Huge rise in pensioner shoplifters in past year, security firm reports

John Nussbaum, director of service for retail at Kingdom Security, said his staff were seeing a “different sort of shoplifter now” as the cost of living “pushes people to something they’ve never done before”.

Kingdom Security, which provides security services for hundreds of stores across the country, including supermarkets, convenience stores and shopping malls, was receiving 20 to 30 reports of shoplifting a week from across the UK involving “people who just can’t afford to buy food”, Mr Nussbaum said.

He said: “We’ve seen a massive increase in pensioners shoplifting, putting a jar of coffee in their bag and one in the trolley, that sort of thing.

“For us over the last 12 months, we’ve got this different level of crime now. We’re now experiencing something different – pensioners, people who don’t normally shoplift.

“We’ve had instances of mothers caught shoplifting when they’re with their kids.

“We’re used to seeing the organised gangs, that’s the norm, but the types of people being caught now has changed.”

He estimated that 5% of all those caught shoplifting by Kingdom staff on a weekly basis were aged over 50.

“We’ve not seen this before, and I’ve been in security for 30 years. Ten years ago, five years ago, you wouldn’t have seen this kind of theft. We put it down to the cost of living. People can’t afford to spend £10, £20 on food. It’s desperation.”

He added: “Retailers don’t tend to involve the police when they’re dealing with pensioners. Stores tend to want to handle it on their own.

“It’s not good publicity for a supermarket if it got out that a pensioner had been handed over to the police for shoplifting.”

More than half a million shoplifting offences recorded for the first time

Mr Nussbaum’s comments follow figures showing that the number of shoplifting offences recorded by police in England and Wales in a year has passed half a million for the first time.

A total of 516,971 offences were logged by forces in 2024, up 20% from 429,873 in 2023.

The figure is the highest since current police recording practices began in the year to March 2003, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).

Shoplifting offences have been running at record levels for the past two years and have seen a “sharp rise” since the Covid-19 pandemic, the ONS said.

Additionally, Mr Nussbaum said, staff were seeing “terrible violence now, every day” from organised gangs, with one employee punched in the face just this week and those working at a shopping centre north of London wearing stabproof vests.

He said: “It’s not unusual to come across guns on site.

“We carried out a big operation with police to clean up the city centre, which included the shopping centre. We found knives, drugs – there’s a lot of drug-dealing going on.

“We have a quick response unit for one of our bigger retailers which can get to places very quickly and is highly trained for a variety of incidents and safeguarding.

“But you have to remember that retail staff also have to deal with this every day.”

He said: “There’s no fear any more.

“If someone gets arrested they might get a fine or spend a night in jail. There’s no deterrent any more. There’s nothing to stop these people.

“We’ve had prolific shoplifters who get arrested and they’re back two days later. We have this quite a lot.”

Mr Nussbaum said he supported facial recognition technology being trialled by Asda at five of its Greater Manchester stores, involving customers’ faces, picked up on CCTV, being scanned and compared against individuals on an internal watchlist.

The watchlist, compiled by Asda, is made up of individuals staff suspect have been involved in “theft, violence and/or fraud in Asda stores”, although they may not be convicted of any crime.

Home Bargains, Southern Co-op, Budgens, Costcutter and several independent convenience stores use similar technology.

Mr Nussbaum said: “Facial recognition is brilliant and more retailers should do it. Anything that aids identifying shoplifters, organised gangs, people who could be violent is a good thing.”