Talking Retail Grocery and product news for independent retailers
The company works with Age Check Certification Services, a provider of compliance services for businesses of age-restricted goods and services, to deliver the IDentify scheme. It represents the evolution of programmes launched in 2014 that have test-purchased more than 16,000 retailers, with more than 3,000 retailers receiving compliance audits and in-store training.
The scheme, which currently visits 8-9 towns and cities each year, was delayed by the pandemic in 2020, with the hope of visiting more areas this year.
Ian Howell, a fiscal and regulatory affairs manager for JTI, said: “We know a retailers job isn’t easy, there are lots of pressures they face, but ensuring tobacco isn’t sold to children is something that should be front and centre of their mind. They could get into a situation where if they are found to be selling tobacco to underage people, they could be fined and lose their premises licence. It would be really silly for them to risk this revenue and valuable footfall driver.
“We’d like to expand IDentify, and are looking at ways to grow it such as looking at online test purchasing for vaping to see how robust that is and to see if there is effective age verification during the purchase process. We also want to ensure we are doing everything we can to continue to get the message out there, helping retailers to follow best practice and obey the law.”
