The attached letter is from Chief Constable Susannah Fish OBE QPM chief constable of Nottinghamshire Police which provides advice to retailers on Black Friday.

21st November 2016

Dear Retailer

Re: Black Friday – Retail / Police Coordination
I write in my capacity as the National Police Chief’s Council lead for Business Crime Reduction and Private Security Industry liaison.
As we approach Black Friday, and enter the run up to the Christmas period I would like to encourage a close working relationship between retailers, the business community, private security and policing.

Last year we saw that planning and partnership working can have a significant impact on preventing some of the issues we experienced on Black Friday 2014.

I urge you to continue this good work so that the violence and disorder of previous years is avoided.

Please ensure that your marketing and security teams communicate with each other, and that you have sufficient staff on duty during this busy period. Do not expose the public, your staff, security or the Police to avoidable risk.

Collectively we have obligations to ensure public safety, and to that end, could I ask that you work closely with your in-store staff, security teams and policing to make them aware of changes to opening times, to anticipate increased footfall and also queues outside stores prior to opening.

This may sound obvious, but previous incidents were unacceptable and simply could have been avoided with a better focus on customer safety rather than just high volume sales. It is encouraging that many of you have again decided to spread the Black Friday sales period across the week, rather than relying on just one day.

Please ensure that you communicate these changes in timings to your sales model to all store partners who can contribute to your customers’ safety.

Yours sincerely
Mrs Sue Fish OBE QPM Chief Constable