> opposed to turning private companies into arms of federal law enforcement agencies.
does not explain this policy
> “If you suspect fraud, complete the transaction.”
If there is suspicion of fraud and yet still direct your employees complete the transaction, sure, maybe you're not literally in favor of fraud. But it does mean that you don't care if there's fraud. There's little daylight between not caring about fraud and being in favor of it at Walmart's scale.
does not explain this policy
> “If you suspect fraud, complete the transaction.”
Sure it does. It's not Walmart's job to investigate fraud or any other crime. Their cashier's aren't trained in jurisprudence. And, frankly, a corporate policy of "deny service to customers who you suspect might be up to no good" is just a few racist employees away from another shit show entirely.
Other approaches exist too. But doing absolutely nothing and quietly proceeding with the transaction is just hostile to your most vulnerable customers.
In a town near me, the store generates ~3000 arrests a year, to the point that the town has a police substation on the premises.
most of crime in the world is not petty shoplifting, its financial fraud amd much of it is done under corporate veil
Of first time shoplifters? I find this incredible, as when I worked Walmart (admittedly eons ago) you had to be a very well known repeat offender to get caught. Everyone else would simply be yelled at to leave at best.
Target (from friends at the time) even had a policy to simply let thieves do their thing and document until they hit the threshold for a felony - at which time they'd take action.
Just that repeat offender list ended up with an arrest maybe every other day or so though.
I find it amazing society has changed that much in such a relatively short time. I know every store/location is different but this stat definitely blew my mine.
People should be trained to detect fraud if that's necessary. But saying "don't try to detect fraud" to random-ass employees whose job is not fraud detection seems eminently reasonable to me.
It's not reasonable because of the first sentence. If you're dealing with other people's money, your employees should be trained to detect fraud. If you can't be bothered to ensure that, you shouldn't be dealing with other people's money.
The article doesn't say whether the policy instructed employees to report the suspected fraud afterwards.