1 in 4 pubs & restaurants fail to check IDs in young customers
Posted in Licensing | January 08, 2017 | by Dadds LLP Solicitors
Pubs sold alcohol to one in four teenage mystery shoppers in 2016 without asking for proof of age, according to research from Serve Legal.
The retail age check auditor said its testers performed nearly 43,000 alcohol sales tests across the UK in 2016. Almost 7,000 were conducted in pubs, clubs and restaurants.
Age ID was requested in 73% of on-trade visits and 83% of off-trade visits before alcohol was handed over. Only 41% of young mystery shoppers were asked for proof of age at the point of delivery for online orders of alcohol.
Serve Legal provides an independent test purchase service for retailers of age-restricted products across the UK to check that staff are checking young people for ID. Serve Legal Director Ed Heaver said: “We are seeing far too few online retailers committing to age check testing at the point of delivery... Responsible retailing – and the law supporting it – should apply to every link in the chain.”
The auditor reminds businesses that only passports, photocard driving licences or PASS-accredited IDs should be accepted by staff checking for proof of age.
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