You called the cops for that??

[customersruinmylife]

OK, so I didn't deal with a customer in this story, but this happened because of an SC!

I am in the middle of a normal, quiet shift. Everything is going fine for once! Next thing I know, a police officer is stood at the end of the bar.

PO: Can I speak to the manager please?
Me: I'm the manager. How can I help?
PO: I am here investigating an incident that took place here on...2nd April 2009.
Me: OK...how can I help you with that?
PO: Would it be possible to view your security tapes from that evening?
Me: OK, would you like to follow me out the back.

I took him through. I wanted to keep him out of view as several nosey customers were watching us. We went into the office, I pulled up an old scheduel from 2nd April to see who was on duty, and discovered it was me! I also pulled out the tape from that day.

Me: OK...I was on duty that evening...I don't remember an incident.
PO: Oh...really?
Me: We had a cat fight a couple of weeks ago...
PO: No, it's not a cat fight.
Me: OK, so what are we looking for?
PO: We were contacted by a gentleman. He said he went to the bathroom here, left his coat on a chair. When he returned, the coat was gone.
Me: We're looking for a coat??
PO: Yes.
Me: A coat? Was there anything valuable in the coat, like a wallet?
PO: No. Just a coat. A black coat.

I was stunned. He was looking for a coat? He took me out of the business to look for a coat??

I read the statement. Apparently he reported it missing to a member of staff.

PO: You have no record of him reporting the coat missing?
Me: Well...no. All we got was someone who walked up to the bar, asked if anything had been handed in, and we said no! That was the end of it.
PO: So no record?
Me: No. We're a pub. A lot of people lose things in here when they've had a few drinks. I get at least four phonecalls a day from someone asking for something they lost! If we don't have it, we don't have it.

We pulled up the footage...and the customer was sat in a blindspot!

PO: We're not going to get anything are we?
Me: Not if he was sat there.
PO: OK...

He wrote a few notes in his pad.

PO: Well, thank you for your time.

It's a crime to waste police time. What about a police officer wasting my time?? I was robbed, and I got nothing from the police. When I was beaten up, the police took over an hour to get to me. When that cat fight broke out, it took them 15 minutes to get to us, despite the fact you can SEE the police station from our pub!

And they come in, investigating the case of the missing coat. A coat that was left UNATTENDED. It probably wasn't even stolen, I bet the customer just forgot to bring it or something.

[NightWatch]

*head explodes and brain bits spatter the walls!* Around here I think all our officers do for instinces of lost property is take a report and give the complainant the case number and the phone number to the evidence hold... You got jipped.

[tropicsgoddess]

All that for a freakin' coat?!! Man, forget jipped, you were hosed.

[blas]

I guess it really depends. When I worked at the gas station, any time I phoned the police (for people like Psycho Window Banger, Beer Bottle Thrower, etc) they were there in record time. Then again, that city is so small, there's so excuse for a cop to take longer than a few minutes to get there.

But then again, I recall before meeting my current boyfriend, walking down the streets after leaving the bars with my friends, my Nancy Boy stalker Ex following us and not giving up, me yelling back at him to quit following me......cop car after cop car parked on the street just watching people, waiting for a drunk to catch getting into a car or tripping/falling/puking, looking for people on probation.....and I know they heard me screaming...nothing. Nothing at all.

[crazylegs]

Thing is, in the UK there are police officers who's sole job it is to go through crime reports and make sure that all avenues of investigation have been looked through, someone in that dept will have realised that the theft occured in a pub and it's likely to have CCTV.

On another note a crime is commited if
A person belives an offence has occured against them
AND
An offence has been commited (what this means is that what has happened is illegal)
AND
There is no credible evidence to suggest the offence has not taken place.

So yer, there you go.