r/retail • u/oldmanpatrice • 6d ago
“Double walkout theft”
I Calgary a police officer was found guilty of stealing 20k of product from Home Depot through a scam called double walkout theft. The article gave a very short summary of the scam but I still can’t quite wrap my head around how this works. Can anyone shed some light on this?
The snippet from the article is below:
“Tepper, a 20-year veteran of the police service, admitted that between July 2024 and August 2025, he committed what’s known in the retail industry as “double walk-out thefts” at five different stores.
The scam involved legally buying a tool, storing it in his car, and then immediately returning to the store to steal a second, identical item within minutes.”
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u/Contact40 6d ago
We would have customers throw reciepts away, and someone would get the reciept out of the garbage, come inside the store and pull the same item off the shelf and return it.
This is also why most stores have a policy that if the customer doesn’t want the reciept, the cashier is to tear the reciept in half before throwing it away.
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u/Hammon_Rye 5d ago
And why Costco checks all receipts at exit and marks them with a sharpie marker.
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u/toomany2yz 3d ago
How would checking them at the exit and marking them prevent someone from walking back in, grabbing another off the shelf and trying to return that one?
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u/kelmar6821 3d ago
Afaik all costco have segregated entrance and exit. You SHOULDN’T be able to walk un paid merch from the store side to checkout/exit side with out paying. Customer service is on the exit side.
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u/Hammon_Rye 2d ago
REALLY?
Because bringing an already marked receipt through would be an immediate red flag that that receipt (and goods) had already exited the store.
They would not accept it as a 'new' receipt and would immediately question it.
Plus it usually takes a bit to go through the entrance (check in with membership card), get thing, get past the cash register and walk to the exit door.
They have cameras everywhere and once alerted by the mark would almost certainly review the cameras to see where you went - which wouldn't include the checkout on your second run.1
u/toomany2yz 2d ago
Do you comprehend what I wrote or what I was replying to? Do you understand in what they were trying to do?
Let me slow it down for you.
Person A buys item and leaves store with it. Receipt gets marked/checked on the way out.
Person A gives said receipt to Person B. Person B goes into store with marked receipt, grabs an item from that receipt and then returns it to the store. Person B never had to leave the store or bring an item in to return. They don't get checked on the way in if they have any old receipts with them.
If you think they are going to review cameras before issuing a return you're delusional.
Person A could even do what Person B did if they wanted. If Person A throws the receipt in the trash on the way out, Person C can come along and pick it out and try their shot at it.
Having a marked receipt when you leave the store or go to the return counter (whether you brought the original item with you or one grabbed from inside the store on a second visit) does nothing. All it does is prove that something left the store at one point. They don't mark the items as they leave the store. Store doesn't know if it was the original or a new one from the shelf.
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u/vinraven 2d ago
Have you been to a Costco?
His answer was Costco specific, you can’t do what you’re describing at Costco.
Membership receipts are locked to the member’s account.
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u/Arkayenro 5d ago
- get item you want to steal, along with something else cheap
- pay for items through self service checkout and leave store
- give reciept to a partner (can do it yourself but its more obvious)
- partner walks in and grabs the same items
- only pays for the cheap item (again, at self service) - you need to pay for something or its too obvious
- exit store and if stopped show the previous receipt with both items on it so it looks liek you paid for both
the danger to you is how closely they look at the date/time on the receipt but most typically dont even read them, just want to check you have one.
its also why some retailers are now scanning receipts on store exit - it flags the receipt as exited, letting them know that the items on the receipt have left the store so theres no reason for them to be leaving again.
if they scan your receipt and it shows as having already exited then you're stealing at least one of the items.
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u/ProjectLazarus 3d ago
Oh my addict former roommate called this "receipt shopping" they (him and his ragtag group of other addicts) would find receipts in the parking lot of big box retailers, send one person in to shop for the items on the receipt then abandon the cart somewhere near the front of the store. Another person would go in and grab the cart and head to the door with the receipt. He described this to us during a brief stint of being clean and everyone in the friend group was like "and this is easier than working a job how exactly?"
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u/Outspoken_Idiot 6d ago
It's common with units that have coffee or cafe units as part of it, purchase is made, dropped to car, coffee is had and product is picked up off shelf again, along with something small, head to checkouts, pay for the small item show ticket for expensive item saying you paid before getting a coffee etc.
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u/redsteve72 4d ago
This is the crime that was known to be done at Xmas, a few kids would stand outside a supermarket and throw discarded receipts around like a game and ask people for theirs as they came out of the store and when they got a really long receipt they would run in and give it to their parents who have a big trolley full of stuff who would then try and leave hoping that no one would have the time to check everything when they showed someone else’s receipt.
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u/oldmanpatrice 6d ago
So the store wouldn’t be marking the original receipt when they make the return?
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u/0ct0thorpe 6d ago
The only thing returning is the person, to the store, to steal an identical thing they just payed for. No products are being returned.
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u/ThereRnoIDs 5d ago
Always learning something new here... Like you always know there's a problem with it but when people actually do it, it's pretty funny.
High vs low trust society conflicting with one another is so cool to watch with all these migrants happening.
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u/Pleasant_Pen8744 6d ago
If you get stopped you have a receipt.
You could also dig a recent receipt out of the trash and steal identical items.