On 1 January, a number of Belgian independent supermarkets will start a remarkable scheme to combat the plague of shoplifting. Offenders who are caught, get the choice: pay 181 euros and the police will not be called. How realistic (and legally watertight) is this idea?
Debt collection agency
Shoplifting has been a scourge of retailers for a long time: recent estimates in Belgium and the Netherlands suggest that around 1 % of the sector’s turnover is lost to shoplifting – and the damages done are often higher than the actual net profit. Moreover, retailers often feel like shoplifting is not a priority for police and prosecutors, but now a Belgian retail organisation is borrowing a Dutch concept to tackle the problem head-on.
