A mum has been banned from every Asda supermarket in the UK after failing to pay for the £16 worth of items.
31-year-old Beth Robinson said that the self-scanning machine didn't take down half of her shopping, leading to a misunderstanding that saw her treated like a 'common criminal'.The mum, who has five children, was stopped as she attempted to leave an Asda supermarket in Scunthorpe by a security guard. Upon inspection, it turned out that she hadn't paid for several items within her shopping bags. She had used a scan-as-you-go device to buy the items to a strict budget of £45, but once she'd paid up and tried to leave she was collared by the guard, according to reports in the Scunthorpe Telegraph. Robinson said: "A security guard approached me outside the shop just after I had finished and said I needed to come back inside because there were discrepancies with the shopping."They rescanned all of my shopping and found it had missed £16 of items off. One of them was an £8 tub of baby formula for my seven-month-old son, who was with me at the time. The others were very cheap Savers items like 70p ham and crisps for my children."Robinson, who is currently on maternity leave, said that the scanning device beeped every time she passed an item across it, and added that she has never stolen in her entire life. She continued: "Why would I steal from there? I do three shops there a week, spending about £100 to £150 each week. I've spent so much money there over the years - why would I start stealing 70p items?"The staff said they could understand if I had stolen the items out of desperation, as it wasn't bottles of wine that people usually steal, but I honestly believed every item had been scanned."I was being treated like a common criminal. I told them to watch the CCTV and see for themselves that I scanned every item."Despite her protests, Beth was made to sign an exclusion order banning her from every single Asda location for one year. If she does, they could charge her with trespassing and she could be evicted from the store. She added: "It really shook me up. I tried telling them there must be a problem with the scanner but they said it would have frozen if it had, "I knew I didn't have enough money for all of the items, so I had to return some of them to buy the baby formula milk."I go to that Scunthorpe Asda all the time - we use it for Christmas presents and school uniforms for the kids, and we're all registered at the opticians there. Now I will have to go somewhere else."Beth's husband Dale said that they've contacted Asda to complain about the ban, during which calls he admits to becoming angry and frustrated. An Asda spokesperson said: "We always want to provide a welcoming environment for our customers and asking someone not to visit our stores is always an absolute last resort."Whilst the customer did understand why we had to make this difficult decision and we're more than happy to discuss the situation with her further, we'd like to remind the customer and her partner that we cannot tolerate shoplifting or any form of abusive or threatening behaviour towards our colleagues."
31-year-old Beth Robinson said that the self-scanning machine didn't take down half of her shopping, leading to a misunderstanding that saw her treated like a 'common criminal'.The mum, who has five children, was stopped as she attempted to leave an Asda supermarket in Scunthorpe by a security guard. Upon inspection, it turned out that she hadn't paid for several items within her shopping bags. She had used a scan-as-you-go device to buy the items to a strict budget of £45, but once she'd paid up and tried to leave she was collared by the guard, according to reports in the Scunthorpe Telegraph. Robinson said: "A security guard approached me outside the shop just after I had finished and said I needed to come back inside because there were discrepancies with the shopping."They rescanned all of my shopping and found it had missed £16 of items off. One of them was an £8 tub of baby formula for my seven-month-old son, who was with me at the time. The others were very cheap Savers items like 70p ham and crisps for my children."Robinson, who is currently on maternity leave, said that the scanning device beeped every time she passed an item across it, and added that she has never stolen in her entire life. She continued: "Why would I steal from there? I do three shops there a week, spending about £100 to £150 each week. I've spent so much money there over the years - why would I start stealing 70p items?"The staff said they could understand if I had stolen the items out of desperation, as it wasn't bottles of wine that people usually steal, but I honestly believed every item had been scanned."I was being treated like a common criminal. I told them to watch the CCTV and see for themselves that I scanned every item."Despite her protests, Beth was made to sign an exclusion order banning her from every single Asda location for one year. If she does, they could charge her with trespassing and she could be evicted from the store. She added: "It really shook me up. I tried telling them there must be a problem with the scanner but they said it would have frozen if it had, "I knew I didn't have enough money for all of the items, so I had to return some of them to buy the baby formula milk."I go to that Scunthorpe Asda all the time - we use it for Christmas presents and school uniforms for the kids, and we're all registered at the opticians there. Now I will have to go somewhere else."Beth's husband Dale said that they've contacted Asda to complain about the ban, during which calls he admits to becoming angry and frustrated. An Asda spokesperson said: "We always want to provide a welcoming environment for our customers and asking someone not to visit our stores is always an absolute last resort."Whilst the customer did understand why we had to make this difficult decision and we're more than happy to discuss the situation with her further, we'd like to remind the customer and her partner that we cannot tolerate shoplifting or any form of abusive or threatening behaviour towards our colleagues."