Self-Serve Grocery Checkouts: Pro or Con?

That could be the issue here. Pretty much everyone brings their own bags as there is a 5 cent tax on each plastic bag you get from the store. If the scale 'recognizes' them, it could be more of a problem here than in some other areas.

I bring my own bags and never have a problem.

I think that maybe I had to adjust at the beginning at the store that has the scale where the bags are -- the other store doesn't, I prefer that. Anyway, at the store with the scales, I put the bag on the scale first, before activating anything, and the system seems fine with that.

a FIVE CENT TAX...!!!

that's un-american...

Don't those scales have the zeroing feature that asks you to put the bag on empty and it zeroes out the weight of the bag from the total? If not, that's stealing from you.

There's a word for that in English, you know--tare.

Almost everything in Canada is un-American . . . oh . . . wait . . . that was a joke, huh?

ahhh. tare weight or unburdened weight. thanks.

I tried this weighing thing with my head actually empty of thoughts and then weighed it with my head full of thoughts. Scales didn't budge.

That used to be called tare back in my lab days, Rags.

Me, I like conversations with the clerks and, like Chai, maybe other customers.
It's part of my social life, heh.

On the other hand, when I have tried the self serve machines, I'm just not fast enough at it, and I don't like lines of people waiting for me to do something. Part of this is my vision/clumsiness thing, sort of the opposite of Soz' situation. I probably haven't had produce in my cart when I did use them - having to figure out how to check those would probably ramp up my anxiety quotient.

I've always been a little slow to understand machines, even when I ran labs. Luckily, once I caught on, usually quickly enough in any case, I was quite the swifty, but there was always a short period of machine tharn for me.



edit - (just saw Set's post)

It's not on the scale that weighs your food for purchase. There is a scale in the bagging shelf that makes sure you're not slipping things into the bag that you haven't paid for.

HOLY CRAP!

I just learned something.
I was just weighing something on my postage scale and the "on" button says "tare" next to it. Never thought of what that meant. If I had to guess I would have said it was canadian for "don't worry about it, just turn the scale on".

Thoughts be evanescent kinds of things, and an entire encyclopedia won't tip the scales at a gram . . . so your scale probably just wasn't sensitive enough to register the excellence of your understanding . . .


. . . 'scuse me . . . i gotta go be ill somewhere . . .

There's a really large school for the deaf here.

? Was the humor lost here somewhere?

I love 'em but the local store got rid of them. The manager said they were getting robbed blind.

I only used it once. They had a guy standing there watching to make sure you scanned everything you bagged so I figured if he’s getting paid to just stand there he should at least scan everything for me.

As for the bags, we have a grocery store called Publix here, I bought a few of their vinyl bags and that’s what I use every time I go.

I usually avoid the self-serve, initially because it made me nervous. A bigger issue is the design of the scale/bagging contraption which at Kroger is too small if you want to bag your stuff by weight or refrigerated/ frozen. I shop at 8 am on Sundays. The real person checkout rarely has a line. A number of the baggers have mental issues. They are eager to please.
Labor is a big expense for grocery stores that often operate on thin margins. Self-check out was seen as partial solution.
When I get home I take the 3-minute on-line Kroger Customer Satisfaction survey (hoping to win a $100 gift-card). I noticed that lately there have been a lot of survey questions re self-checkout.

Related to...

Does your library have self check out?

I love it.

I'm surprised at what many people here are saying. The Kroger near my apartment in Ohio had six self check-out lanes, and one employee was stationed there. They were always really busy, but they also all moved along quickly. From appearances, they were very popular.

Yeah, Kroger is one of the places I go, theirs works great and also seems to be pretty popular.

Chai, why yes, I DO love the self-serve library thingies!

I just dislike standing around and waiting in general, and I think I have some discomfort with people doing things for me that I could easily do myself.

Anyway I went shopping today and took some mental notes. Mental note one -- yes, these clerks are super chatty. (Setanta, was that your experience in the Columbus area?) I looked around and pretty much all of them were chatting away. Two -- I usually run into people I know at the store (that happened today). I chat with them happily, mostly because of the speech-thought correlation, I think. I'm not anti-chat in general, just clerk-specific chat gives me fits. Chatting with fellow customers (i.e. strangers) happens sometimes too, especially when I'm with sozlet, that's fine. Three -- I did have a frictionless exchange with the clerk today (I got a bunch of stuff), she was new (at least I didn't recognize her) and didn't seem very chatty. Just asked for my store card, which I figured out easily enough from context, then standard announcing-the-total-price and thank-you's at the end.

I really don't like them.....grocery shopping is such a drudge, and after you go forage for all your items, you get to scan them too? I don't think so, don't like them, never use them....reminds me of that old movie "2001', and I don't even get to talk to HAL.