I’m in Virginia. I’ve recently purchased liquor at two different ABC stores, beer at one grocery store, wine at two others, and wine at a restaurant. None of these have wanted to scan a DL. I’ve never heard of the practice, actually.
If the device keeps a record, then it would also allow matches up with inventory. Assuming the license is linked with the receipt, it would be pretty easy to make sure the policy is being followed.
The problem is, having that data, and having it freely given to them, means they are very likely to sell it. There’s just no reason not to, if you can get your customers to give you that information without a guarantee that they won’t divulge it.
In fact, it is so common, I would assume it the default, and need a citation to convince me otherwise.
What happens if you refuse to allow them to scan your license? Stores in the UK used to have a habit of wanting personal information (like address, telephone number etc.) when making a purchase a few years ago. JJB Sports, for some reason, was always the worst for this. “Store policy”, you see. Simply threatening to walk out the store without purchasing what you came to the cashier for usually made them see sense.
I don’t really see how that would significantly improve protection against fake IDs. I don’t imagine a store refusing to sell liquor to a customer presenting an ID that’s not in their system simply on these grounds; after all, even the most loyal customer will, at some stage, have to make his first purchase. Such a policy would only make sense if the shop required some sort of registration of your ID before they sell you booze, which I’ve never heard of. And even if they did that, it would not protect against people borrowing other people’s registered ID.
They, no doubt can fine or even terminate the employment of the clerk who sells to underage individuals.
The 7-11 up the street from me scans driver’s license/ID for every liquor purchase, even if they know you. A lot of other stores in my area have a storewide policy of asking to see your ID for liquor purchases, even if you are clearly over 21 (when I say liquor, I include beer and wine). Many other stores, however, only have a policy of asking to see ID if you ‘appear to be younger than 32’ or some such.
Once, here in WV, at Kroger self check-out, I was asked for ID to buy cartridges for my razor! After checking into the policy, it seems that these higher priced cartridges are a frequent theft item, so they need to track who is buying them. I don’t know how that helps to prevent theft. . .
When I lived in MD, I was asked for ID to buy a lighter, but they didn’t scan it. Apparently, you have to be 18 to buy a lighter. Who knew?
In North Carolina they make you get a special state transportation permit if you’re purchasing in quantity. The relevent law is:
§ 18B‑303. Amounts of alcoholic beverages that may be purchased.
(a) Purchases Allowed. – Without a permit, a person may purchase at one time:
(1) Not more than 80 liters of malt beverages, except draft malt beverages in kegs for off‑premises consumption. For purchase of a keg or kegs of malt beverages for off‑premises consumption, the permit required by G.S. 18B‑403.1(a) must first be obtained;
(2) Any amount of draft malt beverages by a permittee in kegs for on‑premise consumption;
(3) Not more than 50 liters of unfortified wine;
(4) Not more than eight liters of either fortified wine or spirituous liquor, or eight liters of the two combined.
(b) Unlawful Purchase. – Except as provided in subsection © and in Article 11, it shall be unlawful for any person to purchase, or for any person to sell, an amount of alcoholic beverages greater than that stated in subsection (a).
© Greater Amounts. – Amounts of alcoholic beverages greater than those listed in subdivisions (a)(3) and (a)(4) may be purchased with a purchase‑transportation permit under G.S. 18B‑403. (1905, c. 498, ss. 6‑8; Rev., ss. 3526, 3534; C.S., s. 3371; 1937, c. 49, ss. 12, 16, 22; c. 411; 1955, c. 999; 1967, c. 222, ss. 1, 8; c. 1256, s. 3; 1969, c. 1018; 1971, c. 872, s. 1; 1973, c. 1226; 1977, c. 176, s. 1; 1977, 2nd Sess., c. 1138, ss. 8‑12, 18; 1979, c. 384, s. 3; c. 609, s. 2; c. 718; c. 893, s. 10; 1981, c. 412, s. 2; 1989, c. 553, s. 1; 1993, c. 508, s. 2; 2001‑262, s. 5; 2006‑253, s. 3.2.)
I’ve had to fill out the paperwork before. They make you tell them the route you’ll be taking home.
This sounds like a lot of carryover from the moonshining days.
Wait. You have to get a permit to have a kegger? Or a half-way decent party?
To the barricades!
Wait…this really needs some clarification. Do you mean they put it on a scanner - like the kind you use to scan photos into a computer? Where I live, “scanning ID” means they swipe the magnetic strip through a computer which reads it and determines if the ID is real. I’ve also seen simpler ones at clubs that merely blink a red or green light. This is no science fiction technology. Are you saying that they are not swiping the magnetic strip, but instead are basically taking a picture of the ID for posterity? If so, that is a bit… odd. But if they are just swiping the magnetic strip, then I’d have to say that they aren’t recording your info. In fact, the one time I had mine swiped at a 7-11, they used an entirely different machine (I think it was the lotto computer) than they used to ring up my purchase.
They can, but keep in mind that the store clerks are unionized civil servants.
My 92-yo stepmother was “carded” because my dad ordered a beer in a US airport restaurant. She was sitting beside him and did not order anything to drink. Rules are rules and they apply to everyone. I guess it’s age discrimination if the 90yo does not have to show ID but the 23yo does.
I recall something in the news about Toronto bars doing the same thing a few years ago, taking photos of ID. IIRC the privacy laws meant that they had to delete the pictures after a short time (next morning?) or stop taking pictures; and they were not allowed to use the information for other purposes.
Thanks to 9-11 society seems to have made getting real ID much harder, but it used to be that a drivers license was the ID that allowed you to get almost anything else, from bank accounts (credit cards) to birth certficates and anything else an identity theif would require.
What exactly are the privacy laws that govern personal information in the USA? We hear of online stores and other companies having to disclose if they have been “hacked” and information stolen. I wonder if a computer folder full of scanned drivers licenses is subject to the same security and incident reporting requirements. Or does that only apply to credit cards?
I think you are all missing an important reason for this: lawsuits & litigation.
Sellers of alcohol have frequently been sued for damages caused by their customers. In many states, ‘dram shop’ laws specifically allow such lawsuits against on-sale establishments, but off-sale stores have been sued also.
Scanning a license, and keeping that record, offers significant protection in such suits: [ul][li]it shows that the store clerk did ask for and get an ID.[]it shows that the ID presented was valid enough to not show as fake to the scanner.[]it shows that the ID was above the legal age for purchasing liquor.[]if the ID belongs to someone else, the buyer probably looks like the other person – that shows that the purchaser knowingly intended to fool the store. This mitigates the stores’ culpability.[]if the ID belongs to someone else, it shifts some responsibility to that person, for allowing their ID to be used by a minor. This too dilutes the stores’ responsibility, and possibly any damages.finally, these reasons will also help the store in any administrative actions regarding license revocation, etc.[/ul][/li]
So it’s very much to the stores benefit to do this, for their own protection.
Note that all of the cases mentioned have been for the sale of legally-restricted products (liquor, cigarettes, lighters, illegal drug ingredients).
The last time a 100-year-old friend of mine was carded, she was quite flattered by it. She, too, was not ordering any alcohol.
Of course, she had fun telling the teen-age waiter that:
- that didn’t apply to her, because she was born before the Volstead Act was passed (besides, she knew Andy Volstead, and always voted for his opponent, cause he was a Republican idiot).
- she didn’t have any ID, because she was born at home – there weren’t any hospitals around when she was born, and she didn’t have a birth certificate because there was no county courthouse to get one – she had once had a Baptismal certificate, but that was lost when the old church burned down.
Both of these were wildly inaccurate, but the waiter was too young & dumb to realize this. (The rest of us at the table managed to keep from laughing out loud as she told him this.) He had to go see the manager about it. The owner looked out, recognized her, laughed, and had the waiter deliver a tiny glass of wine to her “with our compliments”.
(This restaurant also offered seniors a percentage discount equal to their age on their birthday. She did this on her 100th birthday, and was delighted to get a free meal. She said she would be back next year, and said she wanted a free meal, plus 1% cash paid to her. The owner said if she showed up, he would not only pay her the 1%, he would make sure the newspaper printed a story about it! Alas, she died just a few months before she could collect.)
But all that just amounts to, basically: the store checked that the buyer was of legal age. And if the buyer is of legal age (but goes on to cause “damages”), why does the store need additional evidence of that?
I can see how store management might want some kind of mechanism to encourage their own employees to always make this check, but given that the clerks are checking, how can a record of the fact help later?
Because a computer record of a scanned license, along with the date & time it was scanned, will be more convincing in Court than just the the testimony of the manager & clerk that they always check ID’s.
You’re misunderstanding my question. I’m saying, if a buyer is of legal age, and the store did check that (but didn’t keep a record), why would they need to prove it?
There’s no problem if a buyer actually is of legal age, and it’s unlikely that the store would ever have to prove anything in court in such a case. What they end up in court over are ones that appear to be of legal age, but actually aren’t.
Just like the problems businesses had when they didn’t card people that looked old enough – most businesses now card everyone (even the 90-year-olds) to avoid these problems.
Doing this, and keeping the record of it, in every case means that you will have the record available in the few cases where you end up in court.
Just like probably 99% of business deals work out fine, and a handshake would have been good enough, without any need for a written, signed contract. But smart businessmen insist on a signed contract in every deal, because they never know when a deal might be one of the 1% that ends up in a court fight – and then you really need that signed contract.
When data like this gets collected it’s not always a question of what they are collecting it for at the moment but what it might be used for later after it has been collected for years. After building a huge database of who has been buying alcohol and where and when over time a lot more could be done with that data than the seemingly harmless reason of keeping a record that age verification took place. You might find your insurance rates go up if you’ve been buying alcohol more often than your insurance company likes, worse still maybe your insurance will go up because a lot of your neighbors buy a lot of alcohol, law enforcement might start keeping a list with your plate number included on it - likely to be DUI cars to watch for in their area, newspapers might start doing stories on the top alcohol buying members of a community, employers might deny you an interview because you bought a gallon of tequila on the way to that Cinco De Mayo party last year, etc.
I must admit it’s kind of cool to be able to scan a license. I worked in a computer store over the holidays. The rule was if someone wrote a check you would ask for their driver’s license and type the number into the computer. We also did this if the purchase was over $1,000 regardless of payment.
I would type it in and one day a customer said, “Why don’t you just use the scanner to scan it.” I said “Would it work?” He said, “try it.” And sure enough I just used my store scanner and the driver’s license number appeared in the computer POS (point of sale) system.
It was odd in a computer store, no one knew our system was set up to do this, but a customer did. 