“Serious concerns” about a convenience store have been raised by police after they saw Covid rules not being enforced and staff were not able to use the CCTV system.

Neither staff at the Today’s (Local) shop in Princes Risborough or customers were seen wearing any face coverings when police visited the store back in June, even though they were required to by Covid-19 rules.

Police turned their attention to the Woodfield Road store when it was revealed the owners had not paid the council their annual subscription for a premises licence - meaning their licence was suspended and the sale of alcohol had become illegal until they paid it.

Neighbourhood police officers visited the shop in the middle of Euro 2020 to see if alcohol was being sold illegally and saw booze was still on the shelves with no notice to say that they could not sell it.

Although police did not actually see anyone buying alcohol during their visit, they said it was “indicated” that booze sales were still happening.

It was during one of these visits that they noticed neither staff or three out of five customers were wearing a face covering and that other Covid-19 legislation was not being followed.

Even while police were present in the shop, the staff member failed to tell customers to put on a mask while inside the store and they also refused to answer questions about who they were when asked by officers.

The subscription for the premises licence was eventually paid, making alcohol sales legal again, but Thames Valley Police’s licensing officer Andy Dean decided to visit the store with Brian Whittall, a licensing officer from Buckinghamshire Council, to see for themselves what was going on.

When they visited on July 9, Mr Dean said the staff member on duty was “very difficult to understand” because English was seemingly not his first language and became “confused” when challenged.

He was also unable to provide excerpts from the shop CCTV and said he had not been trained to use it – a breach of the shop’s licence conditions.

He was also “totally unaware” who Shanthakumar Kanaganayagam – the High Wycombe man named on the licence – was, and gave the name of Rajaratnam Sasikaran as the person who hired him.

There were also alcoholic beverages that were not tagged with the shop name, another requirement of the licence.

Later that day, police received an application to transfer the licence from Mr Kanaganayagam to Mr Sasikaran – but Mr Dean said he was “shocked” to see in the documents that Mr Sasikaran had apparently been running the shop since March.

In a report to Buckinghamshire Council, who will consider the request to transfer the licence to Mr Sasikaran at a special hearing on Thursday morning, Mr Dean said: “Add to this the issues surrounding the Covid-19 aspects mentioned, the breach of conditions that were discovered on our visit (no shop tags, staff not able to use CCTV, CCTV not available on request) and the lack of concern by Mr Sasikaran that any issues that legally arose during this time would be directed to Mr Shanthakumar.

“All the above brings a concern that this applicant hasn’t taken his responsibilities under the Licensing Act seriously. It also seems that he hasn’t ensured his staff are properly trained to be selling alcoholic products. What other legislation is he not complying with?

“Thames Valley Police have serious concerns about this applicant and his attitude towards the law.”

The request to transfer the premises licence will be discussed by the licensing sub-committee at Buckinghamshire Council on August 12.