You must log in or register to comment.
1 of the 2 is an overworked regular, the other a student that started last week.
Also, I avoid self checkout, it takes away jobs.
Yesterday. Supermakrket was packed of people and 2/12 cashregister were only available. Line was moving slowly. Self check out was also full. Me. Holding my best to not release of what ever my stomach created from of that burrito I ate from a parking lot.
I really dislike that most groceries don’t have one big line that feeds into registers. It’s just stupid to allow me to get stuck behind someone who’s arguing about a coupon for 5 minutes while people who came after me flow through the other registers.
The grocery by me also never seems to have enough checkout staff to keep the lines short. There’s a lot of people with full carts, and no express line. I end up waiting for 10 minutes to buy some bread and bananas .
I get carded but still comply, never have to do this overseas. I got really pissed once because some bitch–Karen went out of her way, I need to check your ID with a manager. So I felt bad for all the people waiting behind me. I’m almost 40 and have gray hair on my beard. Honestly, I’ll admit that it pleases me that she’s out of a job since the store closed (it’s becoming an Aldi).
The Costco near me used to have one single line for all lanes of self checkout machines, it was great. Then some months ago they switched it to a line per lane and I hate it so much. I think it’s just stupid “perceptions” — people probably just “feel like” it takes longer when it’s one long line, so they’re happy to wait longer in a shorter line because visually “their turn is coming soon.”
I think I’ve read that it is about perception, which is up there with children thinking the tall, narrow, glass has more water after pouring the short wide glass into it.
The corporation that runs the store does not care how long you wait or what your experience while waiting is like. They’re likely one of just a handful of grocery stores you can easily get to, they or another corpo just like them own those other stores too, and they know you’ll keep coming back because you very nearly have to. So long as there is enough space in that cavernous warehouse for you to wait they don’t care if it takes you hours and makes you miserable, they get paid either way, at most they’ll hire more security to keep the place pacified. Grocery stores have become a food distribution cartel, often a food distribution monopoly.
What’s amusing is, even big stores are capable of this. Back when Black Friday was huge still, places like Walmart would set up this style of checkout queue.
I’ve learned a few things standing in grocery lines. Look for cashiers on the younger side, they just tend to work quicker and less small talk. Look for lines with no elderly, they are the ones who complain about the price tag showing 5 cents cheaper or an expired coupon, pay by check etc… Look for no kids with parents, the parents get distracted and things just go wrong.
It’s not a perfect system, but it’s saved me many times.
Also 3 people with small orders will normally take longer than 1 person with a big order. One of the biggest time syncs is people paying.
Oh man this is one of my pet peeves. You’re standing in line, then in front of the cashier. All to pay for your stuff. Then it’s this whole production werin a look of surprise that, yes you do actually have to pay, followed by 5 minutes of digging through the bag for your card.
Most people pay with a card. You can usually tap your card as soon as the cashier scans something.
Minor correction, please take it in the kindly manner it is offered:
Time sink indicates something that takes time. Time is sunk in a time sink.
Time sync would indicate a synchronizing of time.
Your meaning is very clear from context though, so no worries. 🙂
I end up waiting for 10 minutes to buy some bread and bananas
I could literally walk down to the end of the street and buy my bananas from the gentleman who’s been operating the same produce stall for the last decade, then a loaf of bread from the bakery next door, and be home within 10 minutes. I don’t want to make assumptions, but if bread and bananas requires you to travel to a packed general store, wherever you live, it’s a city planning hellscape.
Vanishingly few places in the US have this density of small provisions vendors. I’ve been lucky enough to live in several, but it’s certainly become a privilege.
That’s the US and supermarket dominance for ya.
US zoning laws are a fucking farce. They were developed to facilitate racial segregation in the 1910s and never really went away.
I’d say it’s the automobile that ruined it all.
Racism comes in more with white flight and suburban sprawl. Then it all collapses.
The automobile was just one additional way to do the racism.
You live in the suburbs and drive to the shopping malls because the blacks can’t afford the cars to get there.
Literally a society designed on apartheid.
And ultimately it’s now trapped the people who supported it because they’re now 80 and can’t safely drive anywhere. Just decaying alive in their 3BR suburban cul-de-sac tombs while private equity waits like a vulture to reclaim the property.
The racism was always there. The automobile enables the racism to do more damage.
The supermarket can’t exist and ruin the small market without the automobile, no matter how racist society is.
The supermarket is a 5 minute walk from my apartment, and for the past few years didn’t have big lines. I don’t know if they changed staffing, or it got more popular, or what.
There are some smaller grocers that don’t typically have long lines nearby, but I don’t think they have the big tubs of peanut butter I lust after, or a few other things I sometimes get. I should probably check out the smaller grocers anyway
And there’s a chance you’ll be stuck behind someone at each one, so your reply has got less to do with what you’re replying to and more to do with your desire to make a different point.
The main queue is a really good idea
The store I work at has started coaching the self checkout assistant to bring customers with a large cart of items that try to use self checkout to an empty lane and ring them out. We do this to try and keep the self checkout relatively quick moving with smaller baskets
I feel so fortunate to be able to shop at HEB. They always have a ton of registers open and quickly flex as volumes change. I feel this meme on the rare occasion I go to Target though
Last time I went to target if like like a Kmart just before the company gave up. My bank even flagged the purchase as fraud because they couldn’t believe I was in there.
That’s funny, the one time my credit card info was stolen, what triggered the card freeze was a purchase made at Target just outside the city.
Time to use the self checkout to save time!
- Please wait 5 minutes for an associate to verify you aren’t stealing
- Please wait another 5 minutes for an associate because you scanned alcohol
- please wait yet another 5 minutes for an associate because we just do that if you have too many items
- please wait for, believe it not, another 5 minutes for an associate because our coupons just never work at the self checkout
- please wait 5 more minutes because fuck you that’s why
No thanks, I’ll just go to the regular checkout lane from now on.
They have AI systems now trying to detect if you’re stealing stuff by scanning one item while putting multiple items in your bag. All it really does is make it so you can’t hold multiple items in one hand while scanning and packing them one at a time with the other. The number of false positives make it so the one sorry employee running the stall is never actually going to stop actual theft.
I wanted self checkout to avoid awkward social contact, not to feel even more observed, damn.
Capitalism says no to technology as liberation. Technology as oppression only.
please wait another 5 minutes to pay in cash
For me, it’s the card readers freezing when i try to do split payments. They use the worst card readers available on the market
Had to explain to my daughter why there are so many empty checkout lanes, and it struck me that I’m gonna have to explain a lot of ruins of a civilization that used to be a bit more human.
I wish scan and go would be more common.
- Bring your own bags.
- Scan and bag items as you go.
- Check in at register and walk out. I’ve got two little kids and it’s the best way. It’s a shame that only Walmart offers scan and go in my area and it’s behind a subscription.
BJ’s does that and it’s very fast. They have a guy at the exit do a spot check, but there’s basically no line.
BJ’s does have an annual subscription though, which sucks.
That sounds super convenient.
The concept of a Walmart subscription is hilarious to me, as well.
And then there are the store who are entirely self checkout aside from one person to enter codes or some shit. Gee thanks, I can drive to the store, find my own stuff, cart it around, check myself out bag my stuff and you get to maximize profit?
Yet the self checkout is only ever 1/4 of the capacity of the POS and is 100% full. Should be the other way around.
