks last. ———–Today it is shoplifting. Tomorrow it will be people just walking into your house and taking what they want. —–ANARCHY
“Shoplifters of the world, unite and take over..”🎤🎸
Clapham Junction, though. C’mon, I can’t be the only one going there and wondering about the ethnicity of this cocky, entitled punk. I’m with Pete North on this one.
Waitrose: you’re a bloody disgrace to humanity. Mr Smith is a man with integrity, an intact moral compass and a functioning pair of balls. He is a hero and just this act alone is all the reference he needs to secure his next job. Top man.👏💪
The reference he’ll get will probably be sacked for gross misconduct. Maybe additionally with something about being aggressive and violent towards customers. Not the best starting point.
zebedee
6 days ago
I don’t shop there because Waitrose is run by a bunch of trans activists.
Please allow me footnote. Baroness Sharon White, the first black woman to lead a major British retail business, a diversity appointment as the CEO of the John Lewis Partnership. Sharon’s initiative: “support under-represented groups, such as the Create not Hate, designed to help them enter creative retail roles”. As her leadership greatly contributed to the decline of the brands, she stepped down earlier than planned. But she had already made sure that DEI was the only criterion for advancing in the once great “partnership”.
That’s an important remark: The people who run Waitrose obviously collect statistics about this and make their prices such that expected financial losses due to theft won’t affect the company.
According to the article, this man was just sacked for his own protection. If he doesn’t stop tackling shoplifters, he might eventually get injured or even killed and since Waitrose is a responsible employer, it’ll do its utmost to prevent that. Apart from that, this is a standard procedure: The ‘partner’ didn’t comply with required procedures. And hence, he was dispartnered for gross neglect of duty.
At the moment, there’s some Waitrose office drone somewhere who really loves his ability to do everything strictly by the book, come hell or high water. After all, propriety must be properly maintained. The book allows for theft as calculable business cost. It doesn’t allow for courage to reduce this cost.
Sometimes, the sheer idiocy of this world is breath-taking.
And because this story is circulating widely and getting so much exposure on social media, Waitrose may as well now hang a neon sign over the entrance of their stores declaring: “All thieves are welcome and will not be discriminated against due to a lack of morals. Be assured that you can steal at your leisure and not be challenged by our staff. You can be confident that should any staff try and accost you before you leave the premises with your free goods, they will be dealt with by the management accordingly and be sacked on the spot.” Or words to that effect.🙄 Because now Waitrose has given the green light to all the scumbags in the vicinity, who already know the police never bother with them, then they can expect an increase in shoplifting at their stores as a consequence. The irony is that the deterrent is non-existent for the thieves, only the shop staff, because Mr Smith has been made an example of so no decent member of staff will dare attempt to apprehend a thief when they see one in future. And as for security guards in shops: may as well have a cardboard cutout standing… Read more »
I’ve just emailed CEO tom.danyar@waitrose.co.uk along those lines which would be something of an inconvenience to me as I rather like one or two of their products but if I really miss them, I can evidently just go in and take them without paying.
DiscoveredJoys
6 days ago
If there is a Health And Safety at Work instruction in force (Do not intervene with shoplifters (for your own safety)) then failing to observe the instruction *must* be subject to disciplinary procedures otherwise ‘the bosses’ might be prosecuted for HASAW failure.
Mind you dismissal seems a harsh penalty under disciplinary procedures – unless there is more to the story than we know.
Surely, if you can just walk in and take what you want, there’s very little requirement for any staff at all. Unlock in the morning, come back later and lock up again. Do a quick stock take to make sure there’s plenty on the shelves to be nicked tomorrow….simples
Richard
5 days ago
Well if that is true it should be a straight forward case of unfair dismissal with mega compensation. That cannot be right!
If there’s a ‘Shoplifters Charter’ in place at the shop which more or less defends the right of thieving scum to steal, then staff transgressing those rights will be made examples of and have the ‘Order of the Boot’ bestowed on them with no redress for disobeying.
Perhaps sacked employees could make full use of those same gifting opportunities from shop management and as a result, never have to pay for any shopping in future – just stroll in, fill their large, strong bags and stroll out again. They’ll save an absolute fortune!
Twm Morgan
5 days ago
It seems then that Waitrose should apologise and reinstate their employee for their shameful action. Rather than SACK him, they should BACK him, and pay him a bonus. But no, rather than see him uphold decent, civilised behaviour, they deprive him of his living.
So now he’ll be able to claim the many tax free generous benefits provided by the tax payer and manage, quite probably on a higher income and tax free. Though I very much doubt he wants that.
I will not be shopping in Waitrose in future unless they give this man his job back.
Would he even want his job back, though? Many in his situation would tell them to shove it. It’s all very demoralising for the staff, too.
Imagine: you’re a conscientious employee, stacking shelves for not great money, you witness people coming in nicking stuff, even recognise some as repeat offenders, but you’re not allowed to do anything to stop them. Then you clock off and need to buy a few groceries, so you go to the till and use your 10% staff discount to pay for stuff you’ve just witnessed someone else freely walk out of the store with, bypassing the tills.
I think it’s a piss-take and my morale would take a hit. I don’t think I could work there out of principle. Even if staff aren’t allowed to intercept thieves, that shouldn’t extend to the security guards. Surely that sort of thing is in their remit, otherwise what’s the point?
RTSC
5 days ago
Waitrose’ staff are Partners in the business. They receive a proportion of the profits in an annual bonus.
By stealing from Waitrose stores, the shoplifter was stealing directly from Walker Smith (and every other Waitrose Partner).
Sacking someone who was acting to protect his own income is utterly disgraceful.
Angelcake
5 days ago
No surprise. Straight white working class man stands up to thieving underclass. Bet they could not wait to get rid of him.
marebobowl
5 days ago
Someone at Waitrose made a very big mistake. By all means give the guy a warning if he broke store rules, but to sack him? No, that was definitely wrong. Waitrose will pay large amounts of money for this error in legal fees and boycotts.
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No surprise to see Waitrose going the bidding of the elites.
Aldi, employ that man.
I wonder what ‘youf’ were doing the thieving? Black maybe? Isn’t that the real reason he was fired.
Given it was Clapham, the store managers were probably DEI.
Aldi are little better in this regard, a friend’s son is currently waiting to find out if he will keep his job after being assaulted by a drunk customer and swearing in frustration.
Oh dear… thoughts go out to that man. Fingers crossed.
Lidl then…
Budweiser and Nike are learning a hard lesson. Americans still boycotting Bud, just started boycotting Nike.
No good deed goes unpunished.
Defend your employer’s property, uphold the law, get the sack. I generally can’t be arsed to boycott specific shops or businesses because most corporates seem to be run by woke prats, but Waitrose and John Lewis are bottom of my list. Waitrose in particular seems to be full of sanctimonious looking twats every time I go in there. Didn’t the Korean shopkeepers defend their businesses with firearms during the LA Riots?
Things like shoplifting and fare-dodging might seem like almost victimless, “low level” crime to people, but in my experience often the perpetrators turn very aggressive when challenged and there is often the threat of or actual violence. It is really not pleasant to be around. They get away with it because most people don’t to challenge them, and as we see from this story, the employer doesn’t have their backs if they do. London public transport is rife with it.
There are no consequences for the perpetrators. Similarly this from the BBC but as usual the lefties have blamed the wrong thing.
Interesting, the Korean shop owners never got burgled during the LA riots. They stood on the roofs of their shops with their rifles. But in the US people have the right to protect their property, with guns. The police do not even have guns in the UK. Not sure why not?
Why not? I think we had the idea of “policing by consent” once. That has largely gone now. Lots of our police do now have guns, some all the time, some in particular situations. They have lot more in the way of body armour, batons, tasers etc than they used to. I wonder why that could be…
I feel immense sadness reading this. This man who tried show decency and honesty, who tried to make sure that right was done, is being punished for his bravery. A shoplifters’ charter is now in place.
Britain is lost. If you can afford to leave, you should leave.
Quite remarkable isn’t it. Don’t pay a speeding ticket, or your taxes, they are on you faster than flies on dead meat. But if you steal, burn, loot, murder, or car jack the BMW that is okay. No one cares.
But where to go? Where is any better?
Roll up roll up get your 200 quids worth of free stuff and not get prosecuted while stocks last. ———–Today it is shoplifting. Tomorrow it will be people just walking into your house and taking what they want. —–ANARCHY
Who needs Black Friday when the highly melaninized can just waltz in and expect a 100% discount 365 days of the year?🤷🏿♂️
“Shoplifters of the world, unite and take over..”🎤🎸
Clapham Junction, though. C’mon, I can’t be the only one going there and wondering about the ethnicity of this cocky, entitled punk. I’m with Pete North on this one.
Waitrose: you’re a bloody disgrace to humanity. Mr Smith is a man with integrity, an intact moral compass and a functioning pair of balls. He is a hero and just this act alone is all the reference he needs to secure his next job. Top man.👏💪
The reference he’ll get will probably be sacked for gross misconduct. Maybe additionally with something about being aggressive and violent towards customers. Not the best starting point.
I don’t shop there because Waitrose is run by a bunch of trans activists.
Please allow me footnote. Baroness Sharon White, the first black woman to lead a major British retail business, a diversity appointment as the CEO of the John Lewis Partnership. Sharon’s initiative: “support under-represented groups, such as the Create not Hate, designed to help them enter creative retail roles”. As her leadership greatly contributed to the decline of the brands, she stepped down earlier than planned. But she had already made sure that DEI was the only criterion for advancing in the once great “partnership”.
So that’s quite the unfortunate surname, then..😶
“… staff had been told not to approach shoplifters…”
Note: the cost of theft from shops is incident on paying customers, not the store owners.
But what if we all stop paying?
Contrary to a popular belief, most people are actually decent and honest. That is, they don’t steal because it was said
Thou shalt not steal.
T&C may apply for members of different cultures.
Well of course. Lookup the free rider problem. Waitrose have put themselves, and us in a different world to the 1990s.
That’s an important remark: The people who run Waitrose obviously collect statistics about this and make their prices such that expected financial losses due to theft won’t affect the company.
According to the article, this man was just sacked for his own protection. If he doesn’t stop tackling shoplifters, he might eventually get injured or even killed and since Waitrose is a responsible employer, it’ll do its utmost to prevent that. Apart from that, this is a standard procedure: The ‘partner’ didn’t comply with required procedures. And hence, he was dispartnered for gross neglect of duty.
At the moment, there’s some Waitrose office drone somewhere who really loves his ability to do everything strictly by the book, come hell or high water. After all, propriety must be properly maintained. The book allows for theft as calculable business cost. It doesn’t allow for courage to reduce this cost.
Sometimes, the sheer idiocy of this world is breath-taking.
And because this story is circulating widely and getting so much exposure on social media, Waitrose may as well now hang a neon sign over the entrance of their stores declaring: “All thieves are welcome and will not be discriminated against due to a lack of morals. Be assured that you can steal at your leisure and not be challenged by our staff. You can be confident that should any staff try and accost you before you leave the premises with your free goods, they will be dealt with by the management accordingly and be sacked on the spot.” Or words to that effect.🙄 Because now Waitrose has given the green light to all the scumbags in the vicinity, who already know the police never bother with them, then they can expect an increase in shoplifting at their stores as a consequence. The irony is that the deterrent is non-existent for the thieves, only the shop staff, because Mr Smith has been made an example of so no decent member of staff will dare attempt to apprehend a thief when they see one in future. And as for security guards in shops: may as well have a cardboard cutout standing… Read more »
Must be a relative of Starmer
FYI, the Waitrose customer service email is customerserviceteam@waitrose.co.uk
It might not do anything, but a few snotty “I’ll never shop there” emails might be noticed.
I’ve just emailed CEO tom.danyar@waitrose.co.uk along those lines which would be something of an inconvenience to me as I rather like one or two of their products but if I really miss them, I can evidently just go in and take them without paying.
If there is a Health And Safety at Work instruction in force (Do not intervene with shoplifters (for your own safety)) then failing to observe the instruction *must* be subject to disciplinary procedures otherwise ‘the bosses’ might be prosecuted for HASAW failure.
Mind you dismissal seems a harsh penalty under disciplinary procedures – unless there is more to the story than we know.
Arrest Shoplifters
not Shopkeepers
Surely, if you can just walk in and take what you want, there’s very little requirement for any staff at all. Unlock in the morning, come back later and lock up again. Do a quick stock take to make sure there’s plenty on the shelves to be nicked tomorrow….simples
Well if that is true it should be a straight forward case of unfair dismissal with mega compensation. That cannot be right!
If there’s a ‘Shoplifters Charter’ in place at the shop which more or less defends the right of thieving scum to steal, then staff transgressing those rights will be made examples of and have the ‘Order of the Boot’ bestowed on them with no redress for disobeying.
Perhaps sacked employees could make full use of those same gifting opportunities from shop management and as a result, never have to pay for any shopping in future – just stroll in, fill their large, strong bags and stroll out again. They’ll save an absolute fortune!
It seems then that Waitrose should apologise and reinstate their employee for their shameful action. Rather than SACK him, they should BACK him, and pay him a bonus. But no, rather than see him uphold decent, civilised behaviour, they deprive him of his living.
So now he’ll be able to claim the many tax free generous benefits provided by the tax payer and manage, quite probably on a higher income and tax free. Though I very much doubt he wants that.
I will not be shopping in Waitrose in future unless they give this man his job back.
Would he even want his job back, though? Many in his situation would tell them to shove it. It’s all very demoralising for the staff, too.
Imagine: you’re a conscientious employee, stacking shelves for not great money, you witness people coming in nicking stuff, even recognise some as repeat offenders, but you’re not allowed to do anything to stop them. Then you clock off and need to buy a few groceries, so you go to the till and use your 10% staff discount to pay for stuff you’ve just witnessed someone else freely walk out of the store with, bypassing the tills.
I think it’s a piss-take and my morale would take a hit. I don’t think I could work there out of principle. Even if staff aren’t allowed to intercept thieves, that shouldn’t extend to the security guards. Surely that sort of thing is in their remit, otherwise what’s the point?
Waitrose’ staff are Partners in the business. They receive a proportion of the profits in an annual bonus.
By stealing from Waitrose stores, the shoplifter was stealing directly from Walker Smith (and every other Waitrose Partner).
Sacking someone who was acting to protect his own income is utterly disgraceful.
No surprise. Straight white working class man stands up to thieving underclass. Bet they could not wait to get rid of him.
Someone at Waitrose made a very big mistake. By all means give the guy a warning if he broke store rules, but to sack him? No, that was definitely wrong. Waitrose will pay large amounts of money for this error in legal fees and boycotts.
Promote him, don’t sack him!