Removing and banning customers from licensed venues

Everyone is allowed to enter public places without permission and remain at a licensed venue, such as a pub or club. This means that unless clearly told to leave, people are generally allowed to enter these public-facing premises. This is called the Implied Common Law Licence.

If you run a licensed venue (for example, a bar, pub, or club), you have the right to:

• say who can come in
• ask someone to leave at any time.

You don’t need to give a reason – but you can’t do it in a way that’s unfair or discriminatory (for example, because of someone’s race, gender, disability, or religion).

Licensees can display a sign near the entrance to their venue stating:

'This venue has the right to refuse entry to any person, or to withdraw any person’s permission to remain on the premises at any time.'

If someone refuses to leave when asked, they are breaking the law under the Inclosed Lands Protection Act 1901 and could be taken to court and sued for damages or harm caused.      

Dress codes

Many venues have dress codes to ensure a minimum standard of clothing is worn. Such codes normally reflect the nature of the venue to set the tone and comfort of a venue and ensure their customer’s safety.  

Examples include banning certain styles or conditions of clothing like thongs, singlets or dirty or torn clothing. 

Discrimination should be considered and similar standards for men and women should be applied equally. 

Restrictions on gang-related clothing is a form of dress code that has successfully been adopted by venues and local liquor accords throughout NSW. A benefit of adopting the strategy through a liquor accord is that it is a united and consistent approach that deflects the decision away from individual licensees.

Venues in the Sydney CBD and Kings Cross precincts must not allow any person to enter or remain in the venue if the person is wearing or carrying any clothing, jewellery or accessories relating to certain outlaw motorcycle-related groups or similar organisations.

Generally, a licensed venue may refuse entry or remove a customer if they are:

• intoxicated
• violent, argumentative, or disorderly
• smoking in a smoke-free area
• using, or possess, any substance suspected of being an illicit drug
• whose presence causes the owner to be at risk of being fined or punished under the liquor laws.

A person who has been refused entry or ejected from a licensed venue must:

• leave the venue
• not remain in the vicinity of the venue (that is, not within 50m of the venue), without reasonable excuse
• not re-enter the vicinity of the venue for 6 hours, without reasonable excuse
• not attempt to re-enter or re-enter the venue for 24 hours.

Note: A person has a reasonable excuse for remaining in, or re-entering, the vicinity of the venue if that person is obtaining transport, resides in the vicinity, or if they fear for their safety.

When removing a person, staff should inform the customer that:

• they are required by law to move more than 50m away from the venue
• they must not re-enter the 50m vicinity within 6 hours
• they cannot return to the venue for at least 24 hours
• if they fail to comply, they will commit an offence, a maximum fine of $5500 applies.

Managers should record the incident in the venue’s incident register as soon as possible.

If a customer has been removed or refused entry and the reason for removing the customer continues, licensees can escalate to:

• bar the customer for an extended period
• bar the customer from multiple venues for an extended period of time
• seek a formal banning order against them.

It is advantageous to be a member of your local liquor accord.

Note: A liquor accord is a group of local businesses, community members, police, and government working together to solve problems related to alcohol, like bad behaviour and violence, in their area.

The benefit of developing strategies through a local liquor accord is that it sets a consistent approach for all venues in the accord to follow. This helps customers understand the expectations from all venues in an area, making it easier for them to comply.

Barring a patron

In order for licensees to influence patron behaviour they need to:

• establish clear guidelines for acceptable and unacceptable behaviour
• determine the consequences of unacceptable behaviour, that is, barring terms
• communicate these clearly to customers
• apply them resolutely and consistently.

The benefits of a barring strategy are:

• it sends a strong message to potentially troublesome customers
• it defines and reinforces acceptable standards of behaviour in local venues
• patrons feel safer so are likely to spend more time at your venue
• less disruption for staff
• a safer work environment
• a more relaxing and enjoyable atmosphere.

Where possible, standard barring policy should be agreed upon and adopted by all members of your local liquor accord.

Multi venue barring

Under a standard multi-venue barring system, licensees work in partnership through a local liquor accord and agree on a system where troublesome patrons are barred from all venues in an area.

If the accord decides to bar a person, then they are barred from all accord venues for the specified period. Essentially this means that each licensee agrees to exercise their common law right to refuse entry for the exclusion period.

In most cases, multi-venue barring is not imposed for one incident, unless serious, but is usually the culmination of a series of incidents over a period of time. These will usually be accompanied by repeated warnings from individual licensees.

Multi-venue strategy

Accords should establish a clear set of procedures for patron barring, and how they will be determined. Key questions to consider include:

• When are patrons barred: Develop a list of behaviours that may lead to a multi-venue barring and agree upon the minimum barring period that relates to each offence. This can also be used by licensees as a guide for individual venue barring and to ensure consistency across the accord.
• The list should detail:
  • specific types of behaviour that will result in a person being barred
  • the barring period for each offence
  • any increased periods for multiple or repeat offences.

Setting an agreed list of behaviours that have been checked by legal advisors helps to ensure anti- discrimination laws will not be breached.

• Determining whether to bar a person: Accords will need to establish who decides whether to bar a person. This could include:
  • the accord executive
  • a specially formed disciplinary panel
  • the full membership of the accord - licensees only.
• Operating the multi-venue barring strategy: Clear procedures should be developed and include:
  • who can make the application?
  • what information is required?
  • when will it be considered – next accord meeting, special meeting of the panel or considered remotely by each panel member?
  • is there a review or appeal option in place?

The strategy should be adopted as a term of the accord. The policy is more likely to be effective if it has full support from all local venues. Take time to meet and consider feedback from all members.

This is a good time for a membership drive as licensees who are not currently liquor accord members may want to join the accord to participate in multi-venue barring.

• Notifying a barred person: They need a formal notification so they can understand what the barring involves. This could be done through:
  • Written information
  • Meeting with the local licensing officer
  • Attendance at a liquor accord meeting

It’s useful to have a central person coordinate the barring notifications. Decide who will be responsible for notifying the customer about the terms of the barring.

• Sharing information: All staff at participating venues need to be told when a customer is barred. A system should be in place to let staff know who the barred customer is and when the barring period is complete.

It’s important to consider how personal information is used and secured. For example: details of a barred person should not be able to be seen by other customers in the venue.

All staff handling personal information should be privacy trained. Depending upon whether a venue is bound by the Privacy Act 1988, additional requirements or limitations on the sharing of information may also apply. If using an ID scanning system special considerations need to be in place.

• Staff training: Staff will need to know:
  • the process for barring a customer
  • how to deal with a barred customer entering the venue
  • how to remember when a barring notification is complete and the customer is welcome to enter again.
• Removal of barring: A person may be barred until the end of the agreed term, or earlier than that if agreed to and voted on by all participating venues.
  The inclusion of a condition, such as attendance at anger management counselling, could be considered before removal of the barring.
• Seek legal advice: Once the accord has agreed on a draft policy, it is important to seek legal advice before finalising the document.
  It is particularly important to check that your policy meets privacy and anti-discrimination laws.
  Check that the penalties and procedures for implementing any barring are legally enforceable before putting them in action as fines could apply.
• Publicise it: It’s only fair to give customers advance notice that the multi-venue barring strategy is being put in place. Consider the following promotion opportunities:
  • In-venue signage
  • local media – see the media release template
  • Promote in community centres – such as, police stations, library's
  • with the displayed conditions of entry or other signage at the door
  • liquor accord, venue websites, social media channels.

Promoting through local community centres can help improve understanding and boost support from all sectors of the community. It may even help promote your venues as a safe, friendly place to be.

• Evaluate: It is important to initially review the strategies regularly. Once the program is established you can move to longer term reviews like annual evaluations.
  • Evaluation questions to consider:
    • effectiveness of each penalty time – is it too short, too long?
    • offences that should be added or removed
    • communication processes between participating venues
    • staff training – do all staff understand the process?
    • is it working – are barred customers finding loopholes?
    • is the response from the general community positive?
    • police data – does the data show the strategy is effective?
    • is the number of customers requiring barring decreasing?

Banning orders are appropriate when:

• a person repeatedly ignores a barring period imposed under common law
• there is no liquor accord in place to implement a multi-venue barring strategy
• venues can't agree about barring a patron
• the patron has been disruptive to the point of justifying formal regulatory action.

Banning periods

Under the Liquor Act 2007, the Independent Liquor & Gaming Authority (ILGA) can ban a patron for up to 6 months from multiple licensed venues if that patron has been repeatedly intoxicated, violent, quarrelsome or disorderly on or in the immediate vicinity of licensed premises.

Applying for a banning order

An application for a banning order can be made to ILGA by filing out the following forms:

The Secretary of the NSW Department of Creative Industries, Tourism, Hospitality and Sport and the Commissioner of Police:

• File

  AM0333 Banning order application by Commissioner of Police or Secretary (PDF 187.26KB)

A licensee who is party to a local liquor accord:

• File

  AM0343 Banning order application licensee (PDF 741.2KB)

A person subject to a banning order must not enter, attempt to enter or remain on the relevant licensed premises. A maximum penalty of $5500 applies.

Tips for complying with the Privacy Act:

• Tell people why you are collecting their information.
• Use information only for its original purpose, unless you have consent or another law allows it.
• Share information only for its original purpose, unless you have consent or another law allows it.
• Let people see their information if they ask and keep it secure, accurate, and up to date.
• Secure the information and destroy or de-identify it when no longer needed.

Venues are using ID scanners to improve security and deter bad behavior. Linking these scanners between venues helps enforce a multi-venue barring policy.

Each licensee should get legal advice to ensure they follow privacy laws. For example, under APP 3, consent is needed to collect sensitive information, like organ donor details on a driver's license.

Follow the compliance tips when using ID scanners 

This information is summarised from: Information Sheet (Private Sector) 30 – ID scanning in pubs and clubs, available from oaic.gov.au