Humiliated, HORRIBLE treatment at Dis-chem Mall of the South.

On the (4/10/2020) at Dischem Alberton Mall of The South My husband and I were treated unfairly, humiliated and mistreated. We arrived at the store around 2:20 pm and took a trolly inside the shop, loaded some toiletries, tea and cosmetics. Then took washing powder soap and loaded it in the bottom basket of the trolley. We headed to the tills and paid for the products. When we got to the door, the security guard on duty asked us if we had paid for the washing powder soap which was in the bottom shelf of the trolly, that's when we realised that we hadn't, we said we can go back to pay for it, she grabbed the powdered soap and started calling for backup security. She told us to wait on the side while she called backup security. We were then taken to a back room, where we were held hostage for a period of 30 minutes while they said they were viewing CCTV footage. They did not even show us that CCTV footage nor offer us an apology. We were then asked to write some form of affidavit and sign it. We did all that and went to pay for the soap.

My question to Dischem Security guards and management is about the job description of your guards. Is it not their job to check customers trolleys and slips and when they discover that there is an unpaid product they confront the cashiers? Or their job is to falsely accuse their loyal customers of theft and humiliate them, because other shops do not treat customers so badly. These security guards must be reprimanded.

What makes me angry is that we did not receive any apology from the security guard, backup security and store manager upon seeing that we had genuinely forgotten to pay for the soap, and we were probably going to forget in their trolly as a customer isn't supposed to go out of their store with their trolly. Secondly, we had not left the shop so we did not understand why we were being accused of *****ing. Thirdly, we do not understand how we would ***** from Dischem when we had bought items worth more than R400, and we buy our monthly toiletries, tea etc at the same dischem. Now I am wondering if these are the instances where being black is a disadvantage, because I don't think they would do that to a person who is not of colour.

I would advise people to avoid buying at Mall of the South Dis-chem in order not to be humiliated and disrespected in such a dehumanizing manner!