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**admin** · 14, April 2006, 10:32 PM

Hard Days

Zo

You sound as if you need a long gin and tonic, and deserve it! When I first qualified, I used to volunteer to do bank holidays, and the odd rota hour for places that opened on a Sunday, for extra cash.

The day after Boxing day I arrived at a pharmacy, which usually does 1 or 2 items during the hour on their rota day. I found about 50 people waiting outside!

Anyway I managed to get a dispenser from a shop who's locum hadn't turned up for the day. As we went through the scripts the most awful forged script I have ever seen came in. So during all these items, and with 50 people in a small shop I had to ring the GP etc. The guy went away in the end. I had to report it to the police, so that meant a statement, mug shot books, a line up etc. One of the staff spotted him in the mug shots, and the idiot had put his own name and address on the back! We all picked him in the line up. He was also the one glaring at me!

That led to going to court, and me being cross examined for 30 minutes. The defence were trying to say I picked the wrong guy from the line up. I kept to my guns and pointed out that the odds of me picking a guy from a line up, and a girl picking him from a mug shot book, and it matched the name and address on the back of the script were a bit slim!

We all left after giving evidence so don't even know if he was found guilty!

**Zoggite** · 14, April 2006, 10:37 PM

...so the moral of this story is:
if you get a forged script, just tear it up, don't make any fuss, and you'll save yourself a whole lot of hassle...!

**Linnear** · 15, April 2006, 09:19 AM

My old boss spotted a forged Rx once and managed to talk the bloke into calling back, "because it was busy"

He called the old bill and two coppers turned up to await his return.

Unfortunately, they'd parked their squad car outside. Funnily enough the bloke didn't come back.

**admin** · 16, April 2006, 10:26 PM

Forged Scripts etc

Zo

Well I think it's your professional duty to report a forged script, and I always have. To be honest I haven't seen one in a while. The trouble it causes you is definietly not worth it.

I once saw a young woman (18ish) just putting goods in her bag. I just walked up to her and said "put it back, and please leave" as I couldn't be bothered with the police statements, court, etc etc She just turned round and went crazy, throwing punches at me. I managed to get her in the old "swan-neck" and had to hold her on the floor for about 15 minutes before the police arrived. They took her away, more statements, more court time, and what did she get? A £40 fine!

**admin** · 16, April 2006, 10:37 PM

A Rather Yukky True Story

I used to work in a shopping centre. It was in a rough part of town, and I ran a needle exchange scheme.

On Christmas Eve one of the staff went to a shop in the centre, for some shopping, in her lunch hour. She said she had seen one of our regular methadone/needle users there. She had been caught shop lifting by the stores manager.

To give you a bit of background, this individual has a permanent hole in her groin, which she injects herself through. She showed me this hole once, and it was horrendous, all necrotic and had a very bad odour (you'll know what I mean if you have had any wound care involvement) with an anaerobic bacteria smell. She refused my advice to seek immediate medical help, but continued to use the scheme.

So the manager of the food shop told her to hand over the goods she had taken. He said he wasn't making a police statement on Christmas, and he just wanted the goods back. The staff member said the addict lifted up her skirt, in front of everyone, and took a packed of bacon and cheese out of her knickers!

What did the manager do? He just put them back on the shelf!

I think it put me off my turkey that year.....

And I didn't shop there ever again......

**Zoggite** · 16, April 2006, 10:39 PM

...and when we pointed out to our new Head Office merchandisers that we thought it unwise to display so many razors and razorblades, especially as our existing CCTV system had been removed and not replaced after the refit, we were told by the Area Manager that "every shop expects to lose some stock to shoplifters, this loss is built into the retail price"; that very afternoon, £56-worth of blades etc... disappeared unnoticed.
We got the same reply when we mentioned our doubts as to the placing of Anusol & Preparation-H suppositories: on a shelf directly above the heating, and exposed to direct sunlight in the early afternoon... But we were told that we were not allowed to deviate from the Planogram, so we now stock boxes of soggy, greasy cardboard, and hope no-one needs piles suppositories...

**Linnear** · 19, April 2006, 11:07 AM

Hi!

I was manager of a busy shop in Plymouth and we lost around £50 a week or so in shoplifting! The shop was bell shaped, wider at the front doors, and the gondolas obscured the corners and this was where we lost the stock.

I had a brainwave and turned the gondolas so they pointed toward the corners and this gave me clear lines of sight into the corners. Our shoplifting problem was solved like that!

The area manager came round the next week and asked why the gondola ends weren't facing people as they walked into the shop. When I expleined why I did it he said, very good but it must go back.

Once I'd put the gondolas back I typed my resignation letter. It was the final straw and I haven't been an employee pharmacist since!

**admin** · 19, April 2006, 01:12 PM

Is Shop lifting still a crime?

Hi All

I was told last week by a staff member that the local police won't come to the store, unless the cost of the goods stolen is over £50. Surely that just tells everyone that as long as it's under £50 it's not a crime any more!

I have decided I am not tackling these people any more. It just puts myself at risk, and you never get thanked for it. I don't think the companies care if they lose stock, they expect to. I think the awful part is that the individuals that are attracted to a store, where goods can easily be stolen, put you and the staff at risk if challenged.

Like Zo and Linnear point out, the planogram is here to stay, and even if you have been selling whatever, to people for years, if it's not on the list it doesn't go up. The art of stocking what your customers actually want to buy is long gone.

Like Zo points out, some of the decisions are just plain stoopid: -

We got the same reply when we mentioned our doubts as to the placing of Anusol & Preparation-H suppositories: on a shelf directly above the heating, and exposed to direct sunlight in the early afternoon... But we were told that we were not allowed to deviate from the Planogram, so we now stock boxes of soggy, greasy cardboard, and hope no-one needs piles suppositories...

The above does not make sense! You might as well put them in the microwave and throw them away. If you ran a business in this way you'd be bankrupt in a month!

On the subject of CCTV, I am not sure it's even worth having it. In this area you also need to have seen the person stealing, not just on the CCTV, but with your own eyes. The CCTV is then just used as back up evidence. I honestly think that with all the problems the Police have, this takes a low priority. It is a terrible cause of anxiety for some pharmacists, and facing shop lifters day after day can really get to you.

**Linnear** · 19, April 2006, 07:21 PM

When I worked fot the CO-OP I did a managers training course and was told thta one of the big stores had a policy whereby they only approached shoplifters if theyw ere seen taking 2 things!
One bloke, my guess a disgruntled ex-employee, (Do you ever get gruntled ex-employess?) used to walk in grab the biggest thing he could calmly place it in his holdall and then walk out knowing the staff weren't supposed to do anything!

**admin** · 19, April 2006, 09:45 PM

Linnear

That is almost unbelievable, but knowing what I do I believe you! Do you know of any stores with the same policy that sell plasma tellies????

**Zoggite** · 31, May 2006, 09:56 PM

more joys of working on Bank Holidays!

...You get to dispense handwritten scripts like this one, from the local eye hospital:
"Betnosol skin cream 1/2%", for a patient who has red raw eyelids, like an albino Panda bear...

**kemzero** · 1, June 2006, 07:13 PM

?

[QUOTE=
To give you a bit of background, this individual has a permanent hole in her groin, which she injects herself through. She showed me this hole once, and it was horrendous, all necrotic and had a very bad odour (you'll know what I mean if you have had any wound care involvement) with an anaerobic bacteria smell. She refused my advice to seek immediate medical help, but continued to use the scheme.

The staff member said the addict lifted up her skirt, in front of everyone, and took a packed of bacon and cheese out of her knickers!

What did the manager do? He just put them back on the shelf!

I think it put me off my turkey that year.....

**kemzero** · 1, June 2006, 07:15 PM

Admin

That would put me off for life mate.Did she really have an anareobic hole in her groin area?

**Zoggite** · 2, August 2006, 10:26 PM

Those holidaymakers have just plumbed new depths of cheekiness: I've lost count of how many times I've been asked to sell a single elastoplast, a single paracetamol tablet, even a single contraceptive pill; but today I was asked by a woman if she could just have ONE puff out of one of our inhalers...! Words failed me, apart from the obvious emphatic "NO!" and other expletives that I couldn't possibly repeat...!

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