Now lift up your bra ... Poundland shop girl quits over strip search
A TEENAGE shop assistant at Poundland was ordered to lift her bra in front of other staff and customers to prove she hadn’t stolen anything.
Naomi Scott, 17, was one of several female employees subjected to the unexpected search by a supervisor as they worked on tills at the budget store.
She did another two shifts after the humiliating incident, but quit her job on Monday and is now looking for work elsewhere. ‘I was disgusted. I couldn’t believe they would make us do it,’ Miss Scott told MailOnline.
‘We’ve always had bag searches and pocket searches. But all of a sudden, last Thursday, they came up with the idea of a bra search. One of my supervisors, a female, came up to us when we were on the till and said, “We need to do a bra search”.’
Miss Scott, who turned 17 in March, began working at the branch in Borehamwood, Hertfordshire, after leaving school in June last year and was taken on full-time in September.
She was paid £3.91 an hour to do 30 or 40-hour weeks at the shop, which is near her family home.
The teenager admitted she had her mobile phone in her bra – which is against company policy as they are not allowed on the shop floor – but complained that her contract had only mentioned bag and pocket searches.
She removed her phone, and then had to pull on her bra to show the supervisor there was nothing else inside.
Miss Scott said: ‘This was in front of staff and customers. She asked me and two or three other women who were working on the tills. Like me, they didn’t look too impressed.
‘She just said, “Have you got anything inside your bra?” I then had to pull my bra outward, give a bit of a shake and see if any coins came out the bottom.’
She said the black sweatshirt she wore as part of her uniform meant she wasn’t exposed when she lifted up her bra.
But she was still furious at her treatment, and felt she had no choice but to obey the order.
‘I felt uncomfortable. It was an invasion of my privacy and it was
‘Shake it and see if coins come out’
embarrassing,’ she added. After the shift she told her mother, Hayley Cooper, who was ‘disgusted’ at what had happened.
The teenager resolved to refuse such a demand in future, and later decided to quit.
‘It was a bit out of the blue but we all went along with it, she said.
‘It’s not in my contract – only bag and pocket searches are in the contract. There was no similar search for men.
‘It’s really put me off going to work – it’s my first proper job but I just left ... I’m now looking for another job.’
A Poundland spokesman said: ‘This was a highly regrettable incident where neither the colleague nor the supervisor followed company policy.
‘There is clear CCTV footage of the incident and we have taken steps to ensure it does not happen again.’