Heathrow security staff confiscated my 100ml gift bottles of rare whisky worth £70 each for a bizarre reason – but left my cheap unlabelled shampoo untouched… Am I the only one who’s suspicious?

Heathrow security staff have reignited a ‘daylight robbery’ row after confiscating a tourist’s rare, expensive whisky – but leaving her cheap shampoo alone. 

MailOnline previously revealed how holidaymakers slammed Heathrow after staff confiscated a woman’s makeup because they claimed her lipstick was a liquid – despite the airport’s own policy saying the opposite.

Now an American tourist’s harrowing experience at the hands of ‘abusive’ Heathrow staff has rekindled criticism of security’s behaviour – and the airport has launched an investigation.

Holidaymaker Susan, from St Louis, Missouri, told MailOnline she was in Edinburgh for a week, where she bought a 100ml bottle of Bunnahabhain Moine and another 100ml bottle of six-year-old Ledaig – whiskies that in regular-sized bottles are worth £70 and £72 respectively.

The bottles had already passed through security at Edinburgh Airport, but when she arrived in Heathrow for her connecting flight, security staff confiscated them.

Susan believes the staff wanted the whiskies for themselves and suggested Heathrow’s approach was damaging UK tourism. She said she would never return to Britain because of her poor treatment.

Both the Tourism Minister Sir Chris Bryant and the Department for Transport refused to comment about the matter, claiming the airport was better positioned to do so. Heathrow would not say if it would apologise.

Susan told MailOnline: ‘It made me very suspicious, especially with me having an unmarked bottle of shampoo that they didn’t care about at all.

‘I am meticulous in my planning. I research everything. I only travel with hand luggage and I know how strict Heathrow is.

‘The girl who started doing my screening was quite inconsiderate of my things. There was stuff scattered all over my bag. It was not a nice feeling.

‘She pulled the bottles out and carried them off to a machine, then a lady said they couldn’t be sure they were 100ml bottles.

‘I kind of looked at her stupefied. I was like, ”What do you mean?” She said, ”We can’t be sure these are 100ml.” And I said, ”Well, they’re labeled 100ml.”

‘I didn’t buy it off a guy from the side of the road I bought it in a shopping mall. 

‘I looked at her like I don’t know what that means and she said, ”Well you could say it was any size.” 

‘I also travel with refillable toiletry bottles and one of them is shampoo and it has zero labelling – it doesn’t say it’s 100ml but they just left that laying there. 

‘They only really had a problem with these whisky bottles they really needed to keep.

‘It was early in the morning. I didn’t really know how to react to it and they have all of these signs up that say we have a zero tolerance policy for abuse of our staff. 

‘I didn’t want them to possibly detain me or make me miss my flight. 

‘The woman I was talking to wasn’t apologetic. She seemed amused by it.

‘She told me the whisky would be destroyed and I said, ”What assurance do I have that they will actually be destroyed,” and she got incredibly angry, really quickly.

‘She walked off with my bottles in her hands and that was the last I saw of them.

‘I don’t know that I believe that they did [destroy the whisky]. I hope that nobody took them for their personal use but I’m suspicious that it might be what happened. 

‘One of the reasons I became so upset is because I had followed every rule and this was something that I was so excited that I had been able to do for my friend.

‘I feel like something was done to me that was inappropriate.

‘The staff were very rude throughout the entire encounter and especially contrasted with the security staff at the Edinburgh airport, who were lovely and very polite and again had cleared all of these things the night before. 

‘[Heathrow staff are] very intimidating and it’s a little bit of a bullying attitude, where they immediately get very defensive at anybody who speaks back to them at all.

‘I said I had a lovely time in Scotland, but the idea of going back through Heathrow fills me with dread.

‘It left quite a negative mark on my holiday and cast quite a pall over my trip to the UK. 

‘I don’t know what to expect and that’s very nerve-wracking.

‘I bought something in good faith from a UK merchant that was advertised at a certain size and the Heathrow security took it off of me. 

‘What does that say about tourists coming through to buy other things?

‘Does that mean you shouldn’t purchase anything in the UK or you should be cautious about spending money with local merchants?’

Although Heathrow is supposed to give passengers it confiscates luggage from a reference number for its Mail and Fly service, which sends passengers’ property on to them securely, Susan did not receive one. 

Heathrow initially indicated to MailOnline that this was because alcohol was not allowed to be sent as part of the Mail and Fly process.

However, this is not true, according to the airport’s own website. After this was pointed out, it claimed that alcohol was not allowed if a passenger was passing through on a connecting flight, as Susan was. However, Heathrow’s website makes no mention of such a rule. 

Heathrow would not say whether it would apologise to Susan. 

A spokeswoman for the airport told MailOnline: ‘On the rare occasion security colleagues are unable to ascertain whether items presented are compliant with Department for Transport regulation, passengers are offered the option to check their items into the hold. 

‘Any voluntarily abandoned liquids are safely and securely disposed of as a precaution.’

A Department for Transport spokeswoman refused to comment about Susan’s experience and said: ‘This is an operational matter for Heathrow Airport.’ 

MailOnline has contacted the Whisky Shop for comment.

Holidaymakers previously called out Heathrow in 2023 after staff confiscated a woman’s makeup because they claimed her lipstick was a liquid.

Shadia Black, from Switzerland, spent two days in London with just hand luggage and was going through Heathrow Terminal Two’s security when she was stopped by staff.

The law student and fashion model said staff initially wanted to confiscate her travel-sized £250 Estée Lauder perfume and face wash gel before they resigned to taking three of her unused lipsticks worth around £90.

Shadia told MailOnline the experience left her ‘enraged’, especially as Heathrow’s website said solid lipsticks were not considered liquids.

She said: ‘They took my bag aside and looked through everything and took a perfume and a face wash gel.

‘They started putting all my lipsticks in [a clear] bag. They said it was liquid.

‘It’s a misuse of position. They didn’t throw it away. They just put it aside.

‘The rules are the rules. I didn’t like the way staff were handling things.

‘I was enraged.’

Shadia said she left the three lipsticks with security because she didn’t want to miss her flight.

She said she wanted ‘people in power to be kept in check. I am fuming. I’ve never been so mad before’.

She claimed: ‘The airport staff are brutally robbing people.

‘They tell you you have too many liquids on your bag and then they take it and put it aside but not in the bin.’

Taking to TikTok, she told her 18,000 followers about her exchange with a female Heathrow security officer.

Shadia said: ‘She was like, ”It has to fit in this clear bag,” and then she gave me this little clear bag.

‘I told her, ”This is lipstick, not liquid”. But she was like, ”Our policy says it is liquid”.

‘Apparently I was the person with the attitude.

‘They were like, ”We don’t care what you came with but when you’re leaving you have to follow the policy.”

‘I was like, ”lipstick is not a liquid,” but she was like, ”It is, it’s on our website. I’m the manager and I say it is.”

‘I was so mad I didn’t think, but now, I would have destroyed them so they can’t take them.

‘I don’t even know what to do. This is so crazy and cruel. 

‘Imagine if they keep taking the stuff out that they want to keep for themselves.

‘They looked like they want to keep these things for themselves. This is a robbery.’

Heathrow’s website says in its FAQ about security and baggage that solid lipstick is not considered a liquid.

Other passengers were equally angry after hearing of Shadia’s experience – with many demanding to know what happens to liquids after security confiscates them.

One said: ‘I used to work in Heathrow. The staff intentionally say [an] item is liquid, over 100ml, [you’re] not allowed to take it. They take it home.’

Another said: ‘It’s disgusting. Daylight robbery. How can they do this?’

When MailOnline approached Heathrow about this incident and what happens to confiscated property, an airport spokesman initially claimed that ‘nothing which is confiscated is kept or reused’.

He said: ‘There’s no other use that we can vouch for. All of our security colleagues are trained.’

The spokesman added: ‘Our security colleagues are trained to apply the standards set down by the DfT for all UK airports on what items can and can’t be taken airside. Any items that are confiscated are safely disposed of.’

However, Heathrow told Shadia the airport’s Mail and Fly service may be holding her lipsticks rather than destroying them.

The Mail and Fly service is supposed to help reunite passengers with property confiscated by security.

When MailOnline spoke to the service, it admitted that security did not throw away things that were confiscated but instead kept them and gave them to Mail and Fly.

The service said it holds them for three months and if no one comes forward to claim them, it will donate the property to charity.

Heathrow did not clarify which charity.

Has security taken your belongings? Email chris.matthews@mailonline.co.uk