UK retail crime up 40 percent

The British Retail Consortium's annual Retail Crime Survey has revealed disconcerting figures.

53 per cent of retail fraud is now cyber-enabled; violence and abuse against staff has risen by 40 per cent in the past year; the overall number of retail crimes committed has risen to 3.6 million.

The cost of retail crime to the industry is 660 million pounds a year

The annual cost to the industry is a whopping 660 million pounds. Customer theft alone is costing businesses 438 million pounds per year. No wonder 56 percent of retailers feel police support is poor.

“These figures reflect a deeply concerning trend. Attacks on retail workers are intolerable, as are attempts to defraud customers. A significant aspect of the cyber security challenge for retailers is the attractiveness of customer data from the point of view of criminals, many of whom operate outside UK borders but can nevertheless gain relatively easy access to UK digital networks, said Helen Dickinson, OBE, Chief Executive of the BRC.

“Retailers are doing everything possible to ensure that staff members and customers are safe and protected. But this rising tide should be stemmed through even stronger cooperation between industry, the government, law enforcement and the private security industry. There is work to do to further improve collaboration between the UK retail industry and its partners, and raise standards of security and policing of these threats across the country,” Dickinson added.

The BRC Retail Crime Survey sample covered 37 percent of the retail industry by turnover and 35 percent by staff, accounting for 1.1 million employees.

Photo credit: Cyber Crime, Source: KPMG website