- A survey shows who’s most likely to admit to stealing at self-checkout: those with income over $100,000.
- “Shrink” at stores with self-checkout is a big problem.
- An expert in compulsive shopping weighs in on why the rich are so tempted to steal.
Theft — or “shrink” as the retail industry calls it — is a big problem for stores that use self-checkout kiosks.
The machines have created a new kind of “partial shrink” where someone pays for most of their stuff, but skips a few items.
One study revealed that about 6.7% of orders had some items that went unscanned (including accidentally) — far higher than the typical 0.3% shrink rate for a fully-staffed checkout.
It might not surprise you that in a survey of 5,000 shoppers, the majority admitted to accidentally bagging an item that didn’t scan at the kiosk. (I’ve done this accidentally — especially when in a rush.)
But something the survey revealed that might be surprising? Wealthier people were most likely of all to intentionally steal, they told surveyers.
Of people who admitted to stealing, the biggest group was among the 18% of people with household incomes of more than $100,000.
(When considering people with household incomes under $35,000, 14% said they'd purposely taken an item without scanning it, according to the survey of 2,000 adults that was done by LendingTree during the fall.)
I talked to Terrence Shulman, an author, therapist, and lawyer of the Shulman Center for Compulsive Theft, Shopping, and Hoarding to find out why wealthier people might be so tempted by self-checkout.
Here's some of what we talked about.
Q: I'm aware that shoplifting isn't only because of need — and that wealthy people might steal for other psychological reasons: It can be thrill-seeking or compulsive.
I'm curious how that comes into play in self-checkout where it's very easy to get away with.
A: I want to admit that I don't know what the truth is, but I'll give you a few theories because I have thought about it.
I think that a lot of people who are higher-income and more well-to-do probably aren't quite as delighted to have all of this self-service kind of stuff, like checkout or having to pump your own gas.
I mean, it all took us a while to get to used to this. I'm generalizing, but maybe for wealthier people, like, it's just another hassle — or it's kind of beneath them. So that's one possibility: that it's kind of like a silent protest. Like, why do I have to do this?
Another thought is that scanning a $10 item for a wealthy person, that's like a penny to them. So there's already a different kind of attitude about money.
There might be even a subconscious kind of thought of: Hey, if I got caught, if I ever did get in trouble, I have the resources — I could hire an attorney, or I could call somebody. I know how to make something happen.
Q: Clients who you work with who have had a problem with shoplifting, are they seeing self-checkouts as sort of a trigger or a temptation?
A: Yes. So what's happening is some people will say, I'm not going to use self-scan, because I don't trust myself.
They also sometimes think, I don't trust the machines.