SANTA Claus has been turned away from Home Bargains because of a “loophole” in the store’s rules.
Charity volunteers were left shocked after Grinch bosses at the Kent store waved them away.
The Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) is a charity registered in England and Wales that carries out heroic rescues, having saved almost a thousand lives since its founding.
RNLI‘s Santa was meant to visit the branch in Whitfield, Dover to collect donations and hand out goodie bags to children.
But Home Bargain’s bosses found a loophole.
Since the visit wasn’t booked via the variety store’s head office, Santa and his pals were dismissed.
This is despite the visit being organised with the store in spring, RNLI says.
Shoppers have slammed the ordeal as “unbelievable” and “awful”, while one councillor describing the bosses’ actions as “shocking”.
The fundraiser organiser shared their disappointment with locals on Facebook.
He said: “If you were expecting to see the RNLI free Santa at Home Bargains Dover today and tomorrow, sadly he will not be there, as the store manager arranged this with us in the spring and their area manager over ruled him and told us to leave.
“Luckily Morrisons Dover do support our free Santa and have very Kindly allowed him to be in there store tomorrow instead, so do pop to Morrisons see Santa get goody bags and sweets all for free.”
All in all, RNLI their time with Morrisons and Tesco‘s turned out to be “a great day out for many local supporters”.
Kent County Council’s Dover West representative Councillor David Beaney told KentOnline: “It’s shocking Home Bargains wouldn’t use common sense.
“The fundraisers do so much for Dover and they shouldn’t have been stopped.”
District councillor Pamela Brivio described it as a “strange decision”
She added: “There is plenty of room at Home Bargains. There have been a lot of different organisations during the year.”
Reacting to the RNLI’s post, one person said: “Pretty bad of home bargains, very bad attitude for a very worthy charity.”
While a second said: “Last time I use home bargains Dover.”
And a third said: “That’s awful.”
A Home Bargains spokesperson confirmed to The Sun: “At Home Bargains we would be delighted to welcome Santa.
“However on this occasion only a man and a collection table were on site, there was no Santa sighted on this occasion and there was no mention of Santa made.
“Our Area Manager advised we need to have authorisation from head office for charity collections which the gentleman didn’t have.
“The store has had no contact with RNLI requesting a collection since the summer.
“We would welcome any further approach from RNLI to collect at our site through our head office.”
Santa and his pals managed to raise £500 across Dover supermarkets during their two day stint.
With under 10,000 volunteers in the UK and Ireland, 95% of its funds go on maintaining and running the service.
Since its founding in 1855, Dover lifeboats have launched on service 2,694 times and saved 984 lives.
Last year they launched 100 times, aided 1,364 people and saved five lives.
