Young people, low-income earners most likely to steal from self-checkout

About 1 in 14 Netherlands residents sometimes deliberately don’t scan and pay for all their items at the self-checkout counter. Young people under 35 are most likely to do this (11 percent), followed by people with a low income (10 percent), RTL Nieuws reports after surveying 21,000 members of its opinion panel.

Most (42 percent) who sometimes steal something from the self-checkout do so to save money on groceries. Another 40 percent said they do it to protest against high prices. The vast majority think supermarkets can lose a little turnover. And over 80 percent think supermarkets who cut costs with self-checkouts must accept that they’ll lose something to theft.

85 percent of respondents told RTL that they sometimes use the self-checkout counter, and 61 percent said they do so regularly. Intentionally stealing something by not scanning it happens most often at supermarkets, followed by department stores and drug stores.

A 24-year-old respondent told the broadcaster that he’s been stealing mainly small things without a barcode - like fruit or a croissant - for the past two years. According to him, supermarkets make a lot of profit, and that’s about the same as stealing from consumers. “Stuff should become cheaper, then I will stop.”

Another respondent said they steal things they typically can’t afford. “I love smoked salmon, but it's just not affordable anymore,” they said. Another said: “It’s a simple way to save 4 to 5 euros.”

Supermarkets have been dealing with increasing shoplifting since the introduction of self-checkout counters. Earlier this month, Jumbo reported that over 100 million euros worth of products are stolen from their supermarkets every year.

Vomar director Aart van Haren thinks people have a misconception about how much money supermarkets make. “People really don’t have to feel sorry for us,” he told RTL. “But the margins are not large, no matter how large a supermarket is.” Vomar doesn’t use self-checkouts but has also seen the number of thefts increase in the past two years.