Saturday, November 17, 2007 , the wee hours

Who really uses those self-checkout stands?

Does your grocery store have the new self-checkout stands?  There are usually about four of them grouped together, and they allow you to scan your grocery purchases, bag them, and pay for them, all by yourself.  There’s a store employee watching over the area to make sure no one cheats, and to fix all the problems that the customers are invariably having.  We’ve used the stands about six times, and I think we’ve encountered some weird issue at least four of those times.  I don’t really like them, but I’m generally safe because those checkouts are always full during busy store hours.  I really thought that people would avoid them, but it looks like many people love them.  I’d much rather let an experienced checkout person handle the job for me.

We make a lot of emergency grocery store trips late at night, when the stores are quiet (I often run out of cat food around 11pm).  There’s usually one checkout stand open, and then a bunch of self-checkouts.  We get stuck using the self-checkouts at these times, when one person is in the one open checkstand buying $400 worth of groceries.  If we just have three or four things, we’ll be brave and try to check out ourselves.  The automated voice is supposed to be helpful, but it’s just bossy.  It screams, “Put your item in the bag!” if you don’t do it quickly enough, and I feel embarrassed and chastized.

We ended up doing last-minute shopping yesterday, and had to use the self-checkout.  Some naughty folks before us hadn’t taken their receipts and coupons with them when they left the store!  I know the automated voice was yelling at them as they walked away (and maybe it’s going to call them up, after researching their phone numbers via their Fresh Values cards).  I took their receipts as well as ours, and took a peek at what they’d purchased.  One person bought just Scotch Tape (aka, “SCTCH TAPE), for $2.99.  Another person bought Arizona Iced Tea, quantity 1, for $3.49.  They saved 30 cents because it was on sale, but I still think that’s pretty pricey for a bottled drink.  Speaking of bottled drinks, there were no leftover receipts for booze… those people probably take their receipts and make sure they get thrown away.  A researcher could almost make a claim that self-checkout users only buy one item, but then we came aong and bought five things to totally screw up the study (the imaginary study in my mind). 

Do you like the self-checkouts?  Do all your grocery stores have them?  I think two out of three big chains here have adopted them (Flippy will correct me if I’m wrong).  I appreciate that they’re a time-saver for some people, but I sure hope it’s not the wave of the future.  Grocery store checkers may have problems with carpal tunnel from repetitive scanning, but at least they have health insurance.  I have enough problems already without health insurance, and I don’t need the added burden of scanning/packing 100 lbs. of groceries,, or dropping a can of peaches on my foot.

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 11/17 at 12:42 AM
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