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Lidl Alcohol Purchase

  • 08-07-2014 10:59pm
    #1
    Registered Users Posts: 41 sickmyduck


    Hi all
    Im 23 year old (and look my age) I was in lidl Parnell Street today and i was buying a pack of bulmers. I got to the desk , asked for id , produced it and the girl at the check out asked my cousin who was standing next to me for her id.. now she is 24 has a 4 year old son and looks alot older than she actually is.. she had not got id and the girl at the check out said she could not serve me even thou I was purchasing alcohol with my money and my id and my cousin doesn't even drink! I asked politely could i speak to her manager and she called the security guard to which i said " I am very sorry i actually asked to speak to a manager and not a security guard could you get the manager please" finally the manager arrived and agreed I would not be allowed to be served because the person I was standing next to did not have Id ... Now lets say i was 32 and not 23 and had my 12 year old son with me and was buying my weekly shop would she still not serve me cause the 12 year old did not have ID ... I personally dont see a difference and I find it completely discriminatory. I was made feel extremely embaressed from the security being called and the scene that was made I find this really unfair and inappropriate has this ever happened to anyone else!?
    Tagged:


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Comments

  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,632 ✭✭✭Aint Eazy Being Cheezy


    Ah that happened me in Tesco before. Exactly the same situation, and the manager backed up the till girl. They gave the story about both people needing ID, so I asked the manager that if a mother came in with her two children and had a bottle of wine in with her grocery shopping, would they refuse to serve her since the kids were underage?

    She didn't directly answer the question, just said they'd make an exception for me just one time.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 3,347 ✭✭✭No Pants


    What a weird thing to do. I don't think I've ever purchased alcohol in Lidl, but just because I might some day, I need to arrange for the person next to me in the queue to have ID? :confused:


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 7,624 ✭✭✭Little CuChulainn


    sickmyduck wrote: »
    Now lets say i was 32 and not 23 and had my 12 year old son with me and was buying my weekly shop would she still not serve me cause the 12 year old did not have ID

    She probably would not. That is their policy and has been for a while.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 2,737 ✭✭✭Bepolite


    Lets say your 13 year old daughter is stood next to a 54 year old man that plies her with booze and then rapes her. Or lets just say that a retailer can serve who ever they like and that people having a go because they couldn't get a few tinnies actually detracts from people that are actually discriminated against.

    Sorry OP but the retailer was trying to be responsible, perhaps got it wrong, but they are erring on the right side of the doubt.

    I apologise for my tone but this has been done to death over and over again here, in after hours, in the consumer forum and probably a dozen other places.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,734 ✭✭✭zarquon


    Not sure what the legal discussion is here at all. The law is the law and anyone buying booze needs ID. If you are in a purchasing group albeit a small one, everyone in the group needs to have ID.

    .


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  • Registered Users Posts: 163 ✭✭ekimiam


    zarquon wrote: »
    If you are in a purchasing group albeit a small one, everyone in the group needs to have ID.

    .

    Does it say that, exactly, anywhere in law? dont think so , they are being over cautious about it.

    they have always had strange policies , when they opened first they insisted the would only take a Garda age card for id, I refused to get one, and they refused me alcohol when I produced my passport.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 2,737 ✭✭✭Bepolite


    ekimiam wrote: »
    Does it say that, exactly, anywhere in law? dont think so , they are being over cautious about it.

    they have always had strange policies , when they opened first they insisted the would only take a Garda age card for id, I refused to get one, and they refused me alcohol when I produced my passport.

    Because the only defence available to selling alcohol on an off-licence to a minor is that a Garda age card was produced. Not a strange policy in the slightest really.


  • Registered Users Posts: 163 ✭✭ekimiam


    Bepolite wrote: »
    Because the only defence available to selling alcohol on an off-licence to a minor is that a Garda age card was produced. Not a strange policy in the slightest really.

    what ? i wasnt a minor, and whats that do for defence?

    its a very strange request, that no other drink selling establishment I ever encountered enforced.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 2,737 ✭✭✭Bepolite


    ekimiam wrote: »
    what ? i wasnt a minor, and whats that do for defence?

    A defence is something presented in court when one is accused of a crime/the defendant in a civil case. The only defence to an off-licence selling alcohol to a minor is that they produced a Garda age card. Not that they produced a passport/birth cert./driving licence/letter from thier ma.
    ekimiam wrote: »
    its a very strange request, that no other drink selling establishment I ever encountered enforced.

    A drinking establishment is not an off-licence. An off-licence refers to the type of licence where one can purchase alcohol, take it away and drink it in a field ones own home.


  • Registered Users Posts: 163 ✭✭ekimiam


    but there selling it to me! who is on record on a passport not to be a minor! wheres the difficulty there?

    no other OFF LICENCE of any description (ie drink selling ) I ever encountered enforced this.

    and i dont think lidl did for long either


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  • Closed Accounts Posts: 7,624 ✭✭✭Little CuChulainn


    ekimiam wrote: »
    but there selling it to me! who is on record on a passport not to be a minor! wheres the difficulty there?

    no other OFF LICENCE of any description (ie drink selling ) I ever encountered enforced this.

    and i dont think lidl did for long either

    If a seventeen year old buys alcohol using a fake Garda Id the shop are not legally responsible. If they purchase it using a fake ID of any other kind they are responsible. They only accept Garda age card so they cannot ever be held responsible.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 2,737 ✭✭✭Bepolite


    ekimiam wrote: »
    but there selling it to me! who is on record on a passport not to be a minor! wheres the difficulty there?

    no other OFF LICENCE of any description (ie drink selling ) I ever encountered enforced this.

    and i dont think lidl did for long either

    Many of the larger retailers (the ones with in-house counsel no doubt) have or have had this policy. Tesco being one.


  • Registered Users Posts: 163 ✭✭ekimiam


    im looking for the legislation for it now, fair point tho guys ill eat my hat!

    but my original question was.... does it say anywhere that the whole group needs ID or Garda Age card?

    and again, I never experienced it anywhere, after that.


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 4,255 ✭✭✭Yawns


    It's a Lidl policy rather than the law they are enforcing. They've always enforced it from what I have witnessed myself at various Lidl stores around the country. If a group of youths or even just a young enough couple are buying alcohol, then they generally ask for ID for the group to err on the side of caution.


  • Registered Users Posts: 163 ✭✭ekimiam


    Intoxicating Liquor Act, 1988, section 31
    4) In any proceedings against a person for a contravention of subsection (1) or (2) of this section, it shall be a defence for such person to prove that the person in respect of whom the charge is brought produced to him an age card relating to such person or that he had other reasonable grounds for believing that such person was over the age of 18 years, or, if the person is charged with permitting another person to sell or deliver intoxicating liquor contrary to the said subsection (1) or (2), to prove that an age card was produced by the person concerned to that other person or that that other person had other reasonable grounds for believing as aforesaid.


    the bit i find interesting is "or that he had other reasonable grounds for believing that such person was over the age of 18 years"

    would a passport not be reasonable grounds? as reasonable as an age card ?


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 7,624 ✭✭✭Little CuChulainn


    ekimiam wrote: »
    Intoxicating Liquor Act, 1988, section 31
    4) In any proceedings against a person for a contravention of subsection (1) or (2) of this section, it shall be a defence for such person to prove that the person in respect of whom the charge is brought produced to him an age card relating to such person or that he had other reasonable grounds for believing that such person was over the age of 18 years, or, if the person is charged with permitting another person to sell or deliver intoxicating liquor contrary to the said subsection (1) or (2), to prove that an age card was produced by the person concerned to that other person or that that other person had other reasonable grounds for believing as aforesaid.


    the bit i find interesting is "or that he had other reasonable grounds for believing that such person was over the age of 18 years"

    would a passport not be reasonable grounds? as reasonable as an age card ?

    I doubt there are many off licence employees qualified o verify the authenticity of a passport. And if you don't have that qualification can you really claim it was reasonable to accept it on face value?


  • Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 17,643 Mod ✭✭✭✭Graham


    There are amendments to the Equal Status Act 2000 where refusal of service of alcohol does not constitute discrimination.
    Source: Intoxicating Liquor Act 2003
    ekimiam wrote: »
    Does it say that, exactly, anywhere in law? dont think so , they are being over cautious about it..

    This may explain the stance some/many retailers take:

    Store Management & Senior Staff Training Programme for the Voluntary Code of Practice of the Display and Sale of Alcohol Products In Mixed Trade Premises

    Where management policy may accept passports and drivers licences as proof of age documents this is done in recognition that the only acceptable defence in court to a charge of sale of alcohol to an underage person is the National Age Card.
    Student cards may not be accepted under any circumstances.

    Take time to examine the ID carefully and compare the photograph to the customer. Ask yourself does the ID look genuine. If you are unhappy with the age ID refuse the sale politely.

    If no acceptable ID is produced, decline the sale politely and request the customer to return with acceptable proof of age documentation. If you encounter resistance stay calm and explain that under the law you are obliged to ask for proof of age. If a customer persists, refer the matter to the manager.

    Practical Guidelines to Prevent Underage Sales

    Care and time must be taken to assess the following factors:

    • The customer’s true age.
    Who is accompanying them (e.g. are the people accompanying them under 18 years).
    • Remember when you are making a sale of alcohol you may be making a sale to a wider party of people other than those who are standing before you at the counter.

    Source: Responsible Retailers of Alcohol in Ireland: http://rrai.ie


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 16,391 ✭✭✭✭mikom


    zarquon wrote: »
    The law is the law and anyone buying booze needs ID. If you are in a purchasing group albeit a small one, everyone in the group needs to have ID.

    .

    Even the toddler in the shopping trolley seat.........


  • Moderators, Computer Games Moderators, Social & Fun Moderators Posts: 18,751 Mod ✭✭✭✭Kimbot


    mikom wrote: »
    Even the toddler in the shopping trolley seat.........

    You never know, stewie Griffin might have used a mind altering ray gun to get Louis to buy him drink..... you can't trust no one these days, not even the toddlers


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 16,391 ✭✭✭✭mikom


    jonny24ie wrote: »
    You never know, stewie Griffin might have used a mind altering ray gun to get Louis to buy him drink..... you can't trust no one these days, not even the toddlers

    Probably buying it for Brian.


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,328 ✭✭✭conorh91


    mikom wrote: »
    Even the toddler in the shopping trolley seat.........
    The Intoxicating Liquor Acts leave plenty of room for common sense on this. It is not an offence to sell alcohol to a person in respect of whom there is no reason to believe the alcohol will be supplied to a minor outside the premises

    Having said that, if a mother rocked up to the checkout with her toddler and a bottle of Dutchy, and said "it sends him right off to sleep, last thing at night" it may be lawful to sell the alcohol in that rather unique situation, since the alcohol is intended for supply to a minor in a private dwelling.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,772 ✭✭✭meathstevie


    It's plain and simple, if a retailer is not completely satisfied that the drink they sell to a person is only going to be drank by over age persons they can refuse the sale and are actually expected to do so. It's an offence to supply drink to minors and that's supplying in all manners possible, including for example giving a 15 year old a can at family barbecue. Wether or not to prosecute is thankfully subject to Garda discretion.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,328 ✭✭✭conorh91


    It's an offence to supply drink to minors and that's supplying in all manners possible, including for example giving a 15 year old a can at family barbecue.
    If this barbecue takes place at a private residence and the alcohol is supplied to a minor by a parent, or on consent from a parent, there is no offence.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 24,523 ✭✭✭✭Cookie_Monster


    conorh91 wrote: »
    The Intoxicating Liquor Acts leave plenty of room for common sense on this. It is not an offence to sell alcohol to a person in respect of whom there is no reason to believe the alcohol will be supplied to a minor outside the premises

    Having said that, if a mother rocked up to the checkout with her toddler and a bottle of Dutchy, and said "it sends him right off to sleep, last thing at night" it may be lawful to sell the alcohol in that rather unique situation, since the alcohol is intended for supply to a minor in a private dwelling.

    so where is the line then? What about a parent with their 15 year old son doing the weekly shop... or if he's 17, 10, 8 etc etc


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 2,737 ✭✭✭Bepolite


    so where is the line then? What about a parent with their 15 year old son doing the weekly shop... or if he's 17, 10, 8 etc etc

    I don't quite understand what was unclear about Conorh91's post. It was put clearly and succinctly. The line is where common sense puts it and within the judgement of the person manning the tills in the instant scenario.


  • Registered Users Posts: 909 ✭✭✭auldgranny


    This happened to my daughter and her friend once. They were both 20 but only one of them had ID. I have to be honest I was delighted they had taken such a stand on it. It was in my daughter's best interest.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 2,737 ✭✭✭Bepolite


    auldgranny wrote: »
    This happened to my daughter and her friend once. They were both 20 but only one of them had ID. I have to be honest I was delighted they had taken such a stand on it. It was in my daughter's best interest.

    I'm also delighted they take a stand on this, personally. Alcohol is one of the major caused of anti-social behaviour and responsible selling is one way to help kerb it.

    That or make it so expensive people can't afford it. Personally I like my wee tipple at a bargain price and would prefer to see more retailers policing the sale.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 6,026 ✭✭✭Amalgam


    If you're a regular customer of Aldi, Parnell Street, Dublin, you are guaranteed to witness a customer having an issue over this policy, (often very loudly..) at least once a week.

    Personally, I have no issues with this policy. I wish more outlets, particularly certain other supermarkets, would follow suit. *cough* Every Little Helps.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,451 ✭✭✭wolfyboy555


    does anyone else notice employees asking if a customer is over 18 when they clearly are? I have seen a few customers who are 40 yrs + and the cashier usually says 'your over 18?' and not in a joking manner. it's like they have to say that to everyone they are not asking for ID!


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 6,026 ✭✭✭Amalgam


    does anyone else notice employees asking if a customer is over 18 when they clearly are? ...

    I think they're worried of getting fined/closed down for a week or more, that certainly seemed to be conveyed very quickly, when talking to a cashier after a disgruntled customer. I'm guessing a uniform enquiry covers their back.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 2,737 ✭✭✭Bepolite


    Amalgam wrote: »
    If you're a regular customer of Aldi, Parnell Street, Dublin, you are guaranteed to witness a customer having an issue over this policy, (often very loudly..) at least once a week.

    Personally, I have no issues with this policy. I wish more outlets, particularly certain other supermarkets, would follow suit. *cough* Every Little Helps.

    To be fair, having run shops round that area for years, it would be naive to think that this particular outlet doesn't have more of an issue than most. I suspect staff have been told to be very strict.
    does anyone else notice employees asking if a customer is over 18 when they clearly are? I have seen a few customers who are 40 yrs + and the cashier usually says 'your over 18?' and not in a joking manner. it's like they have to say that to everyone they are not asking for ID!

    I've never noticed that but they place themselves on very dodgy ground if they are doing this. (That said given the narrowness of the defence perhaps not). If you ask someone for ID/raise a concern about age, the very worst thing you can do is the proceed with the sale. It was clear you knew there was an issue. You're better off saying nothing than mentioning it then continuing without a Garda Age card.


  • Registered Users Posts: 60 ✭✭kampik


    What surprised me is that a friend was refused to buy a bottle in tesco with identity card on which he is allowed to travel through EU and few other countries. They said that they can only accept a passport as a valid document. What sense does this make? He obviously doesn't own a passport as this is a legal document and sufficient for border police, garda or any other government body.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,223 ✭✭✭Michael D Not Higgins


    kampik wrote: »
    What surprised me is that a friend was refused to buy a bottle in tesco with identity card on which he is allowed to travel through EU and few other countries. They said that they can only accept a passport as a valid document. What sense does this make? He obviously doesn't own a passport as this is a legal document and sufficient for border police, garda or any other government body.

    The problem here is familiarity. The staff are unlikely to be familiar with all EU national ID cards and have no training on how to identify a fake one.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 29 Karede


    An Aldi store opened up beside me in the last few months. The first time i shopped there and bought alcohol I was asked for Id. I thought this was funny initially as i'm a married woman in my mid 30's with teenage children and i was doing my weekly shop. I def don't look under 25! That time I just happened to have Id with me and just laughed it off and thought it was a once off.

    Nope, next time I was asked for Id again and i didn't have it with me. The guy was making a big deal out of it and I was so embarrassed. It took the lady behind me in the queue to say to the server "are you for real, she is clearly well over age" for him to serve me while mumbling something.

    Suffice to say I have never been back to that store. I meant to write a letter of complaint at the time but forgot about it! This thread has just reminded me to do so. I would completely understand it if I was a teenager or early 20's but at my age it is ridiculous, unnecessary and embarrassing.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,223 ✭✭✭Michael D Not Higgins


    Karede wrote: »
    An Aldi store opened up beside me in the last few months. The first time i shopped there and bought alcohol I was asked for Id. I thought this was funny initially as i'm a married woman in my mid 30's with teenage children and i was doing my weekly shop. I def don't look under 25! That time I just happened to have Id with me and just laughed it off and thought it was a once off.

    Nope, next time I was asked for Id again and i didn't have it with me. The guy was making a big deal out of it and I was so embarrassed. It took the lady behind me in the queue to say to the server "are you for real, she is clearly well over age" for him to serve me while mumbling something.

    Suffice to say I have never been back to that store. I meant to write a letter of complaint at the time but forgot about it! This thread has just reminded me to do so. I would completely understand it if I was a teenager or early 20's but at my age it is ridiculous, unnecessary and embarrassing.

    This is the problem with enforcement of the law. You'll eventually get flak for asking the wrong person. Can you not just take it as someone doing their job and show ID? What's the harm if some people in their 20s and 30s have to show ID if it means the teenagers aren't getting their hands on easily accessible alcohol?


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  • Administrators, Entertainment Moderators, Social & Fun Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 18,759 Admin ✭✭✭✭✭hullaballoo


    Where is this idea of being qualified to verify a passport/national ID coming from?

    Absolute tosh. If someone hands you a passport and you sell them drink on foot of it, unless there is something obviously wrong with the passport, you have a defence.

    The problem here is people thinking they have a right to be sold alcohol. This is also absolute tosh. The shop decides what it sells and to whom.

    If shops have a strict policy regarding the sale of restricted items like alcohol and cigarettes, then that's their prerogative. If that results in some outlandish situations, that is because the shop has done a good job in clearly defining its policy to its staff and the staff are implementing it blindly with no wiggle-room. That is because they have been told that (a) breaching the policy will cost their jobs and (b) selling alcohol/cigarettes to a minor can/does result in prosecution for both the shop and the person who sold it.

    I was in a supermarket recently with a friend who was turning 30 that weekend. We were having a barbecue and had bought tons of food for it. I'm talking about €200 worth of food. We picked up a crate of beer and half a dozen boxes of expensive enough red wine. Now, there are very few minors who have a shopping list anything like this. Nonetheless, we got to the till and both of us were asked to present ID. I have a beard and a haggard look about me and my friend, turning thirty, was turning thirty. No spring chickens are we.

    All the same, you can't argue with them. They're doing their job in line with what they've been told. We took it that this was as near to a compliment either of us were likely to get on the eve of turning thirty and just asked them to put the alcohol aside until we could both return with ID, which they did.

    On a related/unrelated note. I get severe rage when they rush over to press "Customer is CLEARLY over 25" on the self-service check-outs.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 6,344 ✭✭✭Thoie


    Can you not just take it as someone doing their job and show ID? What's the harm if some people in their 20s and 30s have to show ID if it means the teenagers aren't getting their hands on easily accessible alcohol?

    I have no particular problem with showing ID when buying alcohol - my driving license is usually in my handbag. However, as I am so ancient, there was no such thing as a Garda age card when I was around 18ish - they came into existence while I was in my 30s. The insistence that only a Garda Age Card is acceptable proof of age is where things go wrong. One of the proofs that you give the Gardaí when applying for an Age Card can be a passport, so it's a bit bloody ridiculous that a passport itself won't suffice to purchase alcohol.

    Most people my age are of the opinion (whether it's true or not) that the Garda Age Card is aimed at 18-22 year olds who would otherwise have to carry a more important/expensive document (like a driving license/passport) around with them. In the past, not everyone in that age group would have one of those documents, and they're both relatively bulky documents to be carrying around on a messy night out in the pub. The Age Card was supposed to be a cheap way to get a convenient proof of age.


  • Registered Users Posts: 919 ✭✭✭Joe prim


    Karede wrote: »
    An Aldi store opened up beside me in the last few months. The first time i shopped there and bought alcohol I was asked for Id. I thought this was funny initially as i'm a married woman in my mid 30's with teenage children and i was doing my weekly shop. I def don't look under 25! That time I just happened to have Id with me and just laughed it off and thought it was a once off.

    Nope, next time I was asked for Id again and i didn't have it with me. The guy was making a big deal out of it and I was so embarrassed. It took the lady behind me in the queue to say to the server "are you for real, she is clearly well over age" for him to serve me while mumbling something.

    Suffice to say I have never been back to that store. I meant to write a letter of complaint at the time but forgot about it! This thread has just reminded me to do so. I would completely understand it if I was a teenager or early 20's but at my age it is ridiculous, unnecessary and embarrassing.

    In the US, or at least the bits I visit regularly, I am always asked for ID when purchasing alcohol, despite being very obviously of "mature years" Can't say it bothers me in the least, and , significantly, drunken teenagers falling around in public are not a common feature to the same extent as Dublin. Funnily, they're not quite as strict about guns and ammo.....


  • Registered Users Posts: 909 ✭✭✭auldgranny


    People in this country are always whinging about people doing their jobs when they are not whinging about people NOT doing their jobs.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 2,737 ✭✭✭Bepolite


    Where is this idea of being qualified to verify a passport/national ID coming from?

    Absolute tosh. If someone hands you a passport and you sell them drink on foot of it, unless there is something obviously wrong with the passport, you have a defence.

    It comes from staff have to be trained to do every aspect of their jobs. There is no point in training them to do something extraneous which takes me to your second point. Has the legislation stating that only a Garda Age card will provide a valid defence been successfully challenged / ignored in practice? Honest question as I know it was rumored there was some challenge going on.

    Incidentally the 1988 Act was amended in 2000:

    (Very possible I've missed further amendments! I'm fairly sure Westlaw doesn't have consolidated ILA. So I'm working off the statute book.)

    “(4) In any proceedings for a contravention of subsection (1) or (2) of this section, it shall be a defence for the defendant to prove that the person in respect of whom the charge is brought produced to him or her an age card relating to that person or, if the defendant is charged with permitting another person to sell or deliver intoxicating liquor contrary to either of those subsections, to prove that an age card relating to the person to whom the intoxicating liquor was sold or delivered was produced by that person to that other person.”.

    Now applying a literal interpretation we get 'a defence' but the fact that the reasonable grounds clause has been removed, I would submit, means it's the only defence.


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  • Administrators, Entertainment Moderators, Social & Fun Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 18,759 Admin ✭✭✭✭✭hullaballoo


    Ok, that makes a significant difference all right.

    I tried very briefly to find out whether the definition of "age card" means only a Garda Age Card or not but I gave up when I realised I was trying to make sense of the Intoxicating Liquor Acts.

    It's poor legislating if they have, by omission, made a law that does not allow shops to accept a passport in place of a Garda Age Card. Of course, I'm alive to the possibility (probability) that it could have been intentional to generate revenue from the age cards. (Having checked, though, they only cost €10 and presumably they cost the Govt more in terms of Garda resources, postage etc. than that.) Bizarre law.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 2,737 ✭✭✭Bepolite


    Ok, that makes a significant difference all right.

    I tried very briefly to find out whether the definition of "age card" means only a Garda Age Card or not but I gave up when I realised I was trying to make sense of the Intoxicating Liquor Acts.

    It's poor legislating if they have, by omission, made a law that does not allow shops to accept a passport in place of a Garda Age Card. Of course, I'm alive to the possibility (probability) that it could have been intentional to generate revenue from the age cards. (Having checked, though, they only cost €10 and presumably they cost the Govt more in terms of Garda resources, postage etc. than that.) Bizarre law.

    It's made even more bizarre by the fact that the amendment only covers off-licences. Pubs are still allowed the reasonable grounds standard.


  • Administrators, Entertainment Moderators, Social & Fun Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 18,759 Admin ✭✭✭✭✭hullaballoo


    I was about to post something politically motivated then checked myself.

    It is not uncommon for publican lobbyists to lobby for more restrictive laws against off-trade. That might explain why pubs can just take account of the cut of your jib ahead of what your actual age is.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 6,344 ✭✭✭Thoie


    Ok, that makes a significant difference all right.

    I tried very briefly to find out whether the definition of "age card" means only a Garda Age Card or not but I gave up when I realised I was trying to make sense of the Intoxicating Liquor Acts.

    It's poor legislating if they have, by omission, made a law that does not allow shops to accept a passport in place of a Garda Age Card. Of course, I'm alive to the possibility (probability) that it could have been intentional to generate revenue from the age cards. (Having checked, though, they only cost €10 and presumably they cost the Govt more in terms of Garda resources, postage etc. than that.) Bizarre law.

    That's my objection to it too. It's just poorly worded. If they had said "or other government issued identification providing proof of age", life would be simpler.

    What happens to tourists who are only over for two weeks, or less? They won't have time to get an Age Card. In theory, this would mean that an 18 year old tourist couldn't buy alcohol during their visit, as their passport isn't sufficient proof of age.
    How long will it take to get my card?
    • You should receive your application form within three working days.
    • You should then receive your Age Card within 10 working days of handing in your application form to your local Garda Station.


  • Registered Users Posts: 13,762 ✭✭✭✭dubstarr


    Tesco take passport and full driving licences as well.
    As someone who worked there and got no end of abuse over this you have to do it.You get fined,not the shop and you end up with a criminal record.
    Its easier to refuse than lose your job.
    I know someone who wouldnt serve someone who looked over 18 but had no id.Turns out it was a Garda operation.So you just dont know.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 2,737 ✭✭✭Bepolite


    Thoie wrote: »
    That's my objection to it too. It's just poorly worded. If they had said "or other government issued identification providing proof of age", life would be simpler.

    What happens to tourists who are only over for two weeks, or less? They won't have time to get an Age Card. In theory, this would mean that an 18 year old tourist couldn't buy alcohol during their visit, as their passport isn't sufficient proof of age.

    They'd have to go to the pub... So I actually hope the vintner assoc's are really that Machiavellian.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,472 ✭✭✭Grolschevik


    Nobody asks me for ID any more... [sob]


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 7,624 ✭✭✭Little CuChulainn


    Karede wrote: »
    An Aldi store opened up beside me in the last few months. The first time i shopped there and bought alcohol I was asked for Id. I thought this was funny initially as i'm a married woman in my mid 30's with teenage children and i was doing my weekly shop. I def don't look under 25! That time I just happened to have Id with me and just laughed it off and thought it was a once off.

    Nope, next time I was asked for Id again and i didn't have it with me. The guy was making a big deal out of it and I was so embarrassed. It took the lady behind me in the queue to say to the server "are you for real, she is clearly well over age" for him to serve me while mumbling something.

    Suffice to say I have never been back to that store. I meant to write a letter of complaint at the time but forgot about it! This thread has just reminded me to do so. I would completely understand it if I was a teenager or early 20's but at my age it is ridiculous, unnecessary and embarrassing.

    I wouldn't expect anything from your letter other than "It's company policy".
    Where is this idea of being qualified to verify a passport/national ID coming from?

    Absolute tosh. If someone hands you a passport and you sell them drink on foot of it, unless there is something obviously wrong with the passport, you have a defence.

    That's pretty poor advice to be giving out and likely to get someone in trouble if they follow it.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 6,344 ✭✭✭Thoie


    Bepolite wrote: »
    They'd have to go to the pub... So I actually hope the vintner assoc's are really that Machiavellian.

    Does the Intoxicating Licquor Act not apply to pubs/restaurants/hotels as well? Weird. Maybe the alcohol in pubs gets you less drunk ;)


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,223 ✭✭✭Michael D Not Higgins


    Thoie wrote: »
    Does the Intoxicating Licquor Act not apply to pubs/restaurants/hotels as well? Weird. Maybe the alcohol in pubs gets you less drunk ;)

    It defines an age limit of 21 to apply ID to someone in a pub, with passport, driver's licence, etc as acceptable forms. Much more flexible than the off sales restrictions.


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