I was at a convenience store once (as a customer, not as an employee) where a couple of foreign visitors were trying their damndest to buy a case of beer. From their accents, I took them to be German, but that was just a WAG. Anyway, the clerk was demanding to see their driver’s licenses, and the guys kept insisting that their passports would have to do. The girl kept sayinig “But I have to see your Driver’s License!”* I took from the conversation that the girl a)had never seen a passport in her life; and b) somehow thought that she could make perfect sense out of a German driver’s license.
Anyway, both at the bar and the liquor store, I’ve seen foreign driver’s licenses (always Canadian) and a passport here and there. I sold them the booze/admitted them to the bar every time. No big deal.
I don’t get why people get so peeved at being carded. If you’re legal, what’s the problem? Someone thinks you look young enough to need verification? What a pisser!
Damn, I wish someone would pretend they couldn’t tell my age. I’ve never been carded, and have been offered alcohol in restaraunts well before I was legal drinking age (which was fine when I lived in Texas, I could have a dacquiri if I wanted to!) because I looked older than I was. That was cool then, but now I’d love to be carded–it says, “You sure look young!” sigh Fat chance these days!
I get so irritated by those semi-apologetic signs in convenience stores that explain the concept of “no id, no alcohol.” IT’S NOT THAT BIG A DEAL TO WHIP OUT YOUR ID!!! CLERKS SHOULDN’T HAVE TO APOLOGIZE FOR THIS MILDEST OF INCONVENIENCES!!!
Because it’s stupid, a waste of my time, and yet another example of people substituting policy for judgment.
I used to have lots of fun when I had a UK drivers license, which was a cardboard folder with a paper form stapled inside, signed by the Chief of Police. People looked at me like I was some sort of Martian. Luckily, I also carried my passport. Unfortunately, some of the people who were confused by my driver’s license also had never seen a passport before. There’s a world that exists outside your two-bit town, learn about it!
Never been in an alcohol-related job, but at my last job we had senior citizen’s discount days and college discount days, and both days I would ID everyone who asked for the discount. Usually Senior days were ok, since most people were flattered to think that they looked less than 55 (before people get snarky, it was a charity thrift store and we had a pretty tight budget, and the discount was 50% off on most stuff- so a few bogus seniors could blow our numbers for the week- meaning less hours we could schedule. I didn’t want that) It wasn’t management policy per se, but I am a really bad judge of age and I could never remember who was a senior and who was just in all the time.
I currently work a few shifts a week at the desk of one of the dorms at my college, and the policy is to check everyone’s ID every time and sign in all non-residents. I love the fact that it is posted and my boss makes a point to check everyone’s ID when he works, even though he knows just about all the residents by name, if not apartment #. It makes it much easier for me to get them to do it when they know it’s not just me being a jerk.
I never mind being ID’d- I look askance at cashiers who don’t. I am 22 (in 2 days, happy birthday to me) but I look about 16- so any time I buy age-restricted stuff I just hand my ID over with the beer or porn or whatever. It saves me time, and I like to help out the cashier.
Sounds good. Next time I’m in the US, let me know where you work, so I won’t have any trouble buying alcohol with my Canadian documents.
Seriously, it’s a sensible policy, and pretty much what was in place in our chain. Any identifying document, with both a picture and date of birth, and issued by a legitimate government, was acceptable. And I saw my fair share of everything: other provinces’ driver’s licences, passports from various nations, military IDs (both Canadian and foreign), and plenty of driver’s licences from American states.
Of course, I also saw my fair share of unacceptable documents also. Folks, I couldn’t sell you beer if you used library cards, high school student IDs (though in these cases, I applauded your nerve), college or university IDs (they’re not issued by a government), business cards, or anything that could be altered by the bearer.
But that was the heart of my question, really–our conditions on what constituted an acceptable ID were just as I’ve outlined. The idea of having a policy (or perhaps a law) of accepting only IDs from the local jurisdiction just seems to me to be too restrictive. If you’re willing to accept my out-of-jurisdiction documents when I try to buy alcohol, I’ll happily show them to you. And at my age, I’ll probably also thank you for the compliment!
I like option two. I work in a small liquor store right now with that option and the goal is to keep customers as happy as possible. We check the new customers all the time, except for the old ones. I do not understand why people would want to get protected by a sign. Like a customer won’t understand why I’m asking him for ID in a liquor store.
Not to hijack, but here are a couple questions for the liquor-selling type folks:
How exactly do you tell a fake ID from a real one? What are your methods? Say someone comes in with an ID from a state you’ve never even been to, and you have no idea what that state’s ID looks like but this one looks pretty real. How do you tell? And do you memorize the states that do and don’t have blacklight-sensitive stuff on the card?
Here in this college town (where everyone gets checked every time for everything), fake IDs are big business on both sides (the ID makers and the liquor merchants) and one always hears about certain bars and liquor stores that should be avoided because “those guys can always tell”. How?
Generally, if it’s the kind of license one is used to seeing, it takes about five seconds. Big whoop.
If one get’s ticked off at being carded, then it doesn’t seem to matter if it’s policy or a judgement call–then it’s “What, you think I’m trying to pull something here?” Either way, the clerk is Evil.
And if you actually displayed that condescending attitude to people about their “two-bit towns,” well, maybe it wasn’t your DL that caused them problems.
I don’t have anything against small towns, just clerks whose mental horizons are so limited that they think a passport is some satanic device intended to deceive and confuse them. The same people who think a two dollar bill must be counterfeit because there is no such thing as a two dollar bill.
The fines for sales of alcohol and, to a lesser extent, tobacco to an underage person are SEVERE, both for the company and the individual cashier. The police and ABC (Alcoholic Beverage Control) send underaged kids into stores specifically for the purpose of making sure we ID people. I certainly understand why my employer has a policy instead of trusting the judgment of some of the subnormals I work with…
OK, I can see that! But I still don’t understand the outrage some people display over a simple ID check. Generally it doesn’t take that long, and as far as I’m concerned, it would be nice if someone thought I looked younger than 30! But when you go gray in your mid 20’s–nope, it doesn’t happen! sigh!
There are a number of ways. Assuming for the moment that you recognize the state (province, country, etc.) as a real place, you examine a few things:
First, the ID itself. Legitimate IDs, no matter where they are from, are designed nowadays to be as tamper-proof as possible. So if you see anything that indicates that somebody has tried to erase/write over/peel up/paste on/change anything, you reject it. I suppose somebody could make a very real looking-and-feeling fake ID, but it would be an expensive proposition.
What does the ID say? Some errors were blatant. A Causasian guy’s ID says his name is something Chinese. A typo shows that the bearer was born in 1872. The photo is obviously of the bearer as a child. And so on.
What does the bearer say? Most people know their date of birth (even what it is supposed to be according to the fake ID), but fewer bearers of fake IDs tend to know the details of their fake addresses. Do they even know their name? If the ID says “George,” and I hand it back saying, “Thanks, Bill,” if the bearer doesn’t correct me, then I know something’s up. Even if the bearer corrects me by saying, “I’m not Bill; I’m Steve,” I know something’s up.
How is the bearer’s behaviour, even while he or she waits in line? Nervous, trying to get away with something? Calm, like this is something he or she does every day? Looking out the window at the gang of guys in the parking lot and giving them the thumbs up? Pop quiz: which one of the above definitely won’t get you beer?
What is the bearer buying? The beer that is marketed to the younger demographic, the beer that is extra strong in alcohol, the beer that is heavily advertised on TV and is fairly inexpensive besides? Or the microbrew that has little to no marketing except word-of-mouth and tends to be more expensive than most others on the shelf? The latter is not the kind of stuff a kid would share clandestinely with his buddies; kids generally want as much alcohol as they can get for the lowest price. And some microbrews are barely drinkable to palates with little experience.
None of the above factors are infallible, so none would ever be the only one I’d use–that is, I’d use a combination of factors when selling beer, and the combination I’d use would vary by circumstance. (Note also that there were a number of other factors I’m not going to mention; I’m being deliberately oblique so I don’t turn this into a comprehensive lesson on how to get alcohol illegally.) The important thing is that there is more to it than just an ID; even the best fake ID would cause me to ask questions if the customer was buying Cheapmeister Extra Strong Draft and looking nervous while doing it.
I don’t know … sticking to option #1 seems too close to those “zero tolerance” policies for me. It’s a bit like saying, “We refuse to rely on our judgment and instead choose to consistently enforce this rule without regard to common sense.”
I mean, are you really going to refuse service to 70-year-old grandmother because she forgot her ID. That goes beyond just being consistent and approaches being disrespectful.
“A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds” and all that.
