Pret A Manger provides bodycams to managers after improve in shoplifting and abusive behaviour in direction of employees

Pret A Manger has given bodycams to managers attributable to rising charges of shoplifting and abusive behaviour in direction of employees.

The espresso store chain has launched a trial in six outlets throughout London and put up indicators in store home windows to tell prospects about them. 

The corporate turns into the newest excessive avenue retailer to problem cameras to its employees following surging charges of shoplifting and aggressive behaviour throughout the trade.

A Pret spokesman stated the cameras would solely be worn by workforce leaders or managers and can be turned on solely in particular circumstances. 

The cameras rolled out final month, however solely Pret’s safety workforce may have entry to the footage captured, in accordance with The Telegraph.

Final yr there have been greater than 430,000 reported shoplifting circumstances in England and Wales, the best quantity since information started in 2003, in accordance with the Workplace for Nationwide Statistics.

The issue is so extreme that the British Retail Consortium (BRC) has estimated as a lot as £2bn value of products might be misplaced to buyer theft in 2024, double the quantity misplaced in 2023.

Assaults on retail employees have surged too, with as many as 1,300 circumstances of violence and abuse day-after-day, in accordance with the BRC. 

The organisation discovered that there have been 50 per cent extra incidents within the yr to final September than in the course of the earlier 12 months.

Through the election Sir Keir Starmer made tackling the bounce in retail crime a serious focus of Labour’s manifesto, and he has vowed to scale back crime charges by creating a brand new standalone offence of assaulting a store employee.

The trial follows comparable strikes by firms comparable to Lidl, which spent £2m on physique cameras for workers in all its 960 UK shops. 

In the meantime English Heritage, the charity which manages historic websites throughout the nation, has given body-worn cameras to its workers due to an increase in anti-social behaviour.

In April employees at Boots got physique cameras and panic buttons.

And in March, Greggs employees began to put on physique cameras following a regarding rise in sausage roll thefts and assaults on employees.

Pret’s determination comes after a shake-up within the enterprise after its co-founder, Sinclair Beecham, returned to ‘reaffirm’ the corporate’s values and take care of a mountain of debt racked up in the course of the pandemic.

The chain controversially introduced final month that it was to finish its well-liked espresso subscription service from September. 

Launched in the course of the pandemic, it initially price £20 and gave members 5 free barista-made drinks day-after-day. The scheme grew to become an instantaneous hit as a result of obscene quantity of worth it might be value if drinks have been claimed often.

However Pret was compelled to boost the worth of the scheme to £25 in 2022 as inflation continued to hammer the excessive avenue following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. 

A second value rise, to £30, was carried out final yr. 

Now the subscription will likely be changed by a brand new scheme providing half-price drinks for a lowered payment of £10 a month.

Pret has additionally lowered the worth of a few of its best-selling sandwiches this yr after it was criticised for prime costs.

Opening its first retailer in London in 1986, Pret rapidly grew to become the important thing spot for workplace employees within the metropolis for its mixture of fast service, recent sandwiches and natural coffees which helped to revolutionise the standard lunch break. 

And within the years that adopted, it loved skyrocketing reputation, serving at its peak 1.4million coffees and day within the UK alone to 450 shops and increasing its empire the world over, constructing a loyal following.