SINGAPORE residents are paying US$173 (S$258) per household to make good on losses suffered by retailers primarily from shoplifting, according to a recent worldwide retail survey.

Altogether, local industry lost US$145 million between July last year and June this year because of retail thefts. When wastage from administrative error is included, the overall loss is US$173 million.

Of this amount, shoplifting accounted for over half at 52.4 per cent, while theft by employees made up 24.4 per cent. Supplier theft was also a small factor.

When retailers experience shrinkage, or loss or waste of goods, they pass it on to the consumer, said Ms Natalie Chan, the Asia-Pacific marketing director for Checkpoint Systems, which sponsored the latest Global Retail Theft Barometer survey.

'If the shrinkage is higher than the cost of operations and the business wants to survive, it will have to raise prices, so households have to pay what we call the 'dishonest tax',' she said.

Conducted by the British-based Centre for Retail Research, the survey interviewed over 920 retailers in 36 countries. Singapore ranked seventh for its low shrinkage rate, which measures the loss of goods as a percentage of sales, of 1.21 per cent.

Read the full story in Wednesday's edition of The Straits Times.