Clutching a pack of coloured pencils as she went up to a till, 11-year- old Charlotte Howard expected to be on her way with her purchase moments later.

But the schoolgirl left empty handed when she was told she could not buy the pack because it contained a pencil sharpener.

It was only when her mother Alison, went inside to find out what had happened that it became clear the 99p Store cashier was slavishly following company policy on preventing the sale of ‘dangerous objects’, such as knives and other sharp objects, to under-18s.

Mystified: 11-year-old Charlotte Howard with pencils bought from another shop

Extraordinarily, Mrs Howard was also told she could not leave with the set of 30 pencils  -  because she might hand them to her daughter. The bizarre incident happened when Charlotte was out near her home in Sudbury, Suffolk, buying items for a school project.

Her mother, a 44-year-old nurse, said: ‘Charlotte told me that the woman on the till would not let her have the 99p pack of pencils.

‘I went in to see what the problem was and the cashier told me, “I can’t sell them to her as she is a child and there is a dangerous object in the pack”.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1319384/Girl-11-refused-sale-pencil-sharpener-classed-dangerous-object.html#ixzz120iyTbxE