If my Driver’s License is damaged? By damaged I mean the corners are turned up and the hologram has some scratches on it. I had a number of other pieces of ID with me too.
Well, a private enterprise never actually has to legally sell you anything. At least, in Saskatchewan.
Don’t know where you live, but in N.J., yes, they can, and are supposed to refuse service, if there is any reason to suspect that the i.d. may have been altered. If it’s damaged, it could have been. The establishment risks losing its liquor license if it turns out you (or someone else nearby) is an undercover agent. Not worth their risk.
They probably felt that it was better to be safe than risk a charge of selling to a minor.
As it happens, I manage a liquor store.
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[li] Pretty much any business can refuse to serve any person they wish not to do business with. In certain cases, this might open them to charges of discrimination - but discriminatory conduct in this context is always a matter of patterns, not single incidents,and in any case, they can still refuse to serve you.[/li]
In most U.S. states nowadays, there are varios idiotic laws that either require liquor stores to refuse service in some cases, or establish a de facto penumbra of risk within which the local revenooers might use any incident to fine or even suspend the license of a business if they provide alcohol under those circumstances, even where it’s clear that the person is legal to serve. Dominick’s may not be particularly happy about having to piss you off; nonetheless, they may well have to do it. At my store, for example, we card every single person, regardless of the fact that they were 85 years old yesterday when they came in the store, and refuse service to anyone who doesn’t have ID, even of they only want to buy ice or soft drinks; in my state and city’s regulatory climate, any other policy risks having our license suspended.
Gah. Bloody coding errors.
As an example of the above, the dealership where I used to work refused to sell a new car to a current customer because that customer was virtually impossible to please and the dealer just did not want the hassle.
The dealer offered to continue to service the customer’s current vehicle for the balance of his factory warranty and then terminate the relationship “forever.” The customer retorted something unprintable in a family newspaper and undoubtedly did his best to convince family, friends and acquiantences to never do business there.
The customer also threatened a lawsuit but nothing ever came of that AFAIK.