The self-checkout at Aldi is a godsend. Way too many times I’ve been on my lunch break trying to buy a sandwich and snack, only for some old git to be using the time at the till to have a chinwag with the cashier!
By all means, have a chat with the cashier, but not when there’s a massive queue of people waiting behind you! Also, you know those shelves near the window with the sign saying “Pack here”? That’s not a suggestion. Pack your shopping away from the tills so people can keep buying stuff.
Man I always hear such good things about Aldi. They started building one near us and I got excited. I was gonna see what the job situation was like because I heard they were kinda based.
Nah. It’s reportedly a Taylorist hamster wheel. Unrealistic productivity metrics that, if you really bust your butt, are rewarded with tighter metrics. Sucks, man.
I love it when a cashier checkout is available because everyone is doing the self-checkout and I can get my stuff bagged properly (I’m terrible at bagging up). I’ll even chat with them as they’re in the middle of the most boring shift imaginable.
Workers bagging your stuff at a store is so incredibly weird to me. In Sweden you have to bag your own stuff and afaik it has always been like that.
as a former cashier, fuck talking to people, the mind’s enough
Cashiers no longer pack bags in my area, unless you’re paying for the bag.
Shrinkflation you say?
Weird that the money supply can grow so fast, raising home values to ungodly levels, while we keep getting worse service; you cant even put an overhead bag or choose a seat on an airplane anymore, but nothing to see here inflation is only 2%.
Will they bag groceries into reusable bags, or are you using plastic bags?
At every store near me they’ll use your reusable bags if you have them.
I like the scan and go in the Sam’s club app. Scan the items with your phone, and if the QR code receipt is visible when you walk through the gate thing they usually wave you on without a person checking.
Any mistake during self-checkout and my local supermarkets will consider it shoplifting and pursue it all the way to court if needed. I’m not running that risk.
Lol as if…
Speak for yourself. I had a security guard who watched me scan then try to run up to me when I finished to recheck my stuff.
Like dude, you watched me from the beginning.
What colour is your skin?
Article in Danish where the head of public affairs for COOP, one of the largest retail chains in Denmark, explicitly states that they’ll report anyone who forgets to scan even the smallest item.
Yeah ok
Honestly with my social anxiety, self checkout works perfectly for me. I feel a hard to describe tension when being rung up by most folks that I don’t feel when ringing myself up, and if I’m just popping in for a few things I’d rather not stress myself out more than I need to.
Honestly, even without social anxiety, not having to spend the effort to do basic small talk and engage with someone makes it pretty convenient sometimes. The only time I really use the cashier line is when I have a lot of stuff or my kids with me.
Self-check out makes it easier to steal from the mega corporation. 🤷🏻♂️
honestly no, you’d hypothetically probably be better off putting something in your bag than risk being one of those times the machine asks a worker over to scan shit
Lol, the cashier dgaf. They come over, input the code to canal the alert and go back to their chat, 90% of the time without even looking. The times they do look, they tell you what’s wrong and you fix it.
They’re the most surveilled places in the store and now stores are looking into face recognition tech to effectively ban thieves from stores
They might not care about small stuff, but repeatedly doing it will definitely put you on their radar
It’s not stealing, it’s getting paid to do the cashiers job. Honestly I underpay myself every day i go to work at the self checkout.
Why waste time in a queue? It’s quicker to self checkout and get back to my own thing.
Self checkout hate is plain stupid, it’s for the customers who wanna get in an out quick.
They are running lean enough many places that you actually wait in line to check yourself out. I have no problem checking myself out. Waiting in line to use a machine because they don’t have enough of them on the other hand… Literally some places run like one minder for 12 machines but they will have another 12 machines disabled because they don’t want to come off another minder.
No, you are wrong. Places like Walmart will only have self checkout open, forcing you to ring up your own cart of items while their employees stare blankly at you … either that or you just make eye contact with them and walk away from the cart and leave the store (usually what I do).
I don’t work for them.
The cashier at the self checkout is to
A) Do things that require intervention like verify your ID to sell alcohol
B) Help people having trouble
C) Keep people from literally paying for a banana and taking home TVs
They aren’t there to check you out. If you spend usually spend 15 minutes driving to the store, 15 minutes gathering a cart, and then walk away and spend 15 minutes driving home empty handed I believe the joke is on you. The employees get paid at this point $20 an hour to put away your shit while you wasted your own time and gas.
That’s wasted effort for both the seller and buyer. Hope it’s fixed.
Why do you think that is wasted effort? You can have one person monitor 12 machines where 12 people are checking out
Sorry to hear that you live in flyover country. Too bad your state “voted” for this.
Turn in your commie card, tiny tyrant.
I didn’t punish them. They punished themselves.
That’s not how informed consent works, droogi.
Voted for what? Self checkout lanes?
Corporate deregulation
Probably, those people who support this corpo BS
This is such a boomer take.
Nah fuck that, the machines are scabs, I want someone to earn a paycheck for work.
Then you will pay higher prices.
I load garden shit at Lowe’s. Sometimes we get blown out and people bitch for faster service. OK. We can always hire more people, any given business’ top expense. Then we charge more. Then the customer bitches about prices and goes to Home Depot. Where they don’t have as much staff. Rinse and repeat.
I want
shorter games with worse graphics made by people who are paid more to work lessto pay more to compensate actual human beings doing actual work and I’m not kidding.Banks had no problem slapping a “Teller transaction” fee on withdrawals when ATMs became ubiquitous, to encourage people to use the ATM for free.
That fee is outside my experience. Was that a short-lived thing? Never heard of it, certainly never saw it or heard anyone complain. Weird.
ATMs are not cost free. They’re not merely a kiosk. You have to pay armed men to load/unload them. And not any dude with a pistol will do. I imagine the background check is damned exclusionary.
And then there’s the networking, video and storage, upkeep and updates, all that, it goes on. But of course that still tallies a lower cost than a human, or they wouldn’t do it!
I have never met a machine that offered to weigh your bags before you start that didn’t immediately fuck everything up if you accepted that offer
All that’s going to do is pull employees from other areas of the store when it gets busy and the rest of the time they will have like 2 cashiers. Even if they did switch back to registers they won’t hire a significant amount of people.
When I worked at Walmart I absolutely hated being sent up to the register. I hated talking to customers and I didn’t like that it took me away from finishing my job and my manager would argue with me about why my area wasn’t done when they sent me up to the register for 6 hours and therefore did not have the time to finish my work.
I’d rather they do a more fun and fulfilling job than to do menial tasks just because it has always been like that.
Shit jobs disappearing is a good thing.
It is a mistake to assume that “shit jobs” disappearing will coincide with better jobs becoming available.
Why? To maintain capitalism as something we can pretend is viable for one more generation, just long enough for you to die before you might have to change?
To maintain capitalism
…Seriously? This is your defense? Do you for some reason think that if we all used the self-checkout system that capitalism would vanish? Is OP the one at the helm of whether or not capitalism lives or dies? It all rests on his shoulders, not the status quo or the endless pursuit of profit by billionaires and politicians?
If supermarkets were autonomous, you’d be homeless living in the ally next to them, capitalism alive and well.
Do I think self checkouts are the one thing stopping capitalism? No. But I do think it’s going to have to get a whole lot worse before things change. We need all fast food workers, all wait staff, all grocery workers, all packaging workers to lose jobs. Needs to be impossible to ignore.
Alley*
It’s shit work that most people don’t want to do.
Nah fuck that ain’t having time to hang around the whole checkout lane bullshit just to luddite around.
its funny at one regional market here, the cashiers are fed up with people being stupid and neet help or are even stealing. so sadly its disabled most of the time. at a different place, there keeps being a loooong line, but literaly noone uses the self checkout. it is so useful. if i forgot something or just gotta get coffee beans, i quickly swing by that place because i know no matter how busy it is, i dont have to wait in line xD
If you don’t trust me to the point where you’re going to point 2 security cameras at me while I checkout, and this is your idea of “more efficient”, then I can grocery shop somewhere else.
Hate to tell you but there are cameras on the “regular” checkout lanes too and they think everyone is stealing all the time.
8 hous at $15 an hour is $120
Two security cameras. At most $2000
Assuming the register is basically the same price
Do you want to pay a person to stand and scan groceries for 2 weeks for $1200?
Or do you want to spend $1200 on cameras that will last years?
30k+ a year vs. $1200 once
People could steal 29k worth of stuff, and the company would still makes the same profit.
The cameras are basically security theater anyways. No one is ever going to watch the footage unless needed.
The efficiency is definitely there
Sure, what you’ve described is cost efficiency for the store. I think the person you’re replying to is more concerned with efficiency in their shopping experience, which won’t be improved by lower costs given that the savings will just be funneled to corporate execs and board members (depending where you’re shopping).
Would you rather have 2-3 lines with cashiers or 6+ self checkouts?
I would say I would get out of the store way faster doing self checkout. I call that efficient.
Places like Sam’s Club with their Scan and Go checkout. I can scan all my groceries with my phone as I put them into my cart. Then I just walk under an arch with cameras that scans what barcodes it can. Then I walk out the door. I don’t even have to wait in line or go to a self checkout.
Cashiers aren’t efficient
If the company had to pay cashiers, then the prices of goods are just going to go up. Corporate execs and board members want the money.
So, do you let the Corporate execs and board members save money and hope not to raise prices (maybe lower them), or make them pay a cashier so they are going to raise prices.
Even though I hate the “please place the item in the bag!” “Unscaned item in bagging area!”. Self checkouts are efficient, and the future.
(maybe lower them),
Okay, I’m going to laugh really hard.
HA HAAAA hahahahaha
God, that was good.
Cameras are there to lower insurance premiums. That’s why for years and years every security camera video looked like it was filmed on a potato because there was no incentive to upgrade. The rise of phone cameras has caused the price of 4k cameras to plummet though so they are getting better.
Computer-vision has been a thing for years, though it’s now bundled under the moniker “AI”. I know that the self-checkout cameras at the store where I go use AI to “watch” customers. I would assume most of them do, now. Heck, the cheap camera that I bought to point out my front window for fun pretty reliably detects animals, vehicles, and people.
Self-checkout gang here. I like my groceries bagged a certain way and it’s mildly infuriating to sort stuff on the conveyor belt only for the cashier and/or bagger to mix them randomly in the bags.
Having somebody bag your items is such a USA thing.
Eh, I come from a 3rd world country and baggers are common. In fact, it makes more sense that jobs like those are more common in places with cheaper labor.
Cashiers everywhere around here stopped to put things in the bags for at least 10 years now. I still remember the good times when the bags were carefully and properly put by them with all the items magically fitting. Good old times. Nowadays there’s barely a difference between self checkout and using a human operated one. The main difference is that on self checkout I’m not rushed and can take my time to put the items how I want in the bags.
You can always bag yourself, they will absolutely let you do it.
Yeah, but then I’m holding up the line as everyone’s watching and waiting for me to finish bagging. I also have to go back to the terminal to pay after the cashier is done ringing up everything, then go back to bagging if I’m not done yet; all the while telling the cashier and/or bagger not to help. At least at the self-checkout, no one is specifically waiting for me to finish.
Hahaha. Humans are so silly! My preference is the exact opposite of yours, but the reasoning behind my preference is the same. I strongly prefer a cashier over self checkout because I prefer to bag my own stuff, and find it easier to do that while someone else scans.
Very few of the places I shop lately even have a bagger, so I don’t usually have to ask anyone not to help. I find most self checkouts frustrating because there’s no space for scanned items to sit before bagging them.
I also usually plop my card down on the card reader once the cashier starts scanning, so I don’t have to bounce back and forth between bagging & paying.
We are waiting for you at self check out as well Unless there is no line at all.
Eh, you’re technically waiting for a spot to open up, not a specific person at a specific self-checkout counter.
Same problem and I’d prefer we pay a cashier and a bagger. Not a computer and a slow bagger.
A local grocery store had self check out lanes and removed them and replaced them with 5 express check outs. I feel conflicted about it.
My local grocery store self checkout after every single item:
Unexpected item in bagging area.
If they’re going to treat me like I’m stealing the groceries I’m paying for, making the process slow and inefficient, then I’m just going to go to the regular checkout and not deal with it.
Haven’t heard that in forever. It was hell for some time, but it seems a solved problem everywhere I’ve gone, for many years.
There’s a sensitivity setting that can be adjusted. At first most stores were set to +/- 1oz, so even legitimate items that have varying packing weights could set it off. My local stores have adjusted it so that you really have to put something heavy on there to trigger that alert. They also don’t seem to care if you take stuff off the scale anymore, which is nice because it’s never large enough even if you have an item limit.
Can we talk about how ridiculously tiny the shelf is. On both sides, but especially the first side when you begin to check out. It’s roomFor like a gallon of milk that’s it.
Maybe I should give the ones near me another try then - thanks for the heads up.
I find it fascinating around here that all the self checkouts do that except Walmart which is actually pretty good. I usually go to the cashiers at other places because the self checkouts suck, and the cashiers bag stuff better than me.
Walmart’s self checkout probably doesn’t accuse you of stealing out loud. They want to wait until they can “prove” you’ve stolen over $1000 worth of goods over time so they can charge you with - I forget - either grand larceny or grand theft, which are felonies.
I hadn’t thought of that but that could be the case now that you mention it. I’m not stealing at any of the self checkouts, the grocery store ones though around here always think something got placed in the bagging area that wasn’t scanned which isn’t the case. I guess Walmarts just dont care which I like.
Cub foods has the worst self checkouts around here, unless I’m only buying under 3 items I won’t use it. They also don’t bag your items though if you go to a cashier, all around just kindve a shitty shopping experience at Cub.
Yeah and if you have alcohol you wait eleven minutes for the one employee who is supposed to be helping, to actually notice there are people waiting. Then she realizes five people need help. Gets the cigarettes for the one guy but it takes three trips to the cage and back to get the right ones. Helps the lady with the coupons they grabbed the wrong items for. Helps the really old person who can’t even stand scan and bag all of their groceries (why were they in self checkout anyway?).
Finally comes over to my white-bearded ass after 20 minutes and they could just hit the “customer is over 40” button, but they want to see my id. Yeah I’ll just wait in line for the one cashier.
This problem is caused by shopping at busy times, not self-checkouts.
Not always. I usually shop right when they open because I often work 3rd shift. Sometimes they have half of the self checkouts closed and only one person there, and one register open and they’re just not paying attention because it’s always slow early in the morning. So by the time they notice people need help they have several people who need help. And almost everyone always needs help, those machines are an abomination and don’t really work. I’ve had to get help three times in one checkout because once it hits a flag it locks up.
Unexpected item in bagging area. Ugh.
At my usual supermarket, you can take a scanner thingy and scan your items as you put them in your cart. Once you’re at the lane, you put back the scanner in place, pay for your stuff, and it’s done.
You’re still doing the work, though. And without pay.
“What do you mean you take the items from the shelves? And you have to walk around the store yourself?! How is that ‘convenience’? You’re doing all their work without pay!”
— Probably someone’s grandma when the first supermarkets were opening.
You people are really like those humans in wall-e lmao
Not at all. Those people at wall-e would order food on their tablet, a person getting paid, comes to deliver the groceries/slurpies to them…
I don’t think the robots are getting paid.
Well, they kinda are. They are getting food and shelter. (power and storage)
It’s honestly sad to see that people are so lazy that they’d rather stand there and do nothing than scan the stuff themselves.
I bet these are the same people that drive around the parking lot for 10 minutes to find a spot closer to the door, rather than just parking slightly farther away.
It’s not that i’m lazy, it’s that I know there are extremely wealthy capitalists that has paid millions to think-tanks to come up with this strategy of, offload work to the customer, so they can make more money exploiting consumers. And if possible, do it in a way where idiots online end up defending this model. Jeez people are suckers.
Only US americans seem to be struggling to put groceries in a fucking bag. Not sure if it’s hilarious or sad.
Do you need someone to hold your dick and flush when taking a piss because its too much work too ?
Holy shit dude, I just want to get out of the store faster.
I can’t imagine living my life being that miserable and bleak about everything.
Once you wake up, it’s difficult to go back to sleep…
Hahaha I’m sure that sounded much cooler in your head.
Now playing The Bravery - An Honest Mistake
Self-checkout is the best thing that happened to shops, I wish more had it. No waiting in long lines, no talking to people. Perfect.
