Self-service Checkouts C/D

And I've never seen one break, freeze up, shower anyone with receipts, etc.

i.e. never again.

I don't mind the new RFID machines at the library - when they work - but they seem to give the staff a lot of hassle. Perhaps the labour-intensiveness of the first few months will pay off in the long run.

1) Break

2) Require some basic english comprehension skills to read the instructions and,

2b) Most people can't figure out how to work the damn things.

I'm curious, how much do you buy at the store? When I'm going for an actual weekly or bi-weekly grocery run I have a full cart that's usually around $100. Smaller just-need-a-few-things runs is when I have one of the hand carriers and use the self-checkout.

The self-service checkouts at my nearby supermarket have the volume up at 11, and it delights me to no end to have the computer shout PLEASE REMOVE ITEM FROM BAGGING AREA at me endlessly (in that prim helpful authoritarian female voice), when I've removed the damn item from the damn bagging area, damn it. (Stupid weight system.) Or, better yet, APPROVAL NEEDED, when the damn thing doesn't trust that I in fact did remove the damn item from the damn bagging area, and I have to wave down the nearest clerk, who's usually stuck bagging someone's groceries.

The stupid Price Chopper across the street from me has a self-service checkout system from hell, because you have to scan the items, bag the items, scan your credit card, and then wait for some clerk to watch you sign your credit card receipt. GET ONE LIGHT PEN SYSTEM. (Also, stock some food.)

One time, a woman forgot to scan her Frequent Shopper Card before scanning all her items, and then did it after the fact - it took the computer at least 2 minutes to run down all her savings, and shout them out so folks down in the deli area on the other side of the store can hear what's going on. FIFTY. CENTS. SAVINGS. FIFTY. CENTS. SAVINGS. FIFTY. CENTS. SAVINGS. TWENTY CENTS SAVINGS. TWENTY. CENTS. SAVINGS. TWENTY. CENTS. SAVINGS.

Aha, I reckon this must be an American thing. When you check out in a British supermarket sometimes you get asked in a condescending voice if you'd like help with packing and of course Brits don't want to be a bother so they say "no" unless they have crippling arthritis in both hands.

Just come out over here. We've also just got that really cool light that comes on when you go near the house.

Also, in Morissons it seems the staff aren't allowed to put the next customer's items through until you've picked up all your bags of shopping which is a right arse because half the time I'm juggling bags and receipts and money while the next customer sighs and looks at their watch.

The staff in our local Somerfield/Morrisons/Safeway (it's been all three in the last couple of months) have this policy totally. I thought it was just something inherent in that one store, along with only using one hand for picking up groceries out of the basket, scanning them and depositing them over the other side of the checkout (this evidently prohibits them from bagging goods and passing receipts to you rather than dumping them in the middle of the shopping you are struggling to get into stupidly unopenable bags whilst counting out change and stuff).

-- jill schoelen is the queen of my dreams! (mandeewrigh...), May 9th, 2005 12:50 PM. (later)

I've finally learned that the US has a very distorted view of what constitutes "customer service". I worked as a cashier in a grocery store for about two years, and we were required to ask customers if they needed help taking their bags to their cars. Most of the time, the elderly women with six bags of cat food said, "No, no, I'm fine," and the people who insisted I carry their bags to their Audis were women in their early thirties who had, like, one plastic bag with a box of tampons and a jar of olives in it. And I had to carry the bags to their cars while they walked ahead of me talking on their phones. And I didn't get tips.
People who work in grocery stores are probably anxious about customers bagging their own groceries because they're afraid the customers are going to suddenly freak out about "lack of service" and spit on them, like a customer once did to me.

this seems to broadly be the policy in most supermarkets. it also happens to be the most misguided one that supermarkets emply.nothing worse than waiting for someone to put all receipts away when your just trying to buy a paper or something. I suppose it is meant to be a courtesy, associated with "higher end" supermarkets (eg Nisa/Aldi/Netto type places dont seem to bother) but it more often than not causes resentment in the customers and uncertainty for the cashiers.

self service.....well its ingenious to say the least, not only cutting labour costs (in theory), speeding up transactions (in theory), but evn worse, making shopping "fun" and intervactive for kids, and in the process, training a whole generation to become checkout workers (it always seems to be the kids that persuade parents to use them)

I don't really expect people to pretend like they'd rather be at work than out having fun. That doesn't mean they don't need a job to pay the bills though! You know?

U-Scan is almost at every major supermarket location.. Fred Meyer and at some QFC's at least.

I don't remember greater L.A. having any when I was there.. maybe they've appeared since? I figured if ANY city needed them, it's L.A.

As for the humans vs. machines thing: all of them have both options. For produce and mass groceries, it's always faster to just go to a real person... for just one of two things in your hand, U-Scan all the way. I mean, it SUCKS to wait in line with people buying an entire house worth of economy-pack stuff, and with an "express" line that's three times as long. I don't think anybody is losing in this setup.

When my parents go to the BX (base exchange) at the nearby AFB, they tip the baggers, because that's all they work for, no wage or salary otherwise. At least, that's what Mom tells me.

Self-service is great. Retards who can't work the machines suck. People who bring up the whole cartload of groceries (even though the self-service checkout says 15 items or less) also suck. But being able to go in and buy my five or six things without dealing with the kids on the register is wonderful.

These things are also the bomb in Home Depot (which has the shittiest customer-to-open register ratio this side of the DMV).

When I worked at a grocery store, they made us push paper over plastic bags. I got in trouble for continuing to politely ask 'paper or plastic' rather than being a dick to the customer so that Safeway/Tom Thumb could save .000001 cents per order. I never quite understood how they could constantly push 'customer service' and then turn around and order us to be jerks (also never understood how my fellow lackeys didn't see the problem).

My rule at the supermarket is when you are the person with huge overloaded cart (as I always am), you let the person with the mothers day card and kit kat bars ahead of you. I did this to three people in a row yesterday! oh and always smile and say thank you to the cashier and bagger. I have not heard of tipping baggers but I would if they brought bags out to my car, I've just never exercised that option.

If I wanted a machine to scream at me, I'd go find a Berzerk console to stick a quarter in.

Even though the machines ask me to call for assistance when I scan beer it doesn't keep me from continuing my order w/out waiting for said assistance.

this was a few more x-posts. I guess I just feel really strongly about this stuff. Regardless of whether a checker/bagger is making more than minimum wage, chances are it's not MUCH more. And most people tip bartenders, so I'd imagine they end up bringing home significantly more than most grocery baggers. I guess it's just, to me, like...you can't really serve yourself at a bar. But you could easily bag your own groceries, and if you'd prefer to have someone else do it for you, you should give that person a tip.

But if you are dealing with the public as part of your job, manners and the ability to, you know, deal with the public, are surely part of your remit, no?

(xpost, what kirsten said about smiling and saying thank you is OTM, but it cuts both ways)

Unless you're buying Crisco, rope, condoms, and a side of cow tongue.

(xxxpost - but yes kirsten, that's the kind of exception I mean)

(massive xposts)

xpost

Self-service is much faster for me than regular express checkout. I (sadly) still remember all the produce codes without having to look them up, bag quicker and generally know not to bag fresh fruit and raw meat together (which I've had happen several times lately).

Holy shit, people are awful! What part of the country is this? Sometimes I am grateful for growing up in a small town where hardly anybody had any attitude.

I wasn't talking about actually being rude because of the conditions you work in, more just obviously not being too happy to be there. I don't think people should have to pretend the conditions they're working in aren't shitty just to please customers. They should ideally be polite, yeah, but if some 17 year old kid behind a supermarket checkout's acting surly I'm not going to be much fussed.

Ridiculous OTT asshole customers are rare and welcome entertainment round my way.

Surely you're not implying that prices are dropping (i.e. "staying in my pocket") because of these infernal machines being installed?

-- daria g (daria_gra...), May 9th, 2005 5:53 PM. (later)

This is in friendly ol' blue collar Milwaukee!

However, I am hideously old-fashioned and probably totally wrong.

To un-de-rail the thread, I have never seen a self-service checkout in this country.

(xpost)

I am a curmudgeon and I should go to my bed and dream of kittens or somesuch.

Oh, and thanks.

I am. Supermarkets -- and I might be misunderstanding this -- but I believe they are run on the slimmest profit margins, and yet people will go out of their way to save a little money -- I believe (again, no facts on hand) that they have little to no brand loyalty. So if they can save money by having machines instead of humans, then they will lower their prices, to have a slight edge on their competition. OK, at first they might give 1% back to you and keep the other 1% as profit, but as soon as the competition gets the machines, they will underbid each other.

That's from what little I've read on it -- I think supermarkets follow classical economic theory more than most businesses.

i've worked as a cashier and never really had problems with people being that rude, that i can remember. probably because it was the 'nice' grocery store in ann arbor, home to 100,000 liberal people with middle-class guilt. paid really well, as well. the only complaint was having to wear a tie with produce pictures on it. yeah.