Scott Harris spent 26 years in the Queensland police force before he established his consultancy training retail staff how to de-escalate and manage conflict. And business is booming, thanks to climbing rates of aggression and violence towards retail workers, a phenomenon many believe is a flow-on effect of the COVID pandemic.

“It’s definitely increased over the 10 years since setting up my business,” Harris told me. “A big part of that would have been through the COVID period where people really struggled with being isolated and locked down. There has been a loss of respect and empathy and kindness towards people in the retail sector.”

The customer is always right? Not when customers’ abuse of retail staff is on the rise. Credit: Istock/Getty Images

Harris trains staff at big companies such as Woolworths, Coles, Bunnings and KFC. He is not speaking on a hunch.

Last week Woolworths reported a 26 per cent increase in violent incidents at its stores in the past year. The supermarket giant had locked down stores across the country 45 times in the first half of this year due to security alerts. It has “substantially upgraded” its security in response, and more measures are planned.

Official crime statistics show a 4.3 per cent rise in retail thefts in NSW in the year to March, and a 40 per cent increase in Victoria over the same period.

Victoria has a particular problem with retail-crime-connected criminal gangs stealing goods they sell on the black market. But more generally, people without criminal profiles are more likely to be belligerent, abusive or violent to people who work in shops and behind counters of all kinds. The Australian Retailers Association says 87........

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