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One line has 8 people waiting with a bunch of groceries each but the line is moving steadily
The other line has only two people … a little old lady at the cashier is holding up the line because she wants to process three out of date coupons, a return item with a label that said it was past its best before date, and a loaf of bread that ‘doesn’t look right’.
My old bank branch had thirteen teller stations and two tellers since at least 2018.
Have you tried our self checkout. We make you work for us so we don’t have to hire more employees and you pay the exact same price.
Do you feel the same way about getting the stuff off the shelves yourself?
It is the store who wants payment from you and is responsible for collecting it.
It is the customer who wants an item so he may be reponsible for picking it up.
Not how it uses to work.
Its wonderful how humans don’t have a problem with contradictions when they see one side as “normal”
There aren’t people who will lose the jobs they currently hold because customers get their own products from the store, but there are people who will lose their jobs if everyone switches to self checkout. It’s not a contradiction to view them differently, just like it’s not a contradiction to view the sewing machine and generative ai differently
But people did lose their jobs when shops switched to customers getting their own stuff off the shelves.
The good ones are better because I can scan faster than your trained clerks. (I never had a job scanning so I’m not trained, and my wife does most of our shopping so I’m out of practice - despite that I’m still faster than most clerks)
the walmart here must be experiencing a high rate self-checkout ‘discounts’. they’ve added more ‘watchers’ who are actually watching everything. enough extra bodies now that they could just staff the regular registers, and with less waiting in line for the customer.
They won’t staff them until they consistently have longer queues and see a risk.
Only way to get more checkouts is favour shops with staff and shorter queues that are staffed.
Meh, self-checkout is blessing. I don’t have to stand in a irritated line of idiots, don’t have to deal with overworked and really doing their best impression of not suffering clerk at the checkout and all that taking like what, three times as long as self-checkout?
Ya all really are masochists just so some tortured soul would smile at ya and pretend shit’s fine.
Edit: Folks repeat some points, so I am gonna respond in edit - sorry folk ;-; - but overall I need to check my privilige. THE FUCK YOU MEAN CAMERA. THE FUCK YOU MEAN AI. I live in Europe and we got a scale, a barcode scanner and one person watching 4-8 self-checkouts. Line moves blazingly fast, you scan your shit, you maybe get bothered by machine for a sec if you have loyalty card and that’s it, pack your shit, pay, and go. Oh, some shops even have barcode scanner at exit - some of these catch my barcode before I position it fully. I…feel even more sorry for you, Americans ;-;
A good cashier/bagger is much faster than self-checkout. If I only have like 10 items or something, I use self-checkout, otherwise I go to the cashier. Granted, I rarely get a fast cashier/bagger anymore; makes think the company does that on purpose.
I haven’t had a good bagger since they started using the cheap plastic bags. The worst was before they started outlawing them and I had checkers put 2 or 3 items in one bag and then start a new one so you end up with 12 bags for 30 items.
Good baggers would plan out your heavy items for the bottom and bread and eggs on top and fill those paper bags well. They got rid of those employees first.
I don’t have to stand in a irritated line of idiots,
You’re literally describing the self checkout line here.
I refuse to believe you’ve never been in line, absolutely seething while the poor grandma in front of you is trying lookup, scan and bag her groceries while multiple store employees stand by and watch… And then they needed to help anyway because she has a purse full of expired coupons!
I have but the beauty of self checkout is that there are six kiosks for one line, so when granny is taking forever there are five other stations that can finish up before her.
I like self-checkout in general. I have already been a cashier and I don’t mind. I can keep my headphones on and just go about my day without a social interaction for a few items.
However there’s one thing that I started to not like about some of these, and it’s the giant camera pointed in your face. Sometimes with the image on the screen so that you can see yourself. It makes me wonder how many layers of software are analyzing that data. I’m under no illusions that they are also compiling data from the checkouts with employees, but it’s never so literally in your face.
Self checkout is a blessing when you have, like, six items in your cart. Any more than that, and it’s a punishment. Have you ever tried to be fast with those torture kiosks? They’ve added cameras and shitty AI so that they complain if you’re holding the next item in hand while putting the first item in your bag. It forces you to pick something up, scan it, put it in the bag, wait for the scale to register it, and only then pick up the next item - and heaven help you if you have a second person helping you. Having worked at grocery stores in the distant past, it’s agony.
The actual checkers can scan an item with one hand while picking up the next item, passing each item to the bagger behind them in a steady stream without having to wait for anything. It’s not quite an order of magnitude faster, but it’s close. The only reason self-checkout is ‘faster’ is because one cashier can watch six kiosks at a time, and payment takes the same amount of time no matter how many items you have.
I’ve used self-checkouts in Canada and in The Netherlands. The ones here in Canada are just like the miserable experience you describe. Especially the weight sensor and the machine complaining. In The Netherlands I never had that issue (even with a second person helping me). I’m convinced companies have just turned the anti-theft settings up to aggravating false-positive levels over here.
Yep, that’s exactly it and why no-one understands each other on these threads.
North America is three months away from Boston Dynamic Replicants gruesomly executing and dismembering single mothers in public because a little bit of flour fell out of the bag at the counter and Peter Thiel’s AI decided it was Space Fentanyl.
I keep hearing this argument, but having to put all my stuff up for scanning fucking sucks. In my ideal world stuff gets scanned when I put it into my cart and at the end I simply pay. Everything else is dogshit. Sadly, there are too few supermarkets that offer this.
yes, but some of us got social anxiety and would much rather not have to interact with people when shopping.
I don’t get social anxiety, but sometimes I dont want to talk. Just through in some “yeah, that’s right” and “Oh yeah?”. They can just talk while you think about the next loot drop you’ll get in your favorite game.
They won’t know the difference.
Alternatively, if you’re sick of people talking to you. Just break the convo and start trying to sell them stuff. People shut up real quick.
Just through in some “yeah, that’s right” and “Oh yeah?”
You’re already asking too much from someone with social anxiety.
Just break the convo and start trying to sell them stuff.
Again, what use is this advice to someone who will spend the rest of the week losing sleep over whether that “yeah, that’s right” was used appropriately or not?
If you can’t say 3 words to someone and blow off convos. How can you even survive in the workplace? Social anxiety, sure, but too much for an “Oh yeah?” Come on.
How will you interact with co-workers or customers?
And still, you can ignore the person, swipe card and you keep someone in a job.
Staff don’t always want to talk, but they still would like a job.
If we stay in our comfort zone, our comfort zone shrinks smaller.
I work retail too and I hate having to interact with people just the same. i ain’t opposed to having an employee ring me up cause some store don’t have self checkout. but I like having the option provided to me
also anxiety is wayyyy more than just comfort zones
I am someone that has had anxiety and sought professional help for it.
The way I didn’t improve it, was by avoiding it and staying in my comfort zone. I had to push myself into situations that made me anxious in order to de-arm it. So the bodies fight or flight reflex doesn’t kick in. So the body becomes aware it isn’t a threat that requires that physical reaction. Expanding my comfort zone if you will. Obviously some folk will have very valid reasons why that approach may be much more challenging, but avoiding supermarket checkout staff is an extreme level of avoidance. Professional help would be much better for that than self-service tills.
If we stay in our comfort zone, our comfort zone shrinks smaller.
nah
Heh. Butt.
The reason to have several more checkouts is for holiday rushes. Under normal day to day operations they don’t use them all.
they could use them all. but they allow self checkout to have a line. it’s ok though, the self checkout discounts usually help offset.
the self checkout discounts
Thee what now? You must live in some magical non-Capitalist hellhole if you’re actually getting a discount for ringing yourself up!
the discount for me is time saved not waiting in line to have someone else do a job I can do myself
Do you also want the restaurant to pull out a seat and push you in? do you want the petrol station to pump your own petrol for you? do you want to go to the bank so they can transfer money for you? I cannot for the life of me understand why some people are so hung up on self checkouts
theft. i’m speaking of theft.
Shit, I can’t believe I whooshed that!
(To be fair, my local supermarket has scales and cameras to prevent most shenanigans… so I have to sneakily pocket small but expensive items while still walking around the store!)
Be careful with that. Some stores will let you walk out even if they notice, until they have enough evidence to nail you for more than just petty theft.
And you don’t have to stop for store employees.
They’re referring to what the legal system defines as “theft”
Would’ve been icing on the cake if they were conjoined twins.
All of those are self checkout. Those 2 are also busy helping other people.
How’d you get a picture of my local grocery store?
For real though, one of those cashiers would be on the self checkout helping 50 people at once and the cashier who has to actually scan stuff has 5 people in their line but all of them have enough food and goods for an army.
My supermarket is the opposite. The registers have a few people with like 2 items, and old grampa with 4 weeks worth of groceries is learning how to use the self checkout, and talking back to it when it says there’s an unexpected item on the scale.
Goddamn it, I talk to the self checkout, and I don’t have any grandchildren that I know of.
I always go to the cashier.
I hate self checkout.
The payment flow is always way too confusing, I hate scanning and bagging…
Please keep the cashiers.
same. The local self checkouts are a sensory nightmare for me. There’s blinking lights I can’t avoid, a camera+screen I can’t ignore… I just can’t deal with it.
local home depot only has self checkout. I don’t go there any more.
I guess I’m the opposite. The sensory nightmare for me involves having to interact with strangers, and self checkout offers the utopian promise of avoiding all that. But it fails only too often, as the slightest problem brings the clerk over. It’s a bait and switch for my introverted ass.
But that’s the thing, different people feel better in different methods, so why can’t we keep both and let each one choose? Some would even use both methods in different moments Why does things be always forced into others because “it’s the future”?
Self checkout with app where you can put the items in your own bag or backpack as you shop, is the fucking goat
I have never tried that and I’m not sure how much I would like that
I understand. For me it also took a couple of times to get over the shoplifting feeling 😂
This is the Target in Hixon, TN everytime i go there. I’ve stood in a 20 frustrated person long self-checkout line with at least a dozen regular checkouts collecting dust and not a soul with a red vest in sight. One poor lady helping 5 or so self cheout kiosks. The Starbucks at the entrance has more people behind the counter. And they still wonder why they’re failing spectacularly.
Target fucking depresses the living shit out of me. The only reason I ever go is that I’m a school bus driver and for some reason half of the tips I get at Christmas and the end of the school year (why the fuck do people tip school bus drivers? I have no idea) are Target gift cards. It always has Kmart-at-the-end vibes with half-empty shelves and employees that look like they want to kill you. And I don’t understand how they can maintain a grocery section at all - the selection is poor and everything costs twice as much as it does at normal grocery stores.
For some unknown reason, the stores all seem to have been inadequately constructed. The floor shakes at every multi-story Target I’ve ever been in.
I’ve actually found that Target groceries are cheaper overall than the major grocery store chains, even the shittiest ones. I live in a major U.S. city so ymmv. The only big chain that beats Target’s grocery prices is Walmart. But you have to psych yourself up to shop there because it’s always a hellscape and I’m usually too tired for all that.
Aldi’s/Lidl/Trader Joe’s are also always very economical but they have a limited selection of items.
Look, no one in self checkout is in a hurry or can figure out how to use it, one item won’t scan, they put something on the scale and need assistance from the attendant who isn’t paying attention but isn’t doing anything otherwise. It’s a great system
When you see this, you should be thinking “look what they fucking took from us.”
Once upon a time, those lanes all ran. The CEO’s megayacht is the reason you have to stand in line or check out yourself.
This has been Target and Walmart for the last 30 or 40 years. They build them with 30 lanes with the idea of Xmas rush but then only have one or two lanes open no matter how many customers are waiting.
This was a problem long before self checkout or higher minimum wages or any of that.
They don’t even open the other lanes for xmas rush anymore…
or check out yourself
Thanks CEO’s megayacht. I’ll always pick self checkout over forced human interaction.
Yeah fuck workers amirite
Do you think about the shoe shiners losing their job when you choose to wear sports shoes instead of dress shoes? Would that be a valid argument to stop you? It’s not my responsibility to go out of my way to make sure certain jobs stay relevant.
Hunter-gatherers must have been real mad when agriculture was invented
Should have become sex workers. That job is still relevant.
Agriculture is no longer relevant? Holy fucking shit, it’s really the end times.
You don’t to talk to the cashiers, no one is forcing you to do anything and they won’t even remember you, it’s fine. Why so mad about having the smallest interaction with another human being?
Some of these people are fucking weird. Like the person you’re replying to? Yeah, I would not want to know someone that antisocial IRL.
Maybe you’re weird for making such a statement. Have you ever heard of social anxiety? It can be crippling.
I have crippling anxiety - and i overwhelmingly prefer a manned checkout.
Manned checkout:
Hi, here are my bags, paying by card, thanks.Robot:
Unexpected item in bagging area Try and flag a worker down they are busy solving the above issue for 4 other people wait patiently for a minute or two the worker doesn't realise i need their help have to go ask them for help continue scanning my items above happens 2-5 more timesThe robot tends to have significantly more human interaction, it’s slower than having a professional do it, and the human interaction is SO much worse.
You don’t even have to speak to the checkout person. Yet lemmy treats anxiety as normal, memes abound! Yeah, that’s fucking weird and anyone that crippled is, well, crippled, needs serious help.
The CEO’s megayacht thanks you for doing the cashier’s work for free
My labour ain’t free.
This is why I always use the cashier lanes. I can goof around and check my phone while I wait. The store can pay somebody to check my items out
You think that’s bad, did you know some stores make you pick the stuff up from the shelves instead of the worker doing it for you!
Yeah, I’m not sure why I would be bothered by having to scan my own stuff, especially since I get through self-checkouts much faster. I value my time more than saving that physical action.
I beg to differ. I don’t have pay attention in the normal checkout - that time is fully mine.
In the self checkout that’s time I can’t use on anything else.
Its specifically because I value my time I avoid the self checkout unless I am only picking up a couple things.
really depends. If you are a busy buiseness person, sure. but if you just stand there and wait for rhe people infront of you, you might as well do the self-checkout if its faster
Minimum wage did this. If they have to pay more than the natural rate for that labor they are going to hire as little as they can. Eventually things will slow and they will get through the queue but you will have to wait. But the company had no downtime for expensive labor.
The alternative was hiring a lot of people at an extremely low rate, meaning you end up with more labor than you need by a lot when things are slow, but at least you aren’t paying much for that excess labor and your customers never wait so they are likely to return. The consumer really wins there but someone will have to be paid a low wage.
Just go to the self checkout. It’s so much easier to steal from
Honestly, stealing from the manned checkouts is easier. I just tell them “This bag is from another store” and while that’s true, I bought the bag from aldi, the contents are all from here. And they don’t get paid enough to even look up or deviate from their programming.
Isn’t it normal to reuse bags from other shops?
Does your local grocery not have the AI cameras set to over-react mode where it flags things that get scanned and put into the bagging area too quickly? Or when you scan a heavy item and put it under the cart since it would never fit in a bag anyway?
If not, it’s something you can look forward to soon!
I just go to those because it’s faster
Just in case you’re wondering, they actually do man all those checkouts during superbowl weekend
My first job I worked at a grocery store that had I think 12 checkouts and only 4 cashiers on at most times. The exception was when they did a special “2 hour sale” during which time it was busy enough for all stations to be staffed, but also it was basically guaranteed that you’d get to go home early on those shifts because it would die down pretty quick and they’d cut the unnecessary staff for the day
