Licence for Rotherham shop revoked after illegal workers caught selling bootleg cigarettes and vapes

Rotherham Council’s licensing sub-committee revoked the licence for Aro Mini Market on Fitzwilliam Road after discovering ‘a significant supply of illegal tobacco and e-cigarette products at the premises’.

Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council’s (RMBC) trading standards officers obtained a warrant to visit the shop on February 21 2023, after test purchasers were sold counterfeit cigarettes.

They found illegal cigarettes and tobacco ‘concealed in a toolbox’ behind the counter, and illegal vapes on display.

They also found that the shop ‘had been left under the control of persons who had no legal right to work in the UK’.

Officers seized 3,569 sticks of illegal cigarettes, 43 packets of tobacco and two vapes.

Trading Standards and South Yorkshire Police officers visited the shop again on September 7, and found another member of staff who ‘should not be working in the UK’.

The officers searched the premises and seized 229 illicit vapes, 1,700 sticks of illegal cigarettes and 16 packets of rolling tobacco concealed in a black holdall and a shopping bag behind the counter.

In an email, the license holder of the shop said he had been outside of the UK due to a family emergency, and alleged that the people he left in control of his shop had used it for “personal interest and illegal things”.

A report by licensing officers states that the license holder “has demonstrated a complete lack of management control at the shop and has continued to breach the terms.. of the licence”.

The sub-committee revoked the licence on December 18 with immediate effect.