A bowling alley in Bracknell Forest will be banned from selling alcohol for five days after being caught selling beer and cider to 16 and 17-year-olds.

Hollywood Bowl, based in The Point, will be unable to sell alcohol from midnight on Monday, November 14 to 11.59pm on Friday, November 18, after being caught selling alcohol to two different sets of underage volunteers sent in by Bracknell Forest Trading Standards and Thames Valley Police in two months.

The staff members who sold the alcohol have each been issued with fixed penalty notices by the police and the business will now not be able to serve any alcohol for this five day period later this month.

Under the Licensing Act 2003, police or trading standards can either prosecute a business or issue it with a closure notice of up to 14 days when there is evidence of ‘persistently selling alcohol to children’ – defined as two proven sales in a three month period. This closure prevents the sale of alcohol for the period of the notice but does not mean the business has to physically stop trading.

If the business sells alcohol during the ban there is a maximum punishment of six months in prison for the offender.

John Nash, Bracknell Forest Trading Standards team manager, said: “On two separate occasions, once in August and then again in September, Hollywood Bowl sold alcohol to our underage volunteers.

“Since the first failure we have been working with the business to improve their policies and procedures. This willingness to work with this authority has meant that the closure notice is not as long as it could have been.”

Councillor Nick Allen, chairman of Bracknell Forest licensing committee, said: “Our trading standards team carries out test purchases throughout the year to ensure that local businesses stay within the law. They also provide an indication of where we need to target further advice and training to help local businesses.

“Serving alcohol to children is a serious offence which carries significant penalties. If you're going to persistently sell alcohol to children we will use the Licensing Act to stop you.”

A spokesperson for Hollywood Bowl said: “We take our responsibilities in selling alcohol very seriously and we provide ongoing training to all of our team members in addition to working closely with councils and police forces across the country. We have operated the bowling centre in Bracknell for many years and this is the first incident of its kind which we are all very disappointed has occurred.

"As a consequence of these tests we have retrained all of our team members and put some additional procedures in place. We welcome the additional support that we have had from the Bracknell Forest Council in implementing these."