Wisconsin Alcohol Age Compliance Checks (AACC) Manual

This manual is intended to serve as a practical resource for planning, developing, conducting, and using Alcohol Age Compliance Checks (AACC) to reduce and prevent sales and service of alcohol beverages by licensed retailers to people who are underage. Its goal is to provide law enforcement, prevention coalitions, public health professionals, and municipal and county officials with guidance on conducting compliance check efforts to prevent underage alcohol consumption in their communities. Alcohol age compliance checks and tobacco compliance checks are governed by different laws, and this manual does not address tobacco regulation in any way.

How you use the manual will depend on your role in compliance checks. You may find some chapters that are more relevant to your needs than others. Reference the “Table of Contents” to move between sections or find tools in the Resource Toolbox. Compliance check protocols vary depending on local jurisdiction size, budgets, staff capacity, or law enforcement preferences. Specific protocols for checks are not outlined in statute so steps provided in this guide are best practices based on local experience.

Check out the appendices which have a variety of forms and other tools that you can use as templates for your local compliance checks. References are also included at the end of each chapter, with clickable links when available, to further assist you.

Don’t know where to start?

Whether you’re just starting out or are looking to energize your compliance checks effort, this guide provides the rationale for compliance checks and the basics for how to implement them in support of a prevention strategy. There are also comprehensive summaries available in this guide explaining how compliance checks are allowed under state statute, as well as an overview of the Wisconsin alcohol licensing process.

Need to build community buy-in?

Strong relationships are necessary to develop support, build community buy-in and address equity considerations when implementing compliance checks. Whether it is with municipal leadership, law enforcement, public health, or others connected to your prevention coalition, these relationships will tell the story of why the community needs to care about reducing alcohol access to youth. Take a few moments to review the comprehensive section that explains how each partner plays an important role from pre-check through a possible enforcement action.