Asda fined £500k for selling out-of-date food
16th February 2026
Asda has been fined £500,000 for repeatedly displaying out-of-date food for sale at its store in Barnsley back in 2024.
The retailer pleaded guilty to five offences under the Food Safety Act at Barnsley Magistrates Court and was ordered to pay £507,767.77 in fines and costs.
During a visit in March 2024, the trading standards team at the Barnsley Metropolitan Borough Council found 32 out-of-date food items for sale, spanning eleven different chilled products and totalling 581 days past their use-by date.
In June 2024, the officers found that the store was continuing to sell food items past their use-by date, failing to respond to warnings from inspections earlier in the year.
Officers found three non-compliant chilled food products for sale during this follow-up visit, consisting of nine individual items which were collectively 91 days past their use-by date.
All out-of-date food products found during these visits were removed from sale and seized by the trading standards team.
“While improvements have been made since these offences, including a new checking system, retraining and increased auditing in the store, the sizeable £100,000 fine per offence sends a clear message that non-compliance never pays,” a spokesperson for the Barnsley Metropolitan Borough Council said.
Councillor Wendy Cain, cabinet spokesperson for public health and communities, added: “We expect businesses of all sizes to only sell safe food, and this significant result sends a clear message that we will always put people’s health and safety first, taking action where businesses fail to comply with legislation or respond to warnings.”
A spokesperson for Asda said: “We are disappointed that some out-of-date products were found on sale at our Barnsley store in 2024. This fell short of the standards our customers rightly expect and that we hold ourselves to.
“In the time since these products were found, we have introduced a new date code checking process in every Asda store to ensure the freshest products are always available for customers to buy.”
The retailer confirmed that the updated process, introduced in November 2024, involves daily manual checks on all short-life products and twice-weekly checks on every long-life product.
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