strip search leaving store
 

Okay.. it wasn't really a strip search, but I got your attention. :)

What do you guys and gals think about the storeperson who goes through your bag/cart as you LEAVE the store. This is after you've stood in line for several minutes to pay for the stuff. They expect you to line up like sheep again to be searched. They are basically accusing everyone of thievery. Personally, I don't stop unless my wife is along because she doesn't want to make a commotion.

Fry's electronics was the first store that I saw do this as a rule. This goes back more than 10 years. I don't stop at Fry's, I walk past the long single file line and exit the store. I feel they would have to have reason to accuse me of shoplifting to search my belongings. They are after all, mine. I paid my hard earned money for what's in the bag. It's insulting.

Is this a California thing? Costco is doing it now. I am just be grouchy again? Is it legal to search either inside or outside the store exit. Can I give them the finger and continue walking without my membership being revoked?

I know there are some attorneys here. I would like to hear if a precedent has been set. I feel I'm going to make my own here soon. :)

Fry's does it; Costco does it; Sam's does it.

You are guilty until proven innocent, get used to it.

3 second minor inconvenience. Probably helps keeps the prices down.

bunch of wimps... sound like my wife ;)

For the legal people out there... how are search and seizure laws applied to this type of thing?

Pisses me off too. I notice that the same franchise does it in some stores, but not in others. If I'm not with my wife, I usually make a rude comment. I don't care if it keeps prices down or not, its still insulting.

I just ignore them. I've even responded when challenged; "None of your business." Because it isn't.

I don't mind Costco. But I feel like a criminal every time I step into the local Guitar Center.

Hey, guys! I'm not a real musician! Really! I have a real job! I can afford to pay for my strings and picks!

I blow past the Fry's retailmonkeys; no one has called me back yet. With Costco, for some reason, I don't mind them checking.

I ignore the Fry's folks as well. I seem to recal the search when exiting thing is something you agree to when you become a member at Costco.

The worst I ever saw was at Wal Mart (in Milpitas for the locals). They had all of the exit doors blocked except for one, so all the lunchtime traffic was channeled past one dim-witted barely literate employee to check receipts. The line for the exit search was longer than most of the registers, and moving slower.:rolleyes:

In hindsight, I should have called the fire department. Blocking all those exits had to be against city fire code.

Tom

Re: strip search leaving store
 

When you become a member at costco and sign that contact you give them the right to search your cart as you leave.

Here at the home base of Costco - Kirkland Washington - for 15 years I've been curious as to why Costco checks the cart vs. receipt.

How the hell are ya gonna get anything past the checker that would sit in your cart, anyway? Put it in your coat ;-)

Just my $.02 but it sounds like people are being acused of theft without proof. Kind of like being pulled over and searched just because you were on the road. It must be a CA. thing I have never been searched here in Va, and I look like the kind of person who would get stopped. (long hair, short beard)
Hell here the cops can't even search your car without a warrant, If it isn't in plain sight they can't do anything about it.

just because i come into your store and want to shop for something, doesn't give you the right to search me.
where are the constitutional attorneys?

what's next, fingerprinting on entry?

Not a "legal people," but search and seizure laws apply to government action against citizens, not the policies private businesses have toward their customers.

Personally, I haven't run into any checks that I consider too intrusive, and if I did, I'd just stop doing business with any company whose policies I didn't like. Like Walmart's new policy requiring that customers wait in the check-out line for at least 10 minutes (if the wait gets to be less than ten minutes, they close registers); I've just stopped shopping there.

Exactly.

You guys are thinking about this as law abiding citizens. You can't believe the lengths people will go to steal. If it keeps prices lower, I am all for it.

Its not like you are being asked to bend over and cough.......

What is actually stupid about the practice in my opinion is that the line of registers is usually placed 50' away from the exit. So you stand in line for 10 minutes, pay, and then head for the door where you're stopped again because none of these *security* guys saw you in line. So in actuality the *security* guy isn't paying any attention to whats going on over at the registers, but stops you before leaving the building anyway. They do this at Costco and Target in MN, and you really can't sneak past the registers with a cart or a box or whatever to the exit in the first place. Its like checking out twice...it doesn't bother me that much but funny how none of them have a posted policy at the entrance about how it goes down when you shop there...

"Yeah, you got me. I didn't pay for this 52" Plasma TV that I have on your store warehouse cart that YOUR associate loaded from the back dock inside your store..." DUH.

In reality, retail chains don't make much on 52" televisions. And they are obviously next to impossible to steatl. Its the little stuff.

People stealing printer toner, meat, computer games. Those items are small, easy to steal, and hurt the bottom line.

Yeah but you missed the point...the place to prevent that stuff from getting stolen is before they hit the checkout anyway. Quick checks of carts and whatever is fine but asking to dig through your bags is quite another. So when I've stood in line for 10 minutes with my cart, don't stop me at the door for the *security* guys lack of attentiveness.

Nobody's person is being searched.

This is exactly why I quit Sam's. I will not be treated like a criminal.

The exit search is completely voluntary. Most people will see the line of people having their bags searched and willingly join it themselves without further thought. I always walk past this check point and give them a firm "no" when they ask me to stop. It never has gotten beyond that.

Vote with your wallet and simply stop shopping at the stores that do this...

At Costco it's mandatory -

They do it here in NJ at Home Depot, Costco, Target, Walmart...etc.

I don't get how this 'search' is effective. Most of the time, they don't even glance in the bags, they just look at the receipt, make a check mark, and off you go. Yeah, I feel real secure... :rolleyes:

-Z

If it slows me down, I just go on thru. Costco, or whatever. No one has ever chased me down. Just give them " is it worth your life, look".

Wow, I have never ever found an issue with this. Only store I shop at that does it I can think of at the moment is Sams.

at costco, the only annoyance is that it creates just one extra logjam. i dont really care, it isnt so much of a search, they just look at my 5 gallon container of ketchup, and verify. i dont shop at FRY's. just try to return something and you will see why.

Same here. They just count the number of items in your cart and the reciept and make sure they match.

I've never seen this anywhere else. Must be that all you big city folk feel entitled to a store's merchandise...:p

I have seen it done at a walmart in Alabama. I never have really thought about it but now I will either wall on by or ask them to stop me about 200 feet from the store. I believe it is a legal thing. After 200 feet you can't say you were looking for a salesperson. Not sure what state gave us that one. After 200 feet they are detaining you and violating you rights. I guess I might hold up the receipt as I walked by. Here they usually have an off duty cop standing there with a store salesperson. Thanks

I hate these receipt checks. They are a waste of my time and money. Yes, my money. By shopping at that store, I am paying the wages of the clerk doing the shopping. I am convinced that the wage cost of those employees is greater than whatever shoplifting they might prevent.

Case in point: I was recently shopping with someone else at a store that does these checks. We each paid separately. We put all our stuff in the same cart, yet only showed the clerk one of our receipts. He waved us through without even noticing all the stuff in the cart that was not on the one receipt he saw.

last Christmas, i went into a "things remembered". my girlfriend wanted to get the dogs, stocking stuffers. silver name tags. so i wandered around. naturally i found the flask. kinda neat, so i played with them and just to see if it would fit, put it into my back pocket. out of nowhere, some fool yells, "hey! stop that you thief!" and i feel a hand grab my arm. i put the flask back ( i was a bit red faced) and went outside to sulk. given a few seconds, i got pissed. so i went inside to search the manager. she saw me looking for her. i said, "do you want to talk about this here, or will you want more privacy? i tore her employee a new a-hole. she tried to find the idiot to apologize to me, but i couldnt care less. my girlfriend thought it was funny. i wished the guy knocked me to the ground and frisked me...hahaha.

They do it at the local Big K-Mart (I only buy cat litter there).

One thing I've seen that's pretty strange to me is at a particular Best Buy, where all the security guards seem to be Black. they're pretty thorough checking Black customers but seem to just wave me (middle-aged white buy) through. Someday I'll have to ask 'em why they can't show me the same respect...

Z, They do it at Costco up here but non of the other places you mention....at least the ones I go to.

Personally I think it's ineffective. Perhaps a deterrent to the occasional shoplifter or someone who's buddys with a cashier.

Well, somebody's pilfering billions of dollars worth of stuff. I'm sure most of it goes out the back door, or does it? You'd be surprised what gets stuck between someone's loins on the way out the door. Not that a clerk is going to pat you down, but maybe it's just another checkpoint to deter potential perps.

Maybe they should use rottweillers foaming at the mouth .... unleashed.

Sherwood

Two recent anecdotes from the automotive industry: one, a VP of the ocmpany was ocming in Saturdays and bringing large trucks to load up and pilfer inventory from a huge warehouse for over a year. The management figured he'd taken $1.4 million worth...

In the other, a VP at a parts retailer cooked up a deal with a large wholesale customer for a cash exchange for a quarter million in inventory. All caught on tape by a PI -- as it took place in a strip club parking lot.

Shoplifters do a lot of damage, but the really big scores often involve insiders.

"Maybe they should use rottweillers foaming at the mouth .... unleashed."

Uh....maybe you should see the 'women' at our local Costco.
They have no leash law, unfortunately.

My wife just said:

"Like I'm gonna put a 5 gallon jar of mustard in my pants"

I'd actually like to see that.

Yes, it does. Most retail theft is committed by employees. Too lazy to find figures.

In high school, one of my friends worked at Best Buy unloading the trucks at night and stocking the shelves. He said it was not uncommon to see more than one employee leave with over $1,000 in merchandise, each night. When they started cracking down (managers actually started watching the unloading--and stopped letting people park next to the unloading truck), the employees got inventive. One trick was that they would load all of the stuff the wanted into a safe that was for sale, and then take the keys to the safe home. The next day, they'd come in when they weren't working and use their employee discount to buy the safe full of merchandise...

I thought that is what these searches were all about. Like if your best friend is the clerk and doesn't ring up the plasma TV in your cart. The door guard is supposed to catch it.

Now that makes sense - !