Racetrack, which comprises 11 stores in and around Glasgow, has used its own CCTV and facial recognition system to stop a con artist in his tracks.
The system, installed and maintained by Nitro Solutions, is able to recognize individuals that may have previously attempted thefts or abused staff and also identifies their car number plates.
An individual who had previously visited Racetrack’s Coatbridge store pretending to cash out Pay Safe vouchers was picked up on the system when he entered the firm’s Ibrox site. “He was always targeting younger staff who he was able to confuse by showing a fake text to claim they had to pay him,” explained Vikas. “Staff have not only given him the voucher for £100 but paid out a further £100.”
But upon entering the Ibrox store last month, the system instantly recognised the scammer and staff refused to serve him.
“Action taken by our loyal staff has prevented another theft and will hopefully deter this individual,” said Vikas, adding that despite having police headquarters sited just 200m from the shop, police had failed to attend when contacted.
He claimed that the investments in security were essential because the company was not getting enough support from the police. “It is sad that we have to spend so much money and effort installing these systems but that is where the country is,” he said. “Retail Crime is a daily occurrence for us all but nothing is done so we have to take our own action. We have one of the IT team doing CCTV requests daily from the sites and we as a small group have over 600 individuals banned in our estate.”
