Have you ever ACCIDENTALLY shoplifted something?

[YellowRubberDuckie]

I did this weekend. I'm not going to go into specifics except to say that it was a huge mistake, I forgot it was in the basket, paid for a LARGE item without taking it out of the basket, and totally forget that what we got was in the back until we had gotten to the car. I feel TERRIBLE. Have any of you ever done this?
Duckie

[ScreamingMeemie]

1. A couple of months ago my purse hooked up on the hanger of a

sweater at Old Navy... I didn't see it until I swung my purse up on the counter at Sears... I was torn between embarassment over accidentally taking it and embarassment over walking around with it hooked on my purse.

[YellowRubberDuckie]

2. I would have been mortified.

And you have an Old Navy IN the mall there? Wow. I'm jealous. I'd love to have a one stop shopping experience like that, but they do not exist in malls here.
Duckie

[ScreamingMeemie]

7. I'm sure the woman at Sears thought I was an idiot...

Boy was my face red when I took it back to Old Navy. We have an Old Navy in the mall closest to us. The rest are usually outside the mall. I love the fact that I can do all my shopping at once.


How are you doing?

[YellowRubberDuckie]

11. I'm great. How are you?

I came home half way thru the day. I was just miserable. I felt really terrible.
Duckie

[Nicole]

9. Old Navy in malls

I think OKC is the exception, not the norm. I have shopped Old Navy in both the Norman & Lawton malls. Plus various malls in other states.

[YellowRubberDuckie]

12. Who wants to go to Norman?

LOL

[Nicole]

26. Me!

I have family in Norman that I visit often. Plus the mall there is less crowded.

[YellowRubberDuckie]

27. The traffic is terrible.

And I work a few blocks from Penn Square Mall. It's rarely too crowded.
Duckie

[Pithlet]

25. None of our Old Navy's are in malls, either.

A lot probably depends on how old the stores are, local zoning laws, etc.

[Nicole]

28. Interesting.

The only Old Navy I've been in out of a mall was in OKC & Edmond, OK. I thought we were just behind the times.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

24. No.

But my kids pocketed stuff when they were little. I'm pretty sure they did it on purpose though.

Funniest item was a pocket Bible my girl lifted when she was two or three.

On edit: that should have been a reply to the OP.

[skygazer]

3. Yeah, I have

I was shopping one day and I didn't grab a basket because I was only getting a few things. They grew into quite a few things so I popped a bottle of advil in the pocket of my hooded sweatshirt so it would be easier to carry and forgot to pay for it.

I realized when I got to my car and went back in and paid for it. It was embarrassing but as someone who works retail, I can generally tell the difference between an honest mistake and an actual attempted theft.

[calico1]

37. That reminded me of the can of tuna in

My Cousin Vinny.

[tigereye]

4. yeah, I just marched back in the store and gave it back

that used to happen when my kid was a toddler in the cart - things used to end up hidden under him by mistake.

I was too tired to feel bad at the time.

[Midlodemocrat]

5. Yes. And, I felt terrible about it.

I had placed some small cosmetics, et al for my eldest on the seat of the cart and during the time in the store, put my purse over it (probably while fishing for my glasses at some point).

Got to the checkout, unloaded, paid and didn't notice until I got to the car.

I went back in to pay for the stuff and they were actually very nice about it.

[Nicole]

6. Yes

The same way you did. I had something small in the bottom of the cart. The cashier scanned my large item without removing it from the cart. I forgot about the small thing until I got to the car & unloaded my cart.

When I returned to the store to pay for it the customer service person was very nice. I was embarrassed.

[rug]

8. Imagine my chagrin when I discovered a Toshiba laptop under my coat.

[YellowRubberDuckie]

10. LOL...

I'm talking about something that cost under 5 bucks that was an accident. Silly.
Duckie

[Dangerously Amused]

13. Did you return it?

[YellowRubberDuckie]

16. I was too mortified.

It was a $2.50 item. I'll fix it when we go back this weekend.
Duckie

[David__77]

14. yes.

i know it's happened, but i can't specifically recall. i know it's happened with large items in the cart in the supermarket.

[HarukaTheTrophyWife]

15. Yeah, but I was taught in my family to look at it as free stuff.

However, I spent my childhood without premium cable due my parents having conflicting morals.

It was against my mother's morals to steal cable, yet against my father's morals to pay for premium cable. So we just did without.

[Magrittes Pipe]

17. .

[YellowRubberDuckie]

18. .

[Fox Mulder]

19. Accidentally? No.

On purpose?

No comment.

[Pithlet]

20. Yes. A cop at the front of the Target stopped me, too, as I was leaving.

I'd missed the bottle of Niqyl at the bottom of the cart when I checked out. I had a kid in the front seat of the cart, and it had rolled underneath. I was so embarrassed. It was right around the time they changed their formula to get rid of whatever ingredient is suppossedly used to make meth. He was very nice, but he did check the ingredients to make sure it didn't have that uber-ingredient before sending me back to pay for it. I wonder if it had been the older formula, I would have been in trouble.

When I was 16 I walked out of a drug store with a hairbrush. I'd intended to pay for it, but forgot I had it in my hand as I followed my mom out of the store. I realized my mistake when we got to the car, so I went back inside and payed for it without anyone being the wiser.

[LostinVA]

21. My mom did once -- she had a magazine under her arm and left the store

[crim son]

22. Sure. I have this habit of putting on and taking off my glasses

when I need to read something. So if I have to read a label or something in a store, I take the glasses out of my purse, read, and then put them back. Every now and then I put the item I'm shopping for into my purse... I did it last week in the pharmacy, right in front of a tech. Anyhow, I've caught my error every time but once... and arrived home with an ugly scarf I'd never had any intention of buying.

[Redstone]

23. No, but I know LOTS of people who have. It's OK; don't worry. Really does

pretty much happen all the time.

Redstone

[Wetzelbill]

29. I am addicted to shoplifting

I don't do it anymore, but I have been caught. As recently as a few years ago. It's a struggle every time I walk into a store not to take something. Source of great embarassment for me too.

Although, I think I have accidentally done similar stuff to watch you just described. I also have gone to this little market next to my apt a few times and grabbed several things, like candy bars etc and found out later that the lady did not ring everything up. That probably is not shoplifting though. She sometimes misses stuff.

[idgiehkt]

30. I don't know if this counts

I had to get a pie and the cashier couldn't get it to ring up. I don't remember the occasion but I think it was a holiday and I was in a hurry, otherwise I'd never be buying pie. The cashier got annoyed and said "I ain't in the mood to fool with this" and stuck it in my grocery bag. I didn't know what to do, so I just took it. I was afraid if I drew attention to the situation she would get in trouble or get fired and I didn't want to get her in trouble. I felt guilty about it for a long time, even though it was only a $5.00 pie.

[pitohui]

32. ha ha that happened to me w. a bottle of booze

it was on the discount counter and wouldn't ring up, i guess it was no longer in the computer

a line was forming and finally the frustrated clerk said, "it's on the house," i never worried about it, assumed she had the authority to make the final decision

[jobycom]

31. Yeah, but I went back and paid for it. It was kind of funny

It was at Autozone. The parts guy had handed me a couple items I needed, and was giving me advice on something else that required him to look at my car. So we both walked out, me carrying the parts he had already handed me. He looked at my car, we decided I didn't need anything else, so I shook his hand and waved and thanked him, and he went back in, and I drove off. I had the parts in one hand while I shook his hand with the other!

Anyway, when I got home it struck me that the parts weren't in a bag, then I realized what I had done, so I called the store and paid for the stuff with a credit card. They had already figured out I hadn't paid, too. Seemed kind of surprised when I called them.

[jmm]

33. No but I have a bad habit of

forgetting to pay if I go to a restaurant where you have to order food at a counter if I don't pay when ordering. That's why I try to always pay upfront instead of waiting until my food is ready or I'm finished eating but it's kind of funny how many people try to argue with me about it.


I've never forgotten to pay at places where you sit down and tell the waiter what you want.

[liontamer]

34. yes i felt terrible!

and i was too embarrassed to return it. so i paid for another one and left it behind.

[YellowRubberDuckie]

35. I was thinking of doing that....

Redeem myself.

[calico1]

36. Yes. I accidentally shoplifted

a set of plastic measuring spoons. They cost around $3 or so. I had left them in the top part of my shopping basket. And no I didn't take them back because the store was a zoo, I was tired and hungry and I didn't want to go stand in line again. Plus I was way the hell back in the parking lot and I just didn't want to walk there again. If it had been something more expensive I would have taken it back in. I didn't feel too, too bad about it because this same store had overcharged me once and I was too tired to go back and fight it. So I figured the store and I broke even.

[MissMillie]

38. almost, this weekend

I refilled my kitty litter containers. The checkout-clerk said "two refills" and I said "three", but I forgot about the poop scoop in the basket. I had to have a separate ring-up for the scoop.

[Darth_Kitten]

39. Yup

Picked out a card in the drugstore, went to the postal office inside the same store, signed card and sent it away.


Didn't know until I got home what I did. I went back the next day and explained what I did, the clerk told me that was a very classy thing to do because lots of people wouldn't come back.

Life happens....

[Downtown Hound]

40. Yes, and it was expensive too

It wasn't entirely my fault. I was buying a lot of software for my computer at this little Macintosh store and the guy forgot to ring one program up. It was a five hundred dollar program too, and I walked right out with it. When I got home I realized what had happened, and I went back and paid for it. The owner of the store was a friend of mine, and he later became a good business client for me, so it was all worth it in the end. I could have lived with myself if it had been a small, inexpensive item, but five hundred dollars? That would have bothered my conscience too much.

[astral]

41. I walked out of a beauty shop with a bottle of conditioner . . .

. . . I didn't pay for. I had gone in there, kinda woozy with a cold and stuck this one bottle in my vest pocket (right in front of me, stuck out of the pocket about 6" so it wasn't like "concealed" or anything!) so I could pick up this other fatter bottle and I had a question about the two before I was going to buy. By the time I checked out after spacing out on all their other hair products, I'd forgotten all about it. I got all the way home and took my vest off before I realized I had that other bottle of conditioner in the pocket still! It had to be right in front of the clerk's face when I did it, too!

I was mortified and horrified --- nobody believes people steal things on accident! Well, I am glad I'm not the only one. What I did was write a check for the amount (around $15) and mail it to the store with a note of explanation so I wouldn't have to deal with them in person, plus I wasn't feel well enough to trek back out there.

[Broken_Hero]

42. nope, not on accident....nt

[barb162]

43. I had a checker put someone else's stuff in my cart.

Didn't discover it till I got home that I had a bag of stuff I didn't buy. It was a while back and I don't even remember what was in the bag. If it were really expensive stuff, I would have remembered the contents

[elocs]

44. About 39 years ago when I was in the 8th grade

my mom bought a winter coat for me in the fall at the new K-Mart in town. It was the only discount store on our side of town, so as I was leaving the store one evening in the winter I was stopped by security. My winter coat, which I had worn for the first time, still had the price tag hanging on it. Of course they hauled me into the security office and called my mom who fortunately paid for the coat with a K-Mart store credit card and they had the record. I have been scrupulous about removing price tags ever since.

[China_cat]

45. No, but my youngest son did when he was

about a year and a half old. I was using a baby backpack for him and, while we were in a bookstore, he pulled a book off a top rack and dropped it into the carrier. I didn't find it until we got home.

[Coventina]

46. Just recently I was in Home Despot looking at floor samples

I didn't know you were supposed to pay for them, so I just took all the ones I was interested in home with me.



I just walked out the door, not thinking anything. I showed them proudly to my husband later that evening. He said, "How much were these?"

Huh?



on edit: I'm embarrassed about it, but I don't feel terribly guilty because we have spent a LOT of $$$$$$$$$$$ there in the last 2 years on our home improvement project. And we're not done yet!

[whyask]

47. I did this weekend too...

We were at a food festival and I thought a lot of the "goodies" were free and filled up my bag only to find when I got home, by my mortified daughter that they were not free. She bought half of what I helped myself to, oops.

[BarenakedLady]

48. Yeah

A couple of times errant food items appeared in my bags when I got home. What I think happened is someone who went through the checkout before me decided against purchasing an item and the cashier put it aside, only to place it in my bag later. That also happened once where I was charged for the item. Unfortunately it always is something I wouldn't eat (non-vegetarian).

[Dervill Crow]

49. Yup, I have. Really ugly earrings from K-Mart.

I must have accidentally knocked them off the rack into my purse.

[ProfessorGAC]

50. Yep. Nearly The Same As You

I bought kitty litter at a Super K near my house. I had one bag in the cart, and the second down on the bottom shelf. I had a whole bunch of other stuff too. Well, i forgot to tell the checker that i had two. I peeled that little UPC sticker off, handed it to her, and she scanned everything else. When i got back to the car, i bent down and picked it up and threw it in the car.

I was half-way home when i realized, "I didn't pay for that other bag." The next time i went in there, i went to the Customer Service counter and said "I want to pay for the bag of cat litter." The on duty manager said, "Don't worry about it. Honest people like you are not our problem. It's worth a bag of kitty litter to have you as a customer!"

So, not only did it "steal" that bag, but when i went back to assuage my guilt, i was surprised to find that i GOT AWAY WITH IT!
The Professor

[Patiod]

51. Yes, and boy was I tempted to say nothing

Was at Dicks Sporting Goods, and had agonized over a $50 tennis skirt, which I couldn't afford. On the other hand, I'm not 100 pounds (like the other women in my tennis group), and I need a plain black skirt for camoflage, and I was playing every single week, year after year.

The kid took the security tag off the skirt, and slid it into the bag with a few cans of tennis balls and announced my total as $4.35. I took a deep breath, and said "you didn't ring up the skirt, did you?".

There was no way I would have enjoyed playing in a "stolen" skirt (even if it wasn't my fault) Bad enough I had to feel guilty for paying $50 for a f#$king tennis skirt, but that guilt was by far the lesser of the two guilts.

[CTyankee]

52. Al Franken's book right after he signed it! I was so gaga about meeting

Al I sailed out of the Barnes & Noble at Yale (Yale's official booksore)with my friend. It wasn't until I got home that I realized I hadn't paid for it. I called the bookstore and spoke to a salesperson and gave her my Visa card number. She just laughed. She said "Well, you're not the first person who has done that!" But she added that she appreciated my honesty!

[RedStateShame]

53. Um.......YES, ABSOLUTELY!!!! That's what I've been trying to say!

Now, can you make a few statements on my behalf to some unbelieving police officers, please?