A dog groomer from Bledlow has been given six months to pay back some of the £44,000 she stole from the country store where she worked.

Rebecca Austin had boasted on Facebook about going to see Ed Sheeran live in concert; taking in the show Bat Out of Hell at London’s Dominion Theatre; swigging glasses of fizz on a day at the Royal Ascot races and enjoying foreign holidays in San Diego, Nice and Denia, Spain.

The mother-of-two was flush with cash after she deleted records of transactions at Widmer Feeds over the course of three years, meaning her deception went undetected by the team, a court heard.

She has now been given the task by a judge of raising funds to pay them back by grooming dogs through her business, Scruffi Pups, during the pandemic and claiming equity in her stable-conversion home.

The team at Widmer Feeds, a family-run business based in the Chiltern Hills which has been going for over 30 years, said that Austin, 52, even used to babysit for their children while stealing their money.

Recorder John Caudle, sentencing Austin at the Amersham Law Courts, told her: “You knew the system, you knew you were trusted and you knew that if it was small amounts you were not very likely to get caught if they had not stumbled across it I daresay you would still be doing it now.

“You were a trusted, integral part of the team. They were shocked that somebody they saw as a friend could be, as they described it, so deceptive and conniving for such a long period of time.

“Very many people would put you straight into prison now, as you fully understand.”

Known as ‘Beki’, office administrator Austin had started stealing from her employers in March 2016 when she deleted a transaction from the IT system and pocketed the funds, the court heard.

Prosecutors told how, over the next three years she deleted 154 separate transactions until, by February 2019, she had taken £43,906. Austin physically took the cash. Her job was to reconcile the cash against the sales and instead she deleted transactions on the victims’ till system and took the cash relating to them so it was like that sale had never happened.

Sam Willis, prosecuting, said: “On February 20 2019, one of the family members involved in running Widmer Feeds discovered 10 transactions had been deleted using the defendant’s user account.

“The defendant attended an investigation meeting and accepted deleting the transactions and taking the money.

“The defendant was cautioned and she answered no comment to all questions asked and she was then charged.”

Austin, who had no previous convictions, had initially denied one charge of theft by an employee but had later changed her plea to admit the offence.

Alice Paterson, who appeared in court, read out an emotional victim personal statement where she revealed how Widmer Feeds, which specialises in brands of horse feed but also sold poultry supplies and pets, had almost gone bust as a result of the thefts.

Ms Paterson said: “Beki was more than a family member, she was a trusted and integral member of our team.

“She looked after our baby when I came back from maternity leave. She cuddled him with the hand she was stealing from us with and that made me really, personally angry.”

A lawyer representing Austin said her client had a depressive disorder but was willing to try and pay the money she had stolen back, partially by claiming a £28,000 equity from her home in North Mill Road, Bledlow.

However, the court heard Austin was facing an enforcement order on her home for turning it from an agricultural barn into a residential home without planning permission, so might not be able to claim the equity.

Olive Lycourgou, defending, said: “When she started taking money from the company, it just became this habit that she could not control at the time and in her mind she did not appreciate how much money had been stolen.

“She wanted to repay the money but at that time she could not find a way of doing that.

“At the moment Ms Austin is working as a dog groomer and she is hopefully to set up her business on April 12 once the restrictions are lifted and she is hoping that once her business gets off the ground she will be able to pay more money.”

Austin was offering to pay £750 up front, followed by £250 in the next week and a further £400 on a monthly basis until the money was repaid, her lawyer said.

Mr Caudle said he would not sentence Austin at the hearing on Friday, but would defer her sentence so she could try and pay some money back.

The judge said: “I think you are a good candidate for rehabilitation but if I lock you up now, you will not be in a position to repay the money you have stolen.

“I take into account that you are working and it seems that your business is doing quite well and you are making money in spite of the pandemic. I suppose people need their dogs groomed whether there is a pandemic or not.

“I am going to defer sentence for a period of six months. In that time, I want you to demonstrate that you mean what you said by repaying as much as you can.”

Austin, who walked free from court, has been contacted for comment over the claims that she had used the stolen money for a foreign holiday and to fund a lavish lifestyle.

In a statement outside court, the team from family-owned Widmer Feeds said: “We as a family are extremely saddened and disappointed with the lack of sentencing today.

“The guidelines for the act of theft she committed state a minimum custodial sentence of three years and we are at a loss as to why this was not adhered to.

“Beki is free to walk away after stealing £43,906 from us and find her next victim, whether that be a vulnerable neighbour, an unsuspecting client at her dog groomer’s Scruffi Pups or a local group or sporting activity that she is involved in.

“In the two years since the theft was uncovered Beki has not repaid a penny despite her claims she would. We certainly do not feel that justice has been done.”