The abused workforce: why violence against retail workers needs to stop
The average shopping experience typically goes: walk into a shop, have a look around, maybe try on a few things and often buy more than expected. Then, on your way out, squat and defecate in the shop's lift.
No? I wouldn't think so either, so hold my shock the moment I was on shift and realised just this had happened, because shockingly it’s often.
Not only do retail workers up and down the country face verbal assaults and physical attacks every shift but also they typically end up cleaning some form of bodily fluid, or the odd discarded bloody tampon.
Never in my life has it crossed my mind to relieve myself in a lift or a fitting room but apparently this is a rarely held opinion. When is it ever appropriate to soil a public space (if you are over the age of three?)
If retail workers manage to escape bodily fluids, there is always a very delightful chance of physical assault or insults, because not having a medium T-shirt in stock 15 minutes before the shop closes is cause to be treated like a doormat.
Research from the 2023 Retail trust report shows that 90% of retail workers have experienced customer abuse, and reported some had even been “punched in the face” or customers had threatened to “slam their head through a desk.” How charming.
It’s no surprise that the mental health of the retail workforce is also plummeting, because who wouldn't feel utterly hopeless after being abused over something potentially as small as not being able to process a return without a receipt.
In the autumn, NationalWorld ran the Silent Crime Campaign, which saw the spotlight turned on crimes that are sometimes disregarded as ‘minor’ but that can have huge consequences on people and communities. Among those we featured were drug dealing, nuisance, shoplifting - and crime against retail workers.
At the Labour conference Home Secretary Yvette Cooper announced that crimes against retail workers would be categorised as a crime in its own right, and therefore made more easy to prosecute.
The union Usdaw found last year that more than two-thirds of its members have been a victim of abuse at work, and attributed much of this to a reaction after customers were challenged over shoplifting.
The Retail Trust in 2023 also found that 80% of retail staff had faced worsening mental health in the last 12 months, mostly attributed to financial instability but also due to a rise in abuse from the public, even reporting a staff member that was “held at gunpoint.”
No one should feel under threat or dread going into work, especially at an often minimum wage, nine-hour shift on the basis people think as soon as they step inside a shop they are permitted to act like weapon-wielding maniacs.
Undoubtedly, there are a lot of stimulants in a retail environment that can cause tensions: the child that will not stop screaming; the lights that are brighter than should be legal and of course queues spanning out the shop. However, do a few bright lights and a 20-minute queue equal punching a worker in the face? I think not.
It does make me question the kind of planet we live on where retail workers are facing the brunt of society's evidence of decline in basic human decency.
Perhaps the worst part? Whilst you can add laws galore to prosecute people for abusing retail staff, or added security to deal with these situations when they arise, is that the abuse has to happen first.
Retail workers must still go in every day worried for their safety, and still act polite and friendly. Oh joy. In no rational world with a shred of human dignity do I believe it acceptable to threaten a person's safety or livelihood over what's often a piece of fabric, frankly rather unbelievable behaviour that unfortunately sees no chance of stopping soon.