Canada groceries: Checking carts, bags, receipts draws customer ire — 'are they going to start patting you down?'

Most customers are used to getting their carts and receipts checked at big stores like Costco. But it appears more grocers across Canada, like the Loblaw-owned No Frills, are enacting the policy even as some customers say it makes them feel "like a criminal."

In a thread titled "They are checking your bags," posted to the popular "Loblaws Is Out Of Control" Reddit group, a customer in Ontario wrote "I couldn't imagine shopping at No Frills now." They recounted the experience of another shopper whose reusable fabric bags were all turned inside out during a transaction.

"This is time consuming," the user Commercial-Carrot477 wrote, adding: "Are they going to start patting you down when you leave the stores now too?"

“This freaks me out when it happens to me, because it makes me feel like I have done something wrong, when I haven't at all,” user bikeonychus wrote. “I stopped bagging up at the checkouts quite a while ago now ... [I just] bag up at my bike."

Another user said they went to No Frills to replenish some items for their office because it "was convenient and I was in a rush." When the cashier requested to check their bags, user new2ontrio wrote that they left without purchasing their items.

“I was offended by the interaction ... Are these people seated in a room and constantly told that everyone is stealing, so they treat everyone like a thief?"

Bag checks make customers feel 'distrusted'

Joe Aversa is an assistant professor in the school of Retail Management at Toronto Metropolitan University. He says grocery stores are trying to mitigate theft and inventory shrinkage, as a result of massive spikes in shoplifting incidents. In May, the Retail Council of Canada found that retail crime in the country amounted to about $5 billion in losses.

“We’re starting to see various security measures being implemented,” Aversa tells Yahoo Canada. “This is just one type.”

Since the pandemic, some grocery chains have also erected plexiglass partitions at certain stores in an effort to combat shoplifting. While Aversa admits that retail theft is a real problem, the measures stores are taking to prevent it is impacting the shopping experience.

“There’s a perception of trust or lack thereof, and bag checks largely make customers feel distrusted,” he says. “There’s privacy concerns, some customers may feel having their bags inspected as invasive. And it’s largely inconvenient.”

Expert: Bag checks don't foster positive customer experience

Aversa says ultimately it’s a balancing act for retailers when it comes to loss prevention and customer experience. He admits there are other less invasive loss-prevention measures, like sensory technology that can automatically scan and charge inventory, though these tactics are often costly.

“These policies have to be thoughtful in order to maintain customer trust and satisfaction,” he says. "Retailers wants to have a good relationship with their customers, built on a positive customer experience. I don't think (checking bags) necessarily fosters that."

In an email to Yahoo Canada, a representative from Loblaw said bag checks are not an existing protocol or corporate policy within their stores.

"That said, we have taken the feedback seriously and have shared it with our stores," the email states.

CCLA: Some bag checks are a form of 'carding'

According to a 2019 post by The Canadian Civil Liberties Association (CCLA) “‘shopkeepers privilege’... is exercised after a theft is witnessed, not in anticipation of an imagined crime” and “after witnessing a theft, a shopkeeper can invite the customer to search the bag together with the shopkeeper. But the shopkeeper has no right to search without consent.”

If no theft is witnessed, and the shopkeeper wants to perform a check, it’s essentially a version of “carding,” a controversial police tactic in which a person is stopped, questioned and documented when no specific offence is being investigated.

For membership-based retailers like Costco, receipt checking is part of the agreement.

Costco's website states that receipt checking is implemented “to double-check that the items purchased have been correctly processed by our cashiers” as it’s the “most effective method of maintaining accuracy in inventory control, and it’s also a good way to ensure that ... members have been charged properly for their purchases.”