Author Topic: self checkouts  (Read 3010 times)

Nick1911

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Re: self checkouts
« Reply #25 on: June 05, 2021, 11:04:15 AM »
Also annoying was when the self-checkout did not deactivate the security tag and the exit door scanner alarm went off.  I just keep on going; if the store feels they have sufficient probable cause to detain me, I am happy to call 911, wait for the cops and we can all have a nice chat.

Also this.  I'm increasingly tired of anti-theft systems that mandate I stop and waste my time for the benefit of the store.  Is it going to stop the actual shoplifters?  No, just be a pain for the rest of us.  I know I didn't steal anything, so screw them.

I was leaving walmart recently when the buzzer went off at the door.  A door greater in his 70's said "Can I see your receipt sir?".  I just said "No thanks!" and kept walking.  Lets see who's really in control of this situation - I'm annoyed enough about their defective system to force the issue.

Bogie

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Re: self checkouts
« Reply #26 on: June 05, 2021, 11:42:02 AM »
My home depot has a handheld scanner. Works pretty well.
 
I hate feeding cash into the machines.
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K Frame

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Re: self checkouts
« Reply #27 on: June 05, 2021, 11:43:39 AM »
^^^Just about all the self-checkout stands up here that I use have a scale built into them, so if you remove a full bag to make room prior to payment, it has a hissy fit and won't proceed.  This is also annoying when I buy a lightweight item, like a pen, toss it in the bag, the weight doesn't register and the screen starts telling me to bag the item and won't proceed.

Yep, same here. But, once you scan an item and place it in the bagging area it registers that item and you can remove the bag and put it in your cart.

I just got back from the store a few minutes ago and did exactly that because I maxed out the items in the bagging area and needed more room.
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K Frame

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Re: self checkouts
« Reply #28 on: June 05, 2021, 11:46:38 AM »
Oh and yes, the size of the checkouts is ridiculously small. At the grocery stores, I look at them the same as the "ten items or less" lane. If I have a bunch of stuff, I go to the human checker. I expect that may be part of the design - a way to route people with fewer items out of the human checker lines. I'd be curious to see if there are studies on that, regarding line efficiency and speed.

As I noted, many of the stores around here are now offering larger self checkout areas to combat that problem. You have the small "voter both size" check outs that were the original style, but the Giant food chain around here has started adding self check areas with belts (like a human check aisle) so you can better manage stuff. Interesting enough, in a pinch they can also be manned by an actual human. I checked out in one of those today.
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MillCreek

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Re: self checkouts
« Reply #29 on: June 05, 2021, 11:49:29 AM »
Yep, same here. But, once you scan an item and place it in the bagging area it registers that item and you can remove the bag and put it in your cart.

I just got back from the store a few minutes ago and did exactly that because I maxed out the items in the bagging area and needed more room.

Now I am intrigued and will try this at my local Safeway and WalMart.  The weight scanners there would not allow this, so I have not tried removing a bag for quite some time.  Time to see if the software/hardware has been updated.
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K Frame

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Re: self checkouts
« Reply #30 on: June 05, 2021, 11:52:51 AM »
We have Safeways here, as well, but it's rare that I shop there. The local Giant Food chain has better prices, it is, or was, locally owned when I moved here in 1990, it generally has better produce, and the staff at Giant is a lot more pleasant.

The cart I abandoned some years ago was at a Safeway, and that's pretty much when I finally stopped shopping there.

I'll occasionally go for a few store brand items that I like, but that's only a couple of times a year.
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Boomhauer

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Re: self checkouts
« Reply #31 on: June 05, 2021, 12:26:33 PM »
^^^Home Depot used to be my pet peeve: I would buy a bag of four machine screws, toss it in the bag, the weight scanner would not register, and hilarity ensued. 

Also annoying was when the self-checkout did not deactivate the security tag and the exit door scanner alarm went off.  I just keep on going; if the store feels they have sufficient probable cause to detain me, I am happy to call 911, wait for the cops and we can all have a nice chat. 

Home Depot doesn’t stop thieves. I could walk in, grab some high dollar tool kits in each hand and calmly walk out right past the cashier without even being spoken to.
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Re: self checkouts
« Reply #32 on: June 05, 2021, 12:32:30 PM »
Home Depot doesn’t stop thieves. I could walk in, grab some high dollar tool kits in each hand and calmly walk out right past the cashier without even being spoken to.

Yep, the alarms go off and no even looks at the door.
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Ben

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Re: self checkouts
« Reply #33 on: June 05, 2021, 12:49:38 PM »
Home Depot doesn’t stop thieves. I could walk in, grab some high dollar tool kits in each hand and calmly walk out right past the cashier without even being spoken to.

Might be regional, but at my HD, when I buy something like a cordless drill, I have to ask an employee to get it from behind a locked case, and then they walk me to the cash register - I'm essentially done shopping. Last time they said they would hold it for me if I had more shopping to do, but I didn't and I would have had to waste time tracking them back down anyway. They also don't let you use the self-checkout - an employee has to check you out.

Also on the theft, yeah, it seems a lot of employees couldn't care less. I was at the Tractor Supply last week, and bought like $100 worth of stuff. After I got rung up, I hesitated about the price I saw on the CC reader. It took a few seconds for it to hit, as in I was taking my first steps away from the register when my brain said, "Hey wait a minute..." The receipt was for $60-something.

So I turned around and told the young girl cashier, "I like getting discounts, but I think this one is too much." Turned out she forgot to scan a $40 jug of algaecide. What got me is that she never said "thanks for catching that"* and was in fact almost perturbed at the extra work of checking the receipt and ringing the forgotten item up.


*I don't expect praise for doing the right thing, and really not even a thank you, but if I was on the other end of this, I would be thanking the customer for being honest and keeping me out of trouble when my register didn't add up at the end of the day.
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Re: self checkouts
« Reply #34 on: June 05, 2021, 12:51:29 PM »
Speaking of alarms, the local Walmart(s) installed gates at the entrances behind the greeters.  They are automagic opening and sound an alarm if you try and exit them.  But people who didn't buy anything, people who already paid before the front cashier stations, and even employees who are taking a shortcut, regularly go through them and start the annoying beep beep beep.  The greeters don't even look over at them when they go off now, so why the beep?
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MillCreek

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Re: self checkouts
« Reply #35 on: June 05, 2021, 12:53:52 PM »
^^^Our local Lowes and Home Depots now do the same as Ben's store with the cordless power tools.  Too many tweakers grabbing them and running out.  Always suspicious when you see a new DeWalt drill with no battery or charger on OfferUp.
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Boomhauer

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Re: self checkouts
« Reply #36 on: June 05, 2021, 02:35:12 PM »
Might be regional, but at my HD, when I buy something like a cordless drill, I have to ask an employee to get it from behind a locked case, and then they walk me to the cash register - I'm essentially done shopping. Last time they said they would hold it for me if I had more shopping to do, but I didn't and I would have had to waste time tracking them back down anyway. They also don't let you use the self-checkout - an employee has to check you out.

Also on the theft, yeah, it seems a lot of employees couldn't care less. I was at the Tractor Supply last week, and bought like $100 worth of stuff. After I got rung up, I hesitated about the price I saw on the CC reader. It took a few seconds for it to hit, as in I was taking my first steps away from the register when my brain said, "Hey wait a minute..." The receipt was for $60-something.

So I turned around and told the young girl cashier, "I like getting discounts, but I think this one is too much." Turned out she forgot to scan a $40 jug of algaecide. What got me is that she never said "thanks for catching that"* and was in fact almost perturbed at the extra work of checking the receipt and ringing the forgotten item up.


*I don't expect praise for doing the right thing, and really not even a thank you, but if I was on the other end of this, I would be thanking the customer for being honest and keeping me out of trouble when my register didn't add up at the end of the day.

Some of them are implementing cages for tools here

It’s not about laziness the employees are prohibited from stopping thieves due to liability
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Perd Hapley

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Re: self checkouts
« Reply #37 on: June 05, 2021, 08:13:50 PM »
Oh and yes, the size of the checkouts is ridiculously small. At the grocery stores, I look at them the same as the "ten items or less" lane. If I have a bunch of stuff, I go to the human checker. I expect that may be part of the design - a way to route people with fewer items out of the human checker lines.

That's just what I've always assumed about self-checkout. It's not that the self-checkout is too small. It's just that they're not meant for someone buying 47 items. You got that much stuff, you need the professionals to step in and take care of it. The self-checkout is for the guy buying a gallon of milk and a can of beans, and wants to pay and get on his way.
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Ben

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Re: self checkouts
« Reply #38 on: June 05, 2021, 09:08:46 PM »
That's just what I've always assumed about self-checkout. It's not that the self-checkout is too small. It's just that they're not meant for someone buying 47 items. You got that much stuff, you need the professionals to step in and take care of it. The self-checkout is for the guy buying a gallon of milk and a can of beans, and wants to pay and get on his way.

I'm kinda remembering that when I saw them for the first time at the Albertson's back in Santa Barbara (I guess in the mid-2000's?), they may have even had a "ten items or less" sign.
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BlueStarLizzard

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Re: self checkouts
« Reply #39 on: June 05, 2021, 10:06:59 PM »
I used to use self checkouts, and still will upon occasion, but mostly I go to a human. The food lion I go to now doesn't have them.
It's the stuff you need ID for and the fact that I always buy cases of beverages, which just don't work with the stupid scale.
In all honesty, I prefer to bag my own stuff. Just today I had to pointedly tell the casher/bagger to please NOT put my raw steak in the same bag as other stuff (she was going to put it with a tomato!)
We just got an Aldi's in town, though and I'm going to try that when I next need groceries.
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charby

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Re: self checkouts
« Reply #40 on: June 05, 2021, 10:32:23 PM »
Of course, the alternative way of looking at that is to say that you already got your 10% discount. By adopting more efficient business practices Walmart has been able to control human capital costs and avoid raising prices.

You're welcome.

I went to WalMart today, I went to the only checker in the store, paid the same as the folks using self checkout.
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zxcvbob

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Re: self checkouts
« Reply #41 on: June 05, 2021, 11:15:47 PM »
When I was in Texas; don't remember if it was this year or last year, I went to Kroger's to get a week's worth of groceries for 4 people.  I'm used to shopping at Aldi where they don't have self-checkouts and the checkers are super fast.  When I go to Walmart, Home Depot, or HyVee I do the self checkout because I just have a few items. 

I went thru the little self-checkout with a heaping cart full of groceries.   :facepalm:  It would have been fine if I'd grabbed a second cart to load the bags into, but I didn't realize that until it was too late.  I mentioned it to the checker next week when I was there, and she said something like "Oh, Darlin'!" :)
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Perd Hapley

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Re: self checkouts
« Reply #42 on: June 05, 2021, 11:23:06 PM »
Just today I had to pointedly tell the casher/bagger to please NOT put my raw steak in the same bag as other stuff (she was going to put it with a tomato!)

That reminds me of one of my wife's many stories about the young women she works with. It's a pre-school, so she has a lot of coworkers in their 20s. One girl was trying to learn some cooking skills, so she went to a store to buy steak for the first time, so she could take it home and cook it. But every package she looked at had blood in it! Gross!  :rofl:
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MechAg94

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Re: self checkouts
« Reply #43 on: June 05, 2021, 11:28:08 PM »
When I was in Texas; don't remember if it was this year or last year, I went to Kroger's to get a week's worth of groceries for 4 people.  I'm used to shopping at Aldi where they don't have self-checkouts and the checkers are super fast.  When I go to Walmart, Home Depot, or HyVee I do the self checkout because I just have a few items. 

I went thru the little self-checkout with a heaping cart full of groceries.   :facepalm:  It would have been fine if I'd grabbed a second cart to load the bags into, but I didn't realize that until it was too late.  I mentioned it to the checker next week when I was there, and she said something like "Oh, Darlin'!" :)
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Bogie

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Re: self checkouts
« Reply #44 on: June 06, 2021, 01:35:56 AM »
Aldi is about the only place that lets the cashiers sit. Which makes sense. But middle managers seem to love watching people with hurting feet...
 
Aldi also has a bar code on EVERY SIDE of all of their products, which, quite frankly, seem to be equal to a lot of name brand products. All the cashier needs to do is keep them moving.
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K Frame

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Re: self checkouts
« Reply #45 on: June 06, 2021, 07:54:33 AM »
"Turned out she forgot to scan a $40 jug of algaecide."

Some years ago Castle Key, another friend, and I were doing a run to pick up something and bring it back to his house. Along the way we stopped at a Sheetz convenience store to get some snacks and beer.

The girl at the register (teenager who clearly didn't care and was totally pissed off at having to be there) didn't scan the beer. Castle tried to point it out, was told "I scanned it," and so we walked out and got back on the road with a free $24 pack of beer that she couldn't be bothered with.

That was damned good tasting beer.
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K Frame

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Re: self checkouts
« Reply #46 on: June 06, 2021, 07:56:44 AM »
"Just today I had to pointedly tell the casher/bagger to please NOT put my raw steak in the same bag as other stuff (she was going to put it with a tomato!) "

But they're both red! It's OK if they're both red!
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K Frame

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Re: self checkouts
« Reply #47 on: June 06, 2021, 07:58:26 AM »
I went to WalMart today, I went to the only checker in the store, paid the same as the folks using self checkout.

As I said, you already got your discount through controlled HR costs. The fact that everyone gets the same discount doesn't make it any less of a discount.

Or you any more special. :rofl:
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Perd Hapley

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Re: self checkouts
« Reply #48 on: June 06, 2021, 09:18:59 AM »

The girl at the register (teenager who clearly didn't care and was totally pissed off at having to be there) didn't scan the beer. Castle tried to point it out, was told "I scanned it," and so we walked out and got back on the road with a free $24 pack of beer that she couldn't be bothered with.

I guess the law may vary by state, but I was under the impression a cashier under 21 can't sell booze. Maybe she didn't feel like calling the manager.
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HankB

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Re: self checkouts
« Reply #49 on: June 06, 2021, 10:11:11 AM »
I refuse to use them, I don't work there. Offer me a employee discount at the self check out register and I'll think about it.
Local paper had a story a while back about the "banana discount."

Local grocery chain (HEB) has scales and tag printers in their produce department - they encourage customers to weigh and tag their own produce. SOME people have found that they can get discounted steaks by putting a "bananas" sticker on them and then scanning it in the self check aisle. So 47 cents a pound rather than ten or twelve dollars.

Discount? Well, only if you consider theft by shoplifting to be a "discount."
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