A customer fell ill after crunching his way through a box of Fox’s chocolate shortbread biscuits that were nearly a year out of date.

Tony Laws, 34, from Sutton, is still waiting for a refund having bought the product mistakenly from the Tesco store in Oldfields Road.

The concrete mixer truck driver also asked environmental health officers to investigate whether food hygiene laws were breached.

He said: “It is truly disgusting. I ate about four of the Millionaires biscuits and thought they seemed a bit soft but then it was a sunny day.

“When I eventually checked the box I found they were about 10 months out of date. I was sick that night but have been okay since.

“What really annoys me is that I spend hundreds of pounds at that store but, when I went in with the receipt, the manager just told me to contact head office.”

This week Tesco did apologise for the failure in its checking system and assured customers that no more biscuits past the sell-by date were being displayed for sale at the branch.

A spokesman said staff had been willing to help Mr Laws complete a complaint form and that the offending product would be sent for inspection.

He added: “A thorough check was done and customers can be confident that this was an isolated incident. "We have thorough procedures to prevent this from happening, but it is clear that something was amiss this time.”

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