'I was mortified': Shopper accuses Countdown of racial profiling

The incident happened at Countdown Lynfield, Auckland, at about 6pm yesterday. Photo / Google

A woman says she was racially profiled at her local Countdown supermarket following an incident at the checkout yesterday.

Jade Wilkes visited her local Countdown in Lynfield, Auckland, as she usually does yesterday afternoon and was shocked at the customer service she received.

Wilkes was asked for her ID to purchase alcohol and provided the checkout operator with her driver's licence. As she was getting her card out to pay for her shopping, she says she heard the operator ask: "I'm going to need your IDs as well."

She looked up to find the checkout operator was talking to the people behind her in the queue, a Chinese mother and daughter.

Wilkes, who is half-Chinese, says she had never seen those people in her life.

She said she explained to the staff member that she was all alone and those people were shopping separately but the operator insisted they were "a group".

"I hadn't even seen these people until she asked for their ID and I turned around to see who she was talking to," she told the Herald.

"She kept insisting 'you're a group' despite us telling her multiple times we didn't know each other," Wilkes said.

"We just kept telling her we don't know each other, we're not together, but she kept insisting."

According to Wilkes, the checkout operator repeatedly insisted the Chinese mother and daughter and half-Chinese Wilkes were "a group", much to their embarrassment.

"It went on for so long, she said 'you're a group' more than 10 times, everyone was looking at us," she recalled.

"I kept saying 'this is crazy, we're not together'," she added.

"Why are you assuming we were even together? We weren't even talking, I've never seen these people in my life. I started getting really annoyed."

Wilkes said there's no chance the staff saw the three of them talking to each other because that never happened.

"Just because we're all Asian she assumed we were all together."

Wilkes, who is 28, says the people behind her in the queue were a mother in her late 40s and a daughter who looked about 15 years old. "The mother was old enough to buy her own alcohol, why would I be buying it for her anyway?"

Eventually, Wilkes asked for the manager who came over, apologised and said she'd talk to the staff member later.

"The manager knows my face. I come here about three times a week, always on my own. She always approves my ID at the checkout."

Wilkes says, despite the manager's apology, the staff member remained "rude" and "unapologetic".

"I was mortified."

"She is racially profiling me for no reason," she added.

According to Wilkes, this is not the first time she has issues at her local Countdown store.

"During lockdown I went there on my own and a manager accused me of shoplifting salmon, saying a colleague saw me. Then she apologised. I wrote on the Countdown site and had phone call from them and that was it," she said.

This time, she has sent a complaint to their head office but, save for an initial acknowledgement email, is yet to hear back.

"What's going on with that store? It's clear racial profiling based on how I look," Wilkes, who has a British accent, said.

"This cannot be tolerated. You can't be making assumptions like that based on race. And she just went on and on and on. It was embarrassing for the family behind me too, I hope they complained as well. She repeatedly accused us of lying."

Countdown has been contacted for comment.