ABSTRACT
Crime against the retail sector is a significant problem. The British Retail Consortium estimate that retail crime cost the UK £1.42 billion in 1995/96, of which £653 million was attributed to customer theft. Additionally, £450 million was spent by retailers on crime prevention measures and 1.6 million suspected shop thieves were apprehended. The survey concluded that retail crime in the year 1995/96 amounted to £85 per annum for every adult household in the UK, which equates to 1.13% of total retail turnover (Wells and Dryer, 1997). A Home Office survey conducted in 1994 found that customer theft cost retailers an average of £35 per incident, or £800 per premises per year (Mirlees-Black and Ross, 1995). In response, retailers are installing a variety of security measures, this commonly includes CCTV (CCTV Today, 1996), audible or dye tags and security guards (Wood et al. 1997). With the financial backing of the Home Office - £5 million in 1994/95 and £17 million announced in 1996 - CCTV systems are set to become a normal feature of British social life (CCTV Today, 1995). Against this background it is perhaps surprising that there have not been more evaluations of the effectiveness of such security measures.
