Letters: Bookshop Bookings

Dear Sir,

I think people should be aware of this. Recently the bookshop management have been asking regular visitors to the shop not to spend unnecessary time talking to the staff.

A friend of mine has been subject to this request and is distraught about it to the extent that they are afraid to go into the bookshop now and are buying their goods elsewhere.

It seems corporate madness to do this; they have also lost my trust and custom. Why be so discriminatory in their request, surely the rules should be applied to everyone and not just a targeted few.

What is disturbing about this is that my friend was spoken to by management staff that they did not even know worked in the bookshop. So how could this management person know who are regular visitors to the shop?

Are we being monitored in some way?

What records are they keeping of our visits to the shop?

How does the management know know what the regular visitors look like?

Are the shop floor staff reporting back to management about our visits?

Just what is the CCTV monitoring being used for other than looking for thieves?

I feel sorry for the shop floor staff; I have always found them helpful, friendly and pleasant. They often chatted with me and consequently I came back there and gave the shop more custom because of their apparent genuineness. But I am left feeling uncomfortable about using the shop any more.

What has happened to this world? It seems money is more important than life and unless we are corporate robots, we are not acceptable. Sorry bookshop, I choose life and humans.

Sorry to withhold my name in this, perhaps from what I have said above you can understand why.

Yours faithfully,

Anonymous