Grocery Store Self-Check Out Slugs

[Joe Guy]

Are you one of them? I see people with a cart full of groceries in the self-checkout line who take the groceries from their cart, scan them and place them on the counter to the right of the scanner. Usually, they do it very slowly. Afterwards, they seem to suddenly realize that they need to put their purchases into bags. So, they pick up the items again, one at a time, and slowly place them into the reusable bags they brought with them to the store.

Why does it not occur to them that they can place their items into the bag immediately after they scan them?

Especially nowadays when the extra time spent in a grocery store could be a matter of life and death from COVID-19.

Just an OBservation....

[Scooter]

Perhaps the trick is not expecting people who are using self-checkout ahead of you to be as fast as a trained cashier. And recognizing that being a good cashier takes actual skill and those employed as such should not be losing their jobs to machines, so you shouldn't be using them if you have any sort of social conscience.

[Joe Guy]

I don't expect people in self-checkout to be as fast as a trained cashier but I do expect the average person to be able to realize that since the goal is to get groceries into a bag, that's what they should do. Don't lay them down and pick them up again.

Cashiers losing their jobs to machines isn't relevant to my gripe.

[Econoline]

Not excusing these people, but I have found that reusable cloth bags rarely fit properly over the metal brackets meant to hold them up, so they will probably fall over until there are already at least 3 or 4 items in the bag. (So sometimes the easiest strategy is just to wait until after you've scanned everything, and then you can devote your entire attention to the bagging process.)

[Bicycle Bill]

As long as you brought up the subject of grocery check-out clerks (and by extension, shelf stockers) ....
 

If you're 'essential' enough to work through a coronavirus pandemic,
you're essential enough to be paid a living wage
excerpted from https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2 ... iving-wage

 
Deservedly, much praise has gone to the healthcare professionals who are battling COVID-19, many of them without sufficient safety gear.  But there are other “essential” workers in harm’s way too.  And for their heroics, they are, by and large, paid next to nothing.  They have limited access to affordable healthcare.  And paid sick leave, where it exists, is still often frowned upon due to inadequate staffing.

And it isn’t just grocery workers.  Amazon warehouse workers in Staten Island are walking off their jobs Monday in pursuit of more protections from coronavirus and fairer pay.  Instacart workers nationwide are doing the same. Employees of Whole Foods announced plans to strike this Tuesday, to demand the company pay for coronavirus testing, provide paid leave for ill and self-quarantining workers, as well as hazard pay for those working during the pandemic.

Good for them.

If you’re "essential" enough to work through a coronavirus pandemic, you’re essential enough to be paid a living wage and to have access to paid sick leave and affordable healthcare.  If your work is important enough that society will collapse into chaos without you, you deserve to be paid accordingly.  You deserve to be able to stay home when you’re sick.  And you deserve access to affordable healthcare if you need it.  We shouldn’t have needed a deadly coronavirus pandemic to show us that, but it’s blindingly obvious now.

-"BB"-

[dales]

The self-check is 20 or items or less where I shop.

Store employees are good about shooing these self-entitled nitwits over to the regular check out lines.

[datsunaholic]

My local Safeway rarely has more than one manned register open; there are 6 self-checkout lanes. I try to use the manned lane but often it's 7 or 8 people deep. I'd avoid the Safeway, but the Grocery Outlet rarely has certain items. Grocery Outlet has no self-checkout.

Anyhow, when I get to scanning my own items at the self-checkout, I always have issues.

First, my reusable bags are at the bottom of my basket. Poor planning on my part, yet I seem to ALWAYS forget and bury them. If I take the other items out to get to the bags before scanning them, the system detects I removed something without scanning it and freezes the system. So yeah, I end up with a pile on the bagging scale before I get to the bags. Then it detects the bags, thinks I removed an item without scanning, and locks the system again.

Which is why I don't use the self checkout except under time crunch (it also won't let you scan the in-store coupons, needs cashier validation).

[BoSoxGal]

Reusable bags are not allowed at present here in Massachusetts, because coronavirus lives on fabrics for some indeterminate length of time and we can’t trust folks to wash their bags.

I struggled a fair bit with using self checkouts when they first became a thing, because of feeling I was contributing to job losses. But then my introversion and desire to have my groceries properly bagged won over, and I pretty nearly only use the self check except when I need to buy town garbage bags - need a clerk for that.

There is less risk not being two feet apart across a check stand from cashier and bagger - although I’ve heard some stores have been installing sneeze guards between cashier and customer I haven’t seen it yet at my local Hannaford.

[dales]

Adult beverages are not allowed at self-check out as well.

I've found that I have had to remind some people of this fact in spite of there being a large sign saying so.

DUH.

[ex-khobar Andy]

Obviously different states have different rules but here beer etc is OK at self checkout - the machine just asks the attendant to OK your age either visually or by ID. What gets me is when I am at the regular checkout and I have ginger beer - the <21 cashier has to enlist the bagger - older guy - to OK me because s/he is not allowed to touch the ginger beers. I've tried to explain that ginger-beer is non-alcoholic but it's pointless. Happens every time.

[Guinevere]

I abhor self checkout and I’m lucky to have a variety of nearby grocery stores that don’t use them, including the local town small grocery store, and the local fruit center in the next town, or Trader Joes or the Fresh Market or Whole Foods.

[Lord Jim]

Both our local Luckys and Safeway have one self-checkout line with four stations in each (usually at least one or two of them are out of order) I almost never use them, because I find them to be a monumental pain in the ass. With ours you can't bag while you check because the stupid machines don't recognize the empty bags and instead start bleating out a message about "unauthorized item in bagging area" and wont let you proceed until you remove the bag. Also, if you're buying fresh produce, they're pretty much unusable without the aid of the one attendant that they assign to watch over these wonky machines.

If I have one quick item I'm picking up (which doesn't happen these days) I might use it if the lines are long, but other than that, I'd rather spend a half an hour waiting to get to a live checker then deal with all the self-checkout crap.

[Joe Guy]

....I almost never use them, because I find them to be a monumental pain in the ass. With ours you can't bag while you check because the stupid machines don't recognize the empty bags and instead start bleating out a message about "unauthorized item in bagging area" and wont let you proceed until you remove the bag. Also, if you're buying fresh produce, they're pretty much unusable without the aid of the one attendant that they assign to watch over these wonky machines......

I learned quickly that after scanning my first item, if I place the item into the bag and then set it down, I don't get the unauthorized item message. Also, I quickly learned the numbers to punch in for the fruits and vegetables that I buy. For example, 4011 is bananas, 4225 is large avocados and 4062 is cucumbers... And they are the same numbers at Lucky as they are at Safeway.

Also, I've found that it's mostly old people that have problems with self-checkout......

[BoSoxGal]

Self checkouts at Hannaford have a starting function where you put your own bags in the bagging area, they are weighed by the machine and then you move on to scanning items. There's an integrated scale that weighs produce and other items (olives from the olive bar) sold by weight, and a directory of items with correlated numbers you can search from if the item isn’t clearly marked or tagged. Coupons can be scanned and submitted into a slot for later collection. About the only time a human clerk is required is if you accidentally scan something twice and need it removed - then a clerk has to come and enter a special code.

Honestly I find it very convenient especially since my shopping basket is usually not hugely full - once near thanksgiving when the checkouts were all long lines and huge baskets I went through the self checkout even though I had a full basket (not item limit at Hannaford) and the only tricky bit was not having a lot of space in the bagging area but it turns out you can remove each bag back to the cart when it’s full without messing up the computer. Back in the beginning with these things it would lose its mind if you tried to abscond with stuff from the bagging area before payment was complete. But now there are cameras in the self check area so I don’t think they worry as much anymore about theft.

And honestly I won’t feel badly about it because it isn’t any different than using an ATM or online banking for deposits, withdrawals, bill pay etc. and anyway haven’t we had stuff like this since the automats in the 50s/60s? And you can’t really get your gas pumped for you hardly anywhere anymore unless you live in NJ. There’s a full serve a little bit out of my way and sometimes I go there when I really need gas and it’s too bitter cold to stand outside myself (not very often, in other words) and I tip the guy $5 for enduring the cold on my behalf.

But honestly when it comes to the self checkout, I prefer it because the bread is never crushed when I get home. If I had a dime for every time I’ve nicely asked for the bread to be on top and the olives to be bagged separately and left out, then got home to find the bread flattened and the olive marinade spilled all over everything - well I’d have a night out to the movies at least. This despite the fact that my mother taught me at a very early age how to unload the groceries so all the refrigerated stuff was together, all the cleaning products, dry goods, frozen foods, etc. and bread and eggs set aside for careful handling so it should be the easiest thing for the bagger to get it right but 98% of them JUST DON’T. It’s a major pet peeve. One of the reasons besides the great prices that I like to do my big shopping at ALDI where self-bagging is the only option.

[Bicycle Bill]

....Also, if you're buying fresh produce, they're pretty much unusable without the aid of the one attendant that they assign to watch over these wonky machines......

I learned quickly that after scanning my first item, if I place the item into the bag and then set it down, I don't get the unauthorized item message. Also, I quickly learned the numbers to punch in for the fruits and vegetables that I buy. For example, 4011 is bananas, 4225 is large avocados and 4062 is cucumbers... And they are the same numbers at Lucky as they are at Safeway.

Those four-digit numbers on the stickers on the produce (apples, pears, avacados) and on the baggies around the celery, lettuce, and grapes, etc. are like the UPC barcode for that particular item, and those numbers are standard across the industry.  It identifies the particular item by type (bananas, green grapes, iceberg lettuce, and so on) and the store's computers then match that number with the current price in the store's databank.

Of course, with the self-scan lanes there would really be nothing to stop a larcenous-minded person from weighing up a bunch of Honeycrisp or SweeTango apples (those are those expensive 'designer' apples) but inputting the code for your plain ordinary red delicious or Macintosh apples instead, and I think the stores know it too; but just as long as the amount they lose through this sort of pilferage is less than the amount they save by not having to pay a real live human to man the scanner(s) it's merely considered just one more cost of doing business.

-"BB"-

[Gob]

Our local shop has been brilliant, I haven't had to hit a supermarket yet.

They are also part of the village scheme for delivering to the old or ill, and have enabled local farmers to bring in fresh veg from the fields to sell.

Our cove fishermen are selling direct to the public, and delivering.

[Jarlaxle]

Self checkouts at Hannaford have a starting function where you put your own bags in the bagging area, they are weighed by the machine and then you move on to scanning items. There's an integrated scale that weighs produce and other items (olives from the olive bar) sold by weight, and a directory of items with correlated numbers you can search from if the item isn’t clearly marked or tagged. Coupons can be scanned and submitted into a slot for later collection. About the only time a human clerk is required is if you accidentally scan something twice and need it removed - then a clerk has to come and enter a special code.

Honestly I find it very convenient especially since my shopping basket is usually not hugely full - once near thanksgiving when the checkouts were all long lines and huge baskets I went through the self checkout even though I had a full basket (not item limit at Hannaford) and the only tricky bit was not having a lot of space in the bagging area but it turns out you can remove each bag back to the cart when it’s full without messing up the computer. Back in the beginning with these things it would lose its mind if you tried to abscond with stuff from the bagging area before payment was complete. But now there are cameras in the self check area so I don’t think they worry as much anymore about theft.

And honestly I won’t feel badly about it because it isn’t any different than using an ATM or online banking for deposits, withdrawals, bill pay etc. and anyway haven’t we had stuff like this since the automats in the 50s/60s? And you can’t really get your gas pumped for you hardly anywhere anymore unless you live in NJ. There’s a full serve a little bit out of my way and sometimes I go there when I really need gas and it’s too bitter cold to stand outside myself (not very often, in other words) and I tip the guy $5 for enduring the cold on my behalf.

But honestly when it comes to the self checkout, I prefer it because the bread is never crushed when I get home. If I had a dime for every time I’ve nicely asked for the bread to be on top and the olives to be bagged separately and left out, then got home to find the bread flattened and the olive marinade spilled all over everything - well I’d have a night out to the movies at least. This despite the fact that my mother taught me at a very early age how to unload the groceries so all the refrigerated stuff was together, all the cleaning products, dry goods, frozen foods, etc. and bread and eggs set aside for careful handling so it should be the easiest thing for the bagger to get it right but 98% of them JUST DON’T. It’s a major pet peeve. One of the reasons besides the great prices that I like to do my big shopping at ALDI where self-bagging is the only option.

This is essentially why I use self-checkout. It's usually faster, and I don't have to worry about things like sandwich rolls bagged under canned fruit, or raw meat with cans of highly-toxic insecticide, or lettuce bagged with Drano.