r/lossprevention

So my workplace is near a Walmart and for the past few years sometimes during my lunch hour I will go buy something at the fast food places near the parking lot. I like to park in the Walmart lot and while I eat. In all the many times I have done that, have never seen what appears to be a floor walker following a customer in. I feel like suspicious because I just park and eat. Sometimes I have gotten down if I needed a short haul.

Please forgive me for such a long string of text. I would really appreciate any advice or insight.

So, our MAPM (Market Asset Protection Manager) gathered a team of people to travel to different stores and make apprehensions. There was a team of 6 APAs (Asset Protection Associates) that travelled to different stores and made apprehensions. I was a member of this team. One APA was assigned to create the schedule and lead the team. This APA had previously been working under the MAPM when she was a store manager. This APA made the schedule to maximize his own profit through mileage and paid drive time benefits. This APA colluded with another APA who would be aggressive and violate policy. Together these two APAs would cooperate to maximize their own profits and abuse the benefits of the drive time and mileage compensation system and ostracize those who crossed them. Our MAPM encouraged us to call out misbehaviour amongst team members. Myself and another APA began to consistently call out the misconduct of the two aforementioned APAs. After some time, there was a restructuring. I was pushed into locations in which I was intentionally shorted on mileage and drive time meanwhile the other two APAs continued to abuse the mileage and drive time system. At this point it was pointed out to our MAPM that this was occurring. In response, our MAPM shut the program down and sent every APA involved in the team back to their own store and removed any drive time and mileage benefits for all former team members. Two weeks later, the APAs who were abusing the system were given the privilege to return to travelling, collecting mileage and drive time benefits for the purpose of training new APAs at the same MAPM’s permission despite the MAPM being aware of the abuse taking place. So please, let me know what you would do in this position and if there is any way I can raise a complaint about what I perceive is both retaliation and favouritism.

Thank you for your time.

Additional for Mods. When I hit post, I received a warning for no “I fucked up” posts. I did not fuck up and followed instructions from my MAPM and was still sidelined as a result of following those instructions.

I’ve been working LP for Marshalls for a while now, and I still haven’t caught an internal. I’ve had plenty of externals and dishonest employee investigations that ended up not going anywhere, but no actual internal cases yet.
I know they’re not something you can force, but I can’t help feeling like I’m missing something or overlooking red flags.
For those of you who’ve worked LP/AP for a while, what helped you start identifying internals? Are there behaviors, report patterns, camera strategies, or audit habits that made a difference? Any advice would be appreciated.

Another day at one of the big retail box stores means another email from corporate on how we’re severely underperforming compared to last year.

How we need to focus on things we’re already doing, how we need to figure out what we’re missing, how we need to raise our percentages and scores compared to last year.

I am seriously so God damn tired of this whole “quotas, metrics, scores, percentages” mindset these corporations have when i bet almost all of them have never worked a day of AP in their lives. I watch my high theft areas daily, I make camera adjustments, I run my theft reports, I talk to my team, on paper I do everything right, but none of that doesn’t matter because you can’t make people come in and fucking steal.

You are literally expecting us to control something that isn’t controllable. I’ve had over 3 repeat shoplifters in my store this week and you know what they did? Nothing. They completed normal transactions and went about their day

I love my job, love my team and my boss but these quotas are hands down the most stressful part of my job and every day corporate shoves them on us is another day I just want to quit

Sorry for the novel

it is very easy to steal at every store, just take the item and walk out the door. The store can't stop you if they don't see you stealing.

Has anyone here ever worked with off duty LEO’s at the store (who are uniformed)? What was it like?

Hey guys We’re building a body cam for retail employees that continuously records (with a 30 second pre event buffer) and lets employees send a one-tap panic alert with live video and location.

Would body cams be helpful? Will companies buy them?

is the job as customer facing as people claim? I know there’s a uniform (all black for three days and then plain clothes the rest, if i’m not mistaken) but do u have to help customers and act as a beauty advisor? or are u just walking the floors deterring theft?? the store by me is considered high shrink btw if that helps

What are your anecdotal stories about bad stops working in LP? Bad-stops are usually zero-tolerance from what I’ve seen but i’m interested to see the situation and the outcome. Thank you!

Hi all workers in the loss prevention field of retail! I’m not in opposition to loss prevention. I get it. A company deserves to be allowed to protect its profits from theft. And I understand that AI is a technology being leveraged in this field. However, I’m curious about the ethical implications involved in floorwalking, specifically in the case of following a veteran with PTSD who may be trained in threat response. It feels like subjecting someone to circumstances that trigger their threat response is highly unethical. Has this issue ever surfaced in the world of loss prevention, and if so, can anybody weigh in on this?

Edit: I thought I was inquiring about a very real phenomenon, but it’s clear that I’m jUsT pRoJeCtInG. Thanks for showing me that the professionals in loss prevention are too scared to have a rationale discussion about their line of work.

Edit 2.0: I asked a question about people being triggered and the edge-lords came out because they got triggered. If you don’t like me questioning your ethics, then don’t be unethical. 🤣

Hi everyone,

I was recently offered a position with Kohls as an LPS. I’m currently employed with another retailer in LP and I’m trying to weigh the pros and cons for myself. iIt would be a pay raise and come with more management type experience compared to my current position.

If you work or have worked for Kohls:

1. How metrics focused is the company? What are the internal/external expectations and do merchandise recoveries count towards external metrics?

2. When was the last major restructure for the LP department? Do you foresee mass layoffs or positions being cut in the near future?

3. How is the company culture? Do store teams feel receptive to LP initiatives or is there an us vs them mentality?

Currently I’m an AP coach for Walmart after being an API for about 3 years. Just wondering what company has the most possibilities for advancement. It seems as once your at AP coach for Walmart your capped unless you go to be a MAPM.

What does this role look like?? I heard it’s door deterrent and uniforms which is something i’m not at all looking for. Wondering if it’s more than that. I’m coming from home depot asset protection, plain clothes, floor observation.

If I did not get caught from target in person can they mail me chargesv

After seeing several videos posted here and elsewhere online, I’m curious. What stores —for certain— have a hands-on policy?

I was thinking about this today. Apparently some big stores like Target have a wall of pictures of banned customers and repeat shoplifters. With everyone wearing masks, I assume it made your job extremely hard? Just curious.