TWO Shropshire businesses have been caught breaking the law on vape sales by magistrates in Telford.

Positive Business Communications Ltd trading as Vapafone in Castle Street, Shrewsbury, was convicted of selling a vape to a minor by magistrates on July 31 and ordered to pay a total of £5,035.10 in fines and costs.

Shropshire Council’s Trading Standards team brought the case after a test purchase operation in June 2023 and when a 17-year-old volunteer was able to buy a Elfbar vape without being challenged as to their age.

A second county business has been rapped over the sale of oversized nicotine-containing vapes.

A total of 3,668 oversized vapes were seized from the Thresher store in Shrewsbury, the Oswestry Convenience Store in Oswestry and the Londis store in Worthen.

Owner Showkumar Jeyaratnam admitted five charges of selling oversized vapes at the hearing on August 5.

The business had been caught selling disposable vapes with at least five times the permitted capacity for nicotine in 2022 and 2023, later restricting sales to the evenings, believing that Trading Standards only undertook visits during office hours. A further 209 of these illicit vapes were seized in February 2024.

The business was ordered to pay fines and costs of £16,621 while Jeyaratnam was ordered to pay fines and costs of £,5021.