70-year old woman denied alcohol at Tesco – Got a £25 voucher

Pamela Harrison, was shopping in a Plymouth Tesco store, she picked up a bottle of her favourite wine and a bottle of beer for her partner to accompany their evening roast, she was shopping with her Grandson, Will at the time and the two headed to the tills to pay, but at the checkout the cashier asked to see Will’s ID.

Of course, Will (aged 16) couldn’t supply a suitable ID as he was underage but wasn’t buying the alcohol.

Pamela’s daughter, Cavina Harrison-Jones was at another till but came over to help her Mum:

“I thought it was a joke,”
“I told him it was ridiculous.
“He kept saying he couldn’t serve my mum without seeing some ID, and that it wasn’t worth losing his job over.”

Cavina then asked to see a manager, who upheld the cashier’s decision and explained the store’s strict ‘Think 25’ policy.

Cavina said:

“I told him ‘You understand my son is not going to be able to prove his age – he’s 16 and he will never have ID to show you.

“I told him my son’s not buying the wine, my mum is, and that it was nothing to do with him.

“His reply was

‘I don’t know that she’s not going to go out of the store and give him an alcoholic drink in the middle of the street’.

Cavina continued:

“I said ‘These are my children and I am never going to let that happen, not in a million years’.

“He said ‘It’s not worth losing my job over’. My blood was boiling.”

The next day Cavina, emailed a complaint to Tesco’s customer service department and she was contacted and offered a £25 voucher as an apology.

“It was just humiliating,” she said. “My son has never been put in that situation before.

“The sad thing was on our way home the only other store was a Tesco, so we waited outside while my mum went in, but the bottle of wine she wanted wasn’t in stock.”

A spokesperson for Tesco said:

“We are a responsible retailer of alcohol and operate a strict Think 25 policy. However, it appears as though we made a mistake on this occasion.

“We have apologised to Mrs Harrison-Jones for the inconvenience and offered her a goodwill gesture. Our store manager will be helping to retrain relevant colleagues too.”