December 29, 10:21 AM 
514 Chai Chee Lane 03-16, Singapore 469029 Here's one of the latest in real-life complaints making their rounds on Facebook: according to a supermarket shopper, a female staffer at an NTUC FairPrice self-checkout section had her pay docked for missing out on a customer who didn't scan all the purchases.
TL;DR: the shopper, a Leslie Ang, wrote that the lady he spoke to said her supervisor was going to deduct her pay for letting a customer "escape without scanning". In his view, this was a "cold and unreasonable" way for NTUC FairPrice to "browbeat" its employee for it.
Read Ang's Facebook post here:
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Posted by Leslie Ang on Friday, 25 December 2015
We thought we'd ask NTUC for their side of the story about this, and a FairPrice spokesperson shared the following details with Mothership.sg:
1. The incident resulting in the staff's pay being "deducted" happened two months ago.
Her takings for that particular day showed a "small shortfall", which the spokesperson says arose from her failing to properly process a NETS transaction. Perhaps her disappointment that day was because the decision regarding the case was only recently made.
2. She was required to "make restitution" since her till didn't tally.
The details of this "restitution" aren't clear from this statement — it could mean she is required to fork out the difference from her own pocket, hence her saying her supervisor was going to "deduct" her pay (perhaps she was saying he was going to deduct it from her pay?). We can't be sure about this, though.
3. They also clarified that the outlet in question is not on Devonshire Road (they moved out of that one more than a year ago), but at Orchard Grand Court on Killiney Road.
Screenshot from FairPrice website
The spokesperson told us they traced the location of the store from images of the receipts Ang posted in comments on his Facebook post.
Here's their statement to us in full:
"We take this opportunity to clarify that we do not have a policy of penalising staff for shoplifting cases. We’ve spoken with our branch staff including our cashier who shared that 2 months ago, she had been unable to reconcile the takings for the day.
Investigations revealed that the small shortfall was due to negligence in not properly processing a NETs transaction. Cashiers on duty are aware that they are responsible to ensure that their tills tally and make restitution in the event of a shortfall. We do not dock their pay in such instances. This is a standard practice in the service industry to ensure Cashiers take ownership and accountability for transactions. As a fair employer, FairPrice will not hold staff accountable for incidences they are not responsible for.
We hope this clarifies this matter. We will also be reaching out to Mr Ang on his post."
Since the statement clearly says "we do not dock their pay in such instances", this hopefully means her salary wasn't lowered, which is the impression Ang's story previously gave.
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