staff safety
Keeping staff safe during the
cost-of-living crisis
Violence and abuse against retail workers tripled over the pandemic and the situation could be worsening as a result of the cost-of-living crisis. So, how can retailers keep staff safer?
Risk has become part of the job description for many retail workers. Although the industry isn’t typically labelled a ‘dangerous’ profession, violence and abuse against retail workers is nothing new and the evidence suggests that incidents increased significantly throughout the pandemic.
A BRC survey showed that violence and abuse against retail workers tripled during COVID, to over 1,300 incidents per day. And while these incidents of violence and abuse soared, only 4% resulted in a prosecution. The total cost of crime was a staggering £1.5 billion.
For retail staff, the day-to-day risk to their personal safety is a very real problem. According to another more recent study, commissioned by personal safety experts, Peoplesafe, 27% of them worry about their safety at least once every week. 75% are concerned about aggression from customers and 42% said they have received verbal or physical abuse from a member of the public.
Unfortunately, it appears the situation could get worse before it gets better. Last month, on Good Morning Britain, Iceland Managing Director, Richard Walker, spoke to Ed Balls and Susanna Reid about the ongoing cost-of-living crisis and cited a worrying new trend.
Reporting that soaring food costs are resulting in a rise in shoplifting across Iceland stores, the supermarket chief also noted that he is seeing an increase in the number of serious incidents associated with aggressive behaviour in store every week.
“Unfortunately, it is going up because people are struggling", he was quoted.
With the Peoplesafe study revealing that one in four people across all working sectors admits they wouldn’t want to take on any role that involved any face-to-face contact with the public, let alone confrontational behaviour (62% citing safety concerns), a very real recruitment crisis could be looming for the retail sector as we head towards 2023.
Stores spent on average £3,724 on crime prevention measures in 2021, including CCTV, security staff and intruder alarms. The question now is, how much do these measures actually increase the feeling of safety for workers when they are all relatively standard things to have in place and crime is continuing to rise? Similarly, how can employers provide the peace of mind and safety levels that staff still feel they are lacking during these increasingly tumultuous times?
The first step may be to acknowledge there is an issue. 57% of employers surveyed by Peoplesafe underestimated the level of concern for safety amongst their staff. The second may be to consider a different solution to employee safety.
Personal safety alarms and apps are not traditionally used in the retail sector, but that doesn’t mean they couldn’t help. A large gap in retail crime is reporting. Despite the high levels of incidents - the equivalent of one a minute - a maximum of only 30% of retail crimes are reported to the police.
28% of retailers stated that they don't report crime because of the time it takes to file and process reports. This is part of a vicious cycle: if the crimes aren’t reported to the police, how can they support retailers to reduce incidents?
Implementing a simple process and capturing reliable evidence are two areas where technology can help to make incident reporting easier. Audio recordings are gathered from every SOS alarm raised by a personal safety device or app. In addition, body worn cameras are being successfully trialled by a number of retailers to capture video evidence. Both audio and video files of this nature are admissible in court as evidence for the prosecution.
Personal safety technology has also proven useful as a deterrent when potential criminals and aggressors have seen it in operation. Available 24/7/365, these solutions are always able to provide assistance to any incident.
The Peoplesafe survey was conducted with 2,081 non-vulnerable and potentially vulnerable workers. Download the study report here: https://peoplesafe.co.uk/whitepapers/overcoming-the-employee-safety-gap/
