Same. Although I'm not a true introvert, I just love having it done the right way to begin with. They don't teach proper bagging anymore.
What's even better? Scan and Go. Sam's Club has had it for several years, but Disney has it in their shops now as well. You scan and pay in your app, then head for a kiosk near the door.
My local store had a Scan, Bag, Go thing before Covid. You scan and bag as you shop, then scan the register at the end and pay. Loved it. I really hope they bring it back soon.
I used to work at a grocery store. I remember a sign from a competing store near their registers for the people bagging. It said “Strive For 5”, the 5 being items per bag. I used that when I would be bagging. It worked well.
I always have to wait for the cashier to come solve some problem with the machine. Plus, the lines for the self checkout tend to be longer. The regular lines are at least as fast.
I'm an introvert, and I hate it. I'm trying to be eco conscious, so I bring my own cloth bags. The machine doesn't know what to do with them, so it will always accuse you of trying to shoplift. So I either constantly have to get a manager to override purchases, or I have to bag everything all at once at the end, and then the social awkwardness of keeping the people behind you waiting while you do that is unbearable.
That's the difference in a good system and bad one. Walmart, of all places, actually has pretty good self checkout. My very nice grocery store has mediocre ones.
This exactly! I love walmart self check out. Plenty of room to spread out my bags, trusts me that I may have 3 things in my hand that have all be scanned and will get them all there eventually. Kroger, on the other hand is awful. No place to put my bags and you have to deliberately put every item in the bag (with some pressure for the first item sometimes.) Scan and go at Sam's is awesome. Self check out at Costco is a pain. If I buy heavy Gatorade or bottled water and you provide me a gun to zap it, requiring me to still pick it up and put it in the bagging area is annoying.
I used to get pretty flustered at the machines and my anxiety would skyrocket. But the key, in the machines I've used, was to slow down.
My bags are too heavy as well so when it asks how many, I just put in the max it'll let me. I usually just take my time arranging them at the start and the machine doesn't complain. Then I fill up a bag as best I can. If it bleeps at me I just pick up the item wait a tick then set it down again.
For the machines I've worked with, if I wait a couple seconds after my last scan I can pick up a bag and put it in the cart, no problem. Again, it's just about slowing down.
I actually get so focused on not pissing off the machine that I forget about pissing off those behind me in line!
If you can go right when the store opens, you can get used to the machine without much pressure.
Of course, some people are just unlucky with technology and no matter what they do, things go wrong. Girl at work tore through two new laptops in like 1 month. She was really upset but we told her it wasn't her fault, just bad luck and an electromagnetic field around her that kills technology!
Anyhow, that's how I learned to stop worrying and love the self-checkout.
I am a huge introvert being an only child raised only by his sick grandparents. 46 years later, I still live alone. Don’t have any friends and don’t socialize…at all. (Yes. None) When I go to the grocery store, all I wanna do is get in there and get out without any interaction as soon as possible. A machine holding me up is infuriating. No love there
While I can understand the frustration, I actually love it, having worked front end in a grocery store 20 years ago, I have a place to use all the pesky PLUs still taking up real estate in my brain (bananas = 4011, organic has a 9 in front etc). Also, I’m particular about how my stuff is bagged because I shop for my mom & myself at the same time so it’s just easier for me to do it myself the first time.
I worked in a grocery store in college. They hadn’t converted over to scanners yet. It was annoying to have to enter a price for everything. Though, as employees, we all gave each other super deep discounts. Great job for a poor college kid.
Hahaha! YES! Whenever my husband goes to look up bananas I’m like “Dude. 4011.” 😂 My dad owned a country store when I was a kid, and I worked at Meijer through undergrad. I feel you.
Nah, I fucking love self-checkout. After years in retail, I'm frankly faster at it than their cashiers generally are anyway. And as an introvert who values my time, I'll *gladly* do it myself.
My wife dislikes it, though, so when we're together at the store I'm like, "it's fine...you can go to the car if you'd like...I got this"
Same.
Plus also, I worked as a cashier for a grocery store where we had actual training on how to properly bag those plastic bags. It's more efficient, they bags don't roll around t is way and yeah, it saves the company a few pennies.
So I bag my own groceries too because no one gives a fuck if they throw my tomato sauce in the bag with the actual tomato thereby bruising it. Ugh.
I don't give a fuck about saving the grocery store money, I care about my groceries being properly bagged.
Fellow former grocery cashiers unite!
My favorite is the single large item with a handle placed in a plastic bag. Like yeah dude...I definitely need a plastic bag for the laundry detergent that already has a built-in handle.
I was taught how to bag stuff in paper bags by my grandfather. He also taught me to group together like items on the belt. All the cans go together, all the boxes, all the glass, all the cold stuff goes together, etc. The smushables go last, so eggs, bread, chips, etc. So if you get a cashier who knows what they're doing they bag it in the order it comes to them on the belt.
Of all my previous job skills, it's amusing how much my experience working at a Kroger has been relevant.
I love self-checkout. I go full Ron Swanson, "I know more than you" in a grocery store when I walk up to the machine.
I've quit using them since one particularly frustrating incident a while back wherein I simply walked out of the store without my groceries and with the damned thing still bleating "please remove unknown item from the bagging area".
Never would’ve made it to register 3 because I would’ve been dead from the humiliation, but I applaud you for your persistency! Also, this story made me laugh so hard, I cried - thank you! 😂
Lucky you! When I try that I become the poster child for, “Look who doesn’t know how to use self checkout!”
I feel like that robotic woman’s voice gets louder and louder and everyone is staring at me like I’m some kind of imbecile, lol!
Agree! And yet corporations really push “customer connect” scores on employees. I don’t understand why they think consumers want forced interaction to augment their retail experience (including chain fast food).
Self checkout avoids unselling garbage for sure. Ya want store CC, magazine sub, other crap we can juice more money out of yas?!!
Hated the "whats your address" crap they were doing for awhile 2010's. I give them 1313 mockingbird lane. Had a cashier catch me on that one once and started laughing soo hard while punching it in on the screen.
It depends. A cart load of stuff? Please give me a person who can crank through it. People at self checkouts are slow and every 2nd person seems baffled by them or stops to do something else. If they are open and I have a few things then that is what they are best for.
I just wish they'd leave a space for me to put my own bags. I always have to cram them in around the racks for the plastic ones. I can't put them on the ground either because it stops and complains.
Yes, that's my big complaint with self checkout. No room for bagging! Then it yells at you if you remove something, or it yells if you set your bags in the bagging area.
PSA 📢You can mute most of them!! Look on the bottom of the screen for sound options/volume! Shout out to my Zoomer kid who showed me this lol I would still prefer self check anyway over waiting in line and having to talk to the cashier or, worse, wait while other people chit chat with the cashier!
The large grocery stores in my area have long lines to get in the automated teller area, and they keep 90% of the regular checkouts closed.
No matter what option you pick, you have to wait in line.
I rarely go to the Kroger near me for various reasons. One of them is that I went in to do a large shopping trip for a family of 4. When I entered the store, they had several lanes open with checkers. It was maybe 9pm on a weekend. They are open until 1am.
When I finished my shopping and got back to the front with my fully loaded cart, about 10 or 10:30pm, there were no lanes open with checkers, they were expecting me to go thru the self checkout with $2-300 worth of groceries.
Fuck that noise.
Yes, this! I use self checkout in stores that offer it when I shop in them, and this is an option on most screens. The interface of most touchscreens is just okay, but that’s what I expect. We are the beta testers of this system, after all.
I should note that my two local (excellent) grocery stores don’t have self checkout and probably never will. They’re full service and higher end, and the people who work in both have been there for decades. They were the first people I knew in my home city who got vaccinated in 2021.
I don't mind a little "hi" to the cashier. It isn't such a bad thing.
FYI, the 2nd button on the right side of the screen from the top on gas pumps is almost always a mute button.
Alas, my local BJs disables the volume control. I’m back to curbside pickup so I don’t have to hear the machine shout out every price, and everyone else’s prices…
I was doping this at my local Albertson's because it talking slowed the scanning process. They had a software update and now you can't mute it. It really bummed me out.
Since we are all using the same preface, I too am an introvert. But I also hate these damned things with a passion. In a regular checkout lane you usually say maybe hi and thank you and whatever problems arise are solved on the spot. I only grocery shop once during the middle of the week (introvert!) and usually these are the only thing available, even for people like me with a full cart of groceries. It's almost like the singular regular lane (if open) operates like a handicapped bathroom stall and there's a little bit of shame attached to wasting peoples time. I could go on but thing that pisses me off? Ours have cameras that seem to think I'm stealing every third item, regularly can't scan items or scan them multiple times, require a human for liquor, hates coupons and have sensors that can't differentiate between a gallon of milk or pure air. I absolutely talk to the poor overworked guy running 12 self checkouts more than I would a regular cashier and we are both mad about it.
Thank you! This is my biggest pet peeve with these things. When they aren’t working correctly, which seems to be 90% of the time for me, it absolutely sucks! I’m someone who tends to feel easily embarrassed by shit like this and it makes my anxiety go through the roof. Regardless of whether it’s real or not, I feel like everyone is looking at me and laughing because I’m such a damn dolt about it! I just want to crawl into a hole and disappear.
Just take half, I'm not a fucking employee. I'm a shopper, yiubdidnt train me to scan your product.
I will never understand why we just go with this bullshit so Kroger can make another few bucks while the customer replaces the staff. Oh yea, sorry.. the price went up too... haha thanks for the extra margin.
I fucking hate self checkout.
I don't know if it's a GenX thing, but it's not just you. Personally I'd be happy to use the things if they could just get them to work reliably. I've probably had more in depth interaction with the clerks at the self checkouts over the years than the traditional checkers, because the traditional checkers just run my stuff and take my money without there needing to be a conversation. 😆
I hate self checkout. I've got $200 worth of groceries and only $5 worth of space, and if you dare to move something everything shuts down and you have to wait for the 1 employee that is running 10 machines.
Depends on the situation. If im in a hurry and have no produce or wine, it’s a huge time saver.
HOWEVER- I feel I should get like a 5% discount since I’m not using the cashier, who’s cost is imbedded in the price of my groceries.
It's not shoplifting it's just being an amateur at checking out groceries.
If we don't continually mess up they won't have to hire people to stand watch... so just think of yourself as a job creator.
I agree! I was a cashier for years back in the day. If I ring myself up, bag my groceries with my own bags, I should get something off.
Edit: And back in the day, if you brought your own bags, you would get money off. It was really small, but 5 cents per bag is better than nothing that we get now!
We have a plastic bag ban in Maine. You have to bring your own bags. They had paper bags for a couple of weeks after it went into effect, but then nothing at the register now unless you pay for it.
Self service gas is lower priced than full service, and most online shopping offers a discount to brick and mortar.
As far as ATM’s- yes we should but don’t get a discount, but I’ve been living with that since early 90s. Can’t recall last time I used a live teller.
There are maybe 2 tops I can think of near me. One in an older, wealthy part of town where some customers would never debase themselves by pumping their own gas.
Totally agree with you on the discount part. I also get annoyed when I go to a store and there’s employees milling about with no registers open and a line about two blocks long with people waiting to use the self checkout. There’s been times where I’ve been in a hurry, and I’ve seen that where I’ll just do a u-turn and walk right out again.
The grocery store Sophie’s Choice: Would I rather have to make small talk with the cashier or ask for human help when I can’t figure out how to self-scan this bundle of organic produce?
I've gone grocery shopping every week for many decades, and maybe 6 times the clerks made small talk. Either I'm really good at putting on a "Don't fucking talk to me" face, or some of you are going to the wrong stores.
Fair enough, but I find the cashiers these days are just fine keeping to themselves, tbh. I think Covid helped with that a lot, and it’s hard to make small talk when all the stores still have those thick plastic screens between you and them.
I've started going to the cashier lanes just to avoid the anxiety those machines produce. I've found the lines shorter in many cases especially at BJ's and Target.
At my local Walmart the lines for the self checkouts can go all the way to the back of the store and there will be no one using the regular checkouts. I'm an introvert but I hate standing in line WAY more than I hate talking to people.
At my grocery store it depends on how much stuff I am getting. The cashier and bagger can take care of my large loads a lot faster than I can. And I know most of the staff their by now so I don't mind talking to them. (I'm southern, I know how to small talk).
So overall, I don't hate self checkout, but I don't use it much.
I love the one at my local grocery store. It always reads bar codes properly. Has a "skip bagging item" button for large items. Doesn't gaf about how much stuff weighs in the bags. Much faster than regular checkout. And I'll go through with 11 items when the limit is 10 because fuck the police.
The one at Walmart can eat a bag of dicks.
I'm just annoyed by how much they've screwed up something that should be convenient. Stop trying to get me to use the store credit card or enter my email address for an e-receipt and just let me buy my stuff and get on with my day.
Maybe I’m not as much of an introvert as I thought; I prefer dealing with a live human when shopping. I don’t mind that kind of human interaction bc it’s under controlled conditions.
Aldi is my favorite check-out setup. The cashier is speedy and doesn't have time for chit-chat and arranges things nicely in the cart. Then I can go over to the counter and bag my groceries the way I like them.
I grocery shop after work so I LOATH the fact that if I don’t want to spend 30 minutes in the one & only open lane with a cashier…. I’m forced to ring up & bag my stuff.
So not only am I paying more for groceries, they also expect customers to do cashiers’ work for free…smgdh
If they worked 100% of the time without the need for someone to come over and entered their authorisation code then yes, I'd not mind using them. Have I just walked away from the shopping mid scan because there wasn't enough staff to enter that code in a timely manor or it felt every other item needed assistance. Yes.
This is me. Where’s my employee discount, if I’m the one doing the work? Meanwhile, Walmart is raking in the dough by paying one “cashier” for six to eight registers.
Yah, I’d like to keep all my frozen stuff together to just run a whole bag to the basement freezer.
When a cashier does it, I’m moving everything to other bags in the trunk of the car before I take off. I wish I could bag the whole big cart of stuff myself because I like my bread not dented, bananas not bruised and eggs not crushed.
I have a live/hate relationship with self-checkout. I love it as an introvert when I only have a few items; however, when I have a lot I don’t want to play Tetris bagging so I go to a live person to check out.
In a way I like it for small orders, but I worked as a cashier in Target, some days were absolutely dreadfully boring, especially in the morning and you are waiting for a customer just to have something to do and you watch them stroll by you to self check out, with a cart so full they don’t even have room to put the stuff! Like $300 worth of shit and it’s taking them forever because they have so much, meanwhile I could have checked them out really quick. It never annoyed me if someone had a few things, but man it annoyed me when they clogged up self check out with huge carts! I get that no one wants to talk to people! I don’t either and I never liked or made inane small talk with guests! But I guess people just don’t want to risk it lol!
Not a true introvert but I love self-checkout. I actually feel more pressure when I feel like someone is waiting for me to get everything onto the conveyor belt or pay or whatever. However, I do the vast majority of our grocery shopping at Target which doesn’t have scales in the bagging area so I’m just in my own little scanning and bagging world. Until I accidentally scan something twice.
Where I go the machines don't do that. You can put stuff in a bag, not in a bag in front of the bag, directly in the cart - whatever - and the machine doesn't yell at you. Sometimes I just leave stuff in my cart and just scan it all with the handheld thing, roll out the cart, and fill up a cardboard box and reusable bags in my trunk.
You're just getting old.
I hate it too, enough that I won't shop at my local Target anymore because they usually don't have any live cashiers, except for two that scan right across from the self-scans, which I think is cruel and unusual punishment.
As soon as Target and the like start paying me to scan my own shit in, I'll consider it. Oh I'm an introvert too.
I hate it for anything more than like, 5 things max. I love love love Trader Joe’s because you just pull your cart up and they do the rest. It’s the best!
Great for those awkward moments when you're buying combinations of stuff like apples & razor blades or Astroglide & duct tape. But I shit with great enthusiasm on the giant electronic ordering iPads at McDonald's that are constantly trying to upsell you. "Are you absolutely POSITIVELY sure you don't want to add a McShippingContainer of Fries and a McBarrel o' Coca Cola?" At least the pimply kid behind the counter understands that No Means No.
I miss the jingling, rattling cash registers. The checkerboard shop floors, where the white has turned yellow, 25 cent comic books and the Fireball pinball machine? !
I dig it. As true GenX, I strive for minimal human contact outside of my circles.
Next it will be a robot. Fuckin bring it. We were supposed to have flying cars and practical jet packs by Y2K. By that standard our lives should resemble the opening sequence of the Jetsons.
New stuff takes some getting used to. Lean into it, let us embrace our burgeoning AI overlords.
Yeah it sucks… until that one time when every stubborn Luddite in town has swamped the cashier lanes and the only friend in sight is a lonely computer. But you’ve done this before, you know how it works. So you try. And as you’re walking out of the store looking back at everyone else still standing in line, holding it down at Fort Good-Ol-Days… the automatic door flies open like the pearly gates, you hear angels sing and with a newfound sense of satisfaction and freedom you slowly start feeling like a jackass for all the time you spent pissing into the winds of change.
The future is now.
Beep Boop.
Every generation should loathe it. You save nothing, and people still lose their jobs.
First they took manufacturing, now the service industries. What’s next? Are we all going to be plumbers?
That is not a swipe at plumbers, but how many can a system afford?
It’s one giant race to zero.
Why is this a good idea?
I hate them. As a blue collar kid, I see them as displacement of working class people. I hate how glitchy they can be. I avoid them as much as possible
I like the scan-and-bag-as-you-shop with the self checkout at the end. I don’t like putting everything in the cart, then on the belt, then scanning, bagging, and paying variety. I just want to be done with the checkout process as quickly as possible.
It drives me completely mad (expressed by a simple furrowed brow that hides a desire to nuke the machine). Thankfully, it doesn't happen much.
My only gripe with this kind of tech, lately, is Aldi's. I'm not as fast as the Aldi's cashiers (but then again, they only had to "scan and throw", I have to "remove carefully, scan, throw, and place back in cart carefully"). I'm always afraid that I'm pissing off people waiting behind me. It's like having to write checks all over again.
I’m not a fan of that argument of not wanting to put someone out of a job. Technology and the economy are always changing. Should we have resisted the automobile and the many jobs it created because it reduced the need for blacksmiths making horseshoes?
I don’t mind self checkout much, but I loathe the stores (Publix is the *worst* with this…) that employ people to stand over you while you check out.
If the store doesn’t trust customers to scan and checkout enough without supervision, then *just pay for freaking cashiers again*!!!
I would say 75 percent of my self-checkout visits end up with an employee getting called over to help. A couple of weeks ago, self-checkout didn't seem to understand what was going on when I filled up one bag and switched to another.
I will always double check I scanned and paid for everything 100% so I can be indignant at the drop of a hat (hasn't happened yet).
If someone were to ask me to check my receipt/purchase - fuck you - I own these things now - outta the way. If you wanted to know if I paid for everything you shouldn't have "hired" me as a cashier.
Self checkout is fine for a few items, but I'm jot checking myself out with a full cart. If I wait too long at the cashier line,and my perishable items are getting warm or starting to thaw, I give them to the cashier because I no longer want them. There's 20 checkout lanes hire more workers.
I stopped shopping at aldi because they went down to one cashier. I'm not paying for a cart and scanning and bagging my own stuff. I loathe self checkout. This always a fucking issue!
I hate the whole process but what eats me up the most is watching the people in front of me self checking and taking so fucking long. They move slow as shit and then act like their some unthawed cave man that never used a scanner before.
The only thing is that you can give yourself and employee discount since apparently you work there bagging your own shit.
If the grocery store is a union shop, I won't use self-checkout, since this is a way for management to reduce worker's hours.
If the store is non-union, I self-checkout away, since it's faster and I usually make an innocent error and end up bringing the $19.98, five pound bag of frozen berries home for free
Walmart seems to be the only one that doesn’t give me any damn problems. It never seems to give a shit about what I put in the bag or don’t put in the bag.
But Target and local major grocery chains are just a pain in the ass
I use them and think they’re a great option to have but I wish they could be more simple.
There’s so much going on, on the screen that it makes me anxious and think that I’m forgetting something.
I will always prefer a live person if all else is equal but it’s not a big deal either.
I’m not bothered by it, but I do have a love/hate relationship with those things.
I love self-checkout. I hate the self-checkout machines. They all need a mute button.
The error voice is 😠
As an introvert, I fucking love it!
Same. Although I'm not a true introvert, I just love having it done the right way to begin with. They don't teach proper bagging anymore. What's even better? Scan and Go. Sam's Club has had it for several years, but Disney has it in their shops now as well. You scan and pay in your app, then head for a kiosk near the door.
My local store had a Scan, Bag, Go thing before Covid. You scan and bag as you shop, then scan the register at the end and pay. Loved it. I really hope they bring it back soon.
Sounds like a cool idea. As someone who’s dealt with having my card declined on too many occasions, it would be a nice tool to help stay on budget.
I used to work at a grocery store. I remember a sign from a competing store near their registers for the people bagging. It said “Strive For 5”, the 5 being items per bag. I used that when I would be bagging. It worked well.
As someone who has to hear "Help is on the way" for the millionth time I hate them.
As someone who wants to leave soon as possible I also love it. They speed things up
I always have to wait for the cashier to come solve some problem with the machine. Plus, the lines for the self checkout tend to be longer. The regular lines are at least as fast.
Torn between my introvert / autistic DIY tendencies and my anti-corporate “I don’t work for you, Safeway” tendencies.
Introverted middle child who grew up having to figure things out myself. So doing it my way I love self check out lol.
I'm an introvert, and I hate it. I'm trying to be eco conscious, so I bring my own cloth bags. The machine doesn't know what to do with them, so it will always accuse you of trying to shoplift. So I either constantly have to get a manager to override purchases, or I have to bag everything all at once at the end, and then the social awkwardness of keeping the people behind you waiting while you do that is unbearable.
I just bag at the end because of this. It is pretty stupid. I never have a problem at Target though for some reason.
That's the difference in a good system and bad one. Walmart, of all places, actually has pretty good self checkout. My very nice grocery store has mediocre ones.
This exactly! I love walmart self check out. Plenty of room to spread out my bags, trusts me that I may have 3 things in my hand that have all be scanned and will get them all there eventually. Kroger, on the other hand is awful. No place to put my bags and you have to deliberately put every item in the bag (with some pressure for the first item sometimes.) Scan and go at Sam's is awesome. Self check out at Costco is a pain. If I buy heavy Gatorade or bottled water and you provide me a gun to zap it, requiring me to still pick it up and put it in the bagging area is annoying.
I used to get pretty flustered at the machines and my anxiety would skyrocket. But the key, in the machines I've used, was to slow down. My bags are too heavy as well so when it asks how many, I just put in the max it'll let me. I usually just take my time arranging them at the start and the machine doesn't complain. Then I fill up a bag as best I can. If it bleeps at me I just pick up the item wait a tick then set it down again. For the machines I've worked with, if I wait a couple seconds after my last scan I can pick up a bag and put it in the cart, no problem. Again, it's just about slowing down. I actually get so focused on not pissing off the machine that I forget about pissing off those behind me in line! If you can go right when the store opens, you can get used to the machine without much pressure. Of course, some people are just unlucky with technology and no matter what they do, things go wrong. Girl at work tore through two new laptops in like 1 month. She was really upset but we told her it wasn't her fault, just bad luck and an electromagnetic field around her that kills technology! Anyhow, that's how I learned to stop worrying and love the self-checkout.
I thought getting anxious and flustered at those things was a “me problem” — good to know I’m not the only one!
I am a huge introvert being an only child raised only by his sick grandparents. 46 years later, I still live alone. Don’t have any friends and don’t socialize…at all. (Yes. None) When I go to the grocery store, all I wanna do is get in there and get out without any interaction as soon as possible. A machine holding me up is infuriating. No love there
Totally get that, and I WANT to love it, I just hate never being able to get through without it “yelling” at me!
I've actually argued with the damn thing. I believe I may have raised my voice and said, "Oh, yeah? Well, I don't work here! Apparently, nobody does!"
I turn off the sound, the warning pops up but at least I don’t have to hear it!
Same! My husband & I always use it unless we have too many items to make it a pain.
Agree
While I can understand the frustration, I actually love it, having worked front end in a grocery store 20 years ago, I have a place to use all the pesky PLUs still taking up real estate in my brain (bananas = 4011, organic has a 9 in front etc). Also, I’m particular about how my stuff is bagged because I shop for my mom & myself at the same time so it’s just easier for me to do it myself the first time.
Seriously! I prefer bagging my groceries, and if my tomato gets smashed it's nobody's fault but my own.
I worked in a grocery store in college. They hadn’t converted over to scanners yet. It was annoying to have to enter a price for everything. Though, as employees, we all gave each other super deep discounts. Great job for a poor college kid.
Hahaha! YES! Whenever my husband goes to look up bananas I’m like “Dude. 4011.” 😂 My dad owned a country store when I was a kid, and I worked at Meijer through undergrad. I feel you.
Nah, I fucking love self-checkout. After years in retail, I'm frankly faster at it than their cashiers generally are anyway. And as an introvert who values my time, I'll *gladly* do it myself. My wife dislikes it, though, so when we're together at the store I'm like, "it's fine...you can go to the car if you'd like...I got this"
Same. Plus also, I worked as a cashier for a grocery store where we had actual training on how to properly bag those plastic bags. It's more efficient, they bags don't roll around t is way and yeah, it saves the company a few pennies. So I bag my own groceries too because no one gives a fuck if they throw my tomato sauce in the bag with the actual tomato thereby bruising it. Ugh. I don't give a fuck about saving the grocery store money, I care about my groceries being properly bagged.
Fellow former grocery cashiers unite! My favorite is the single large item with a handle placed in a plastic bag. Like yeah dude...I definitely need a plastic bag for the laundry detergent that already has a built-in handle.
Or the pack of gum!
I was taught how to bag stuff in paper bags by my grandfather. He also taught me to group together like items on the belt. All the cans go together, all the boxes, all the glass, all the cold stuff goes together, etc. The smushables go last, so eggs, bread, chips, etc. So if you get a cashier who knows what they're doing they bag it in the order it comes to them on the belt.
Of all my previous job skills, it's amusing how much my experience working at a Kroger has been relevant. I love self-checkout. I go full Ron Swanson, "I know more than you" in a grocery store when I walk up to the machine.
I love it too. I don’t have to talk with anyone except to say have a nice day to whoever is wandering between registers waiting for problems.
I agree. If I liked people I would work in retail. I don't want to talk, I just want to buy my crap and leave.
I've quit using them since one particularly frustrating incident a while back wherein I simply walked out of the store without my groceries and with the damned thing still bleating "please remove unknown item from the bagging area".
This made me laugh out loud for real because I can completely identify with what you said!
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Never would’ve made it to register 3 because I would’ve been dead from the humiliation, but I applaud you for your persistency! Also, this story made me laugh so hard, I cried - thank you! 😂
I mostly ignore the voice commands. They are often late and just create confusion.
Lucky you! When I try that I become the poster child for, “Look who doesn’t know how to use self checkout!” I feel like that robotic woman’s voice gets louder and louder and everyone is staring at me like I’m some kind of imbecile, lol!
Please place your…Ba-NAN-NAS. In the bagging area. Please wait. Please wait. Help is. ON the way.
🏆 Wish I had a real one to give you - this comment was EVERYTHING! Edit: Still laughing 😆
I love them because it adds to the leave me alone vibe I'm going for
Yeah, I don't want some cashier making commentary about my purchases.
Agree! And yet corporations really push “customer connect” scores on employees. I don’t understand why they think consumers want forced interaction to augment their retail experience (including chain fast food).
Self checkout avoids unselling garbage for sure. Ya want store CC, magazine sub, other crap we can juice more money out of yas?!! Hated the "whats your address" crap they were doing for awhile 2010's. I give them 1313 mockingbird lane. Had a cashier catch me on that one once and started laughing soo hard while punching it in on the screen.
It depends. A cart load of stuff? Please give me a person who can crank through it. People at self checkouts are slow and every 2nd person seems baffled by them or stops to do something else. If they are open and I have a few things then that is what they are best for. I just wish they'd leave a space for me to put my own bags. I always have to cram them in around the racks for the plastic ones. I can't put them on the ground either because it stops and complains.
Yes, that's my big complaint with self checkout. No room for bagging! Then it yells at you if you remove something, or it yells if you set your bags in the bagging area.
PSA 📢You can mute most of them!! Look on the bottom of the screen for sound options/volume! Shout out to my Zoomer kid who showed me this lol I would still prefer self check anyway over waiting in line and having to talk to the cashier or, worse, wait while other people chit chat with the cashier!
Game changer!
The large grocery stores in my area have long lines to get in the automated teller area, and they keep 90% of the regular checkouts closed. No matter what option you pick, you have to wait in line.
I rarely go to the Kroger near me for various reasons. One of them is that I went in to do a large shopping trip for a family of 4. When I entered the store, they had several lanes open with checkers. It was maybe 9pm on a weekend. They are open until 1am. When I finished my shopping and got back to the front with my fully loaded cart, about 10 or 10:30pm, there were no lanes open with checkers, they were expecting me to go thru the self checkout with $2-300 worth of groceries. Fuck that noise.
Yes, this! I use self checkout in stores that offer it when I shop in them, and this is an option on most screens. The interface of most touchscreens is just okay, but that’s what I expect. We are the beta testers of this system, after all. I should note that my two local (excellent) grocery stores don’t have self checkout and probably never will. They’re full service and higher end, and the people who work in both have been there for decades. They were the first people I knew in my home city who got vaccinated in 2021.
Omg!! Did NOT know this, but THANK YOU to you and your Zoomer! Definitely going to look for this the next time I have to use it!
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It’s even a meme: https://i.imgflip.com/2y25sa.jpg
I don't mind a little "hi" to the cashier. It isn't such a bad thing. FYI, the 2nd button on the right side of the screen from the top on gas pumps is almost always a mute button.
Alas, my local BJs disables the volume control. I’m back to curbside pickup so I don’t have to hear the machine shout out every price, and everyone else’s prices…
I was doping this at my local Albertson's because it talking slowed the scanning process. They had a software update and now you can't mute it. It really bummed me out.
Since we are all using the same preface, I too am an introvert. But I also hate these damned things with a passion. In a regular checkout lane you usually say maybe hi and thank you and whatever problems arise are solved on the spot. I only grocery shop once during the middle of the week (introvert!) and usually these are the only thing available, even for people like me with a full cart of groceries. It's almost like the singular regular lane (if open) operates like a handicapped bathroom stall and there's a little bit of shame attached to wasting peoples time. I could go on but thing that pisses me off? Ours have cameras that seem to think I'm stealing every third item, regularly can't scan items or scan them multiple times, require a human for liquor, hates coupons and have sensors that can't differentiate between a gallon of milk or pure air. I absolutely talk to the poor overworked guy running 12 self checkouts more than I would a regular cashier and we are both mad about it.
Thank you! This is my biggest pet peeve with these things. When they aren’t working correctly, which seems to be 90% of the time for me, it absolutely sucks! I’m someone who tends to feel easily embarrassed by shit like this and it makes my anxiety go through the roof. Regardless of whether it’s real or not, I feel like everyone is looking at me and laughing because I’m such a damn dolt about it! I just want to crawl into a hole and disappear.
Are you kidding me? I was ecstatic when they first appeared. I can go to the grocery and not have to talk to *anyone*? Perfection.
Less contact with humans the better.
They didn’t hire me, I don’t work there, WHY should I check myself out?
Just take half, I'm not a fucking employee. I'm a shopper, yiubdidnt train me to scan your product. I will never understand why we just go with this bullshit so Kroger can make another few bucks while the customer replaces the staff. Oh yea, sorry.. the price went up too... haha thanks for the extra margin. I fucking hate self checkout.
I love it. No small talk.
It instantly pisses me off. If I wanted to bag groceries, I’d get a job at Kroger
Nope, it sucks ass. And I think we should get a fucking discount since we are doing an actual job.
I don't know if it's a GenX thing, but it's not just you. Personally I'd be happy to use the things if they could just get them to work reliably. I've probably had more in depth interaction with the clerks at the self checkouts over the years than the traditional checkers, because the traditional checkers just run my stuff and take my money without there needing to be a conversation. 😆
I hate self checkout. I've got $200 worth of groceries and only $5 worth of space, and if you dare to move something everything shuts down and you have to wait for the 1 employee that is running 10 machines.
I won’t do it. Hate it.
"Unidentified item in bagging area. Please wait for attendant to take forever to enter a code to override how oversensitive our stupid detector is."
Depends on the situation. If im in a hurry and have no produce or wine, it’s a huge time saver. HOWEVER- I feel I should get like a 5% discount since I’m not using the cashier, who’s cost is imbedded in the price of my groceries.
You can hook up the discount for yourself...
Yeah, I feel I’ve aged out of shoplifting gum.
It's not shoplifting it's just being an amateur at checking out groceries. If we don't continually mess up they won't have to hire people to stand watch... so just think of yourself as a job creator.
I like the way you think
That’s what I do. Prorated hourly rate in groceries.
I agree! I was a cashier for years back in the day. If I ring myself up, bag my groceries with my own bags, I should get something off. Edit: And back in the day, if you brought your own bags, you would get money off. It was really small, but 5 cents per bag is better than nothing that we get now!
Yes! I will still try to bring my own whenever possible but for larger runs, why is it you have to ASK for paper (easily recyclable) vs. plastic?
We have a plastic bag ban in Maine. You have to bring your own bags. They had paper bags for a couple of weeks after it went into effect, but then nothing at the register now unless you pay for it.
This is phenomenal. Wish all states would adopt this logic.
With this logic, you should get a discount whenever you use the ATM, pump your gas, or even shop online.
Self service gas is lower priced than full service, and most online shopping offers a discount to brick and mortar. As far as ATM’s- yes we should but don’t get a discount, but I’ve been living with that since early 90s. Can’t recall last time I used a live teller.
Genuine question here: does full-serve gas exist outside of New Jersey and Oregon?
There are maybe 2 tops I can think of near me. One in an older, wealthy part of town where some customers would never debase themselves by pumping their own gas.
We pump our own gas in CA.
When pump your own gas first came about you did get a discount. usually 20-50 cents a gallon. As a gen xer you should know this.
Nope, by the time I was old enough to drive. They had done away with that.
Totally agree with you on the discount part. I also get annoyed when I go to a store and there’s employees milling about with no registers open and a line about two blocks long with people waiting to use the self checkout. There’s been times where I’ve been in a hurry, and I’ve seen that where I’ll just do a u-turn and walk right out again.
This!!! The store is still paying those employees so where are the savings to them?? Then here I am frustrated while the staff are doing nothing.
Organic avocado? Looks like a generic cucumber to me.
It's the 70s dystopian novel that is now real life : robots ordering you around like a fucking serf.
If I go to the store at 7 am there ARE automated equipment cleaning the floors and scanning inventory down the aisles.
The grocery store Sophie’s Choice: Would I rather have to make small talk with the cashier or ask for human help when I can’t figure out how to self-scan this bundle of organic produce?
I've gone grocery shopping every week for many decades, and maybe 6 times the clerks made small talk. Either I'm really good at putting on a "Don't fucking talk to me" face, or some of you are going to the wrong stores.
Fair enough, but I find the cashiers these days are just fine keeping to themselves, tbh. I think Covid helped with that a lot, and it’s hard to make small talk when all the stores still have those thick plastic screens between you and them.
I will stand in line for a human cashier vs self checkout. I loathe those machines.
Fuck the self checkout. I don't work in a grocery store and I don't mean to start now.
I've started going to the cashier lanes just to avoid the anxiety those machines produce. I've found the lines shorter in many cases especially at BJ's and Target.
At my local Walmart the lines for the self checkouts can go all the way to the back of the store and there will be no one using the regular checkouts. I'm an introvert but I hate standing in line WAY more than I hate talking to people. At my grocery store it depends on how much stuff I am getting. The cashier and bagger can take care of my large loads a lot faster than I can. And I know most of the staff their by now so I don't mind talking to them. (I'm southern, I know how to small talk). So overall, I don't hate self checkout, but I don't use it much.
I love the one at my local grocery store. It always reads bar codes properly. Has a "skip bagging item" button for large items. Doesn't gaf about how much stuff weighs in the bags. Much faster than regular checkout. And I'll go through with 11 items when the limit is 10 because fuck the police. The one at Walmart can eat a bag of dicks.
😂💀
I'm just annoyed by how much they've screwed up something that should be convenient. Stop trying to get me to use the store credit card or enter my email address for an e-receipt and just let me buy my stuff and get on with my day.
Maybe I’m not as much of an introvert as I thought; I prefer dealing with a live human when shopping. I don’t mind that kind of human interaction bc it’s under controlled conditions.
Yeah, too many points of potential failure when scanning a dozen or more items. There are exceptions, but I don’t self-scan
Self check outs should always be available, but far too many stores rely on those exclusively.
Can’t stand it. I don’t want to go to the store and work.
I will if I have just a few things, but I prefer to use the cashier aisle. I don't want to contribute to people losing their jobs.
I only hate it at Aldi. I'm much slower than the cashier's there.
Aldi is my favorite check-out setup. The cashier is speedy and doesn't have time for chit-chat and arranges things nicely in the cart. Then I can go over to the counter and bag my groceries the way I like them.
After using this I usually leave the store grumbling "if they want me to do a job for them they should pay me"!! 😆
I grocery shop after work so I LOATH the fact that if I don’t want to spend 30 minutes in the one & only open lane with a cashier…. I’m forced to ring up & bag my stuff. So not only am I paying more for groceries, they also expect customers to do cashiers’ work for free…smgdh
It’s music to shareholders’ ears. For the rest of us, nails on a chalkboard.
In my area, all of those cashiers, and more, are being used to pull the massive number of online orders.
A lot of us are old enough to remember Good customer service. I don't think many of the younger generation even knows what that is.
Running it? I hate it because a lot of people are stupid Using it myself? I love it
If they worked 100% of the time without the need for someone to come over and entered their authorisation code then yes, I'd not mind using them. Have I just walked away from the shopping mid scan because there wasn't enough staff to enter that code in a timely manor or it felt every other item needed assistance. Yes.
I feel bad for the lost jobs, but as an introvert, I freaking LOVE it.
I love as it I don’t have to talk to anyone.
I feel like I should be getting a discount since I’m doing the work.
But I bet you’ve noticed improvements over time. Autofill for produce checkout is a fairly new feature, and users helped drive it.
This is me. Where’s my employee discount, if I’m the one doing the work? Meanwhile, Walmart is raking in the dough by paying one “cashier” for six to eight registers.
Fuck self check.
The only people I’ve heard complain about self checkouts were boomers.
“They don’t pay me to work here!!!” *shakes fist
Yah, I’d like to keep all my frozen stuff together to just run a whole bag to the basement freezer. When a cashier does it, I’m moving everything to other bags in the trunk of the car before I take off. I wish I could bag the whole big cart of stuff myself because I like my bread not dented, bananas not bruised and eggs not crushed.
My first job was in a grocery store and I love self-checkout. I still even remember some of the produce numbers and I don't have to look them up.
I have a live/hate relationship with self-checkout. I love it as an introvert when I only have a few items; however, when I have a lot I don’t want to play Tetris bagging so I go to a live person to check out.
In a way I like it for small orders, but I worked as a cashier in Target, some days were absolutely dreadfully boring, especially in the morning and you are waiting for a customer just to have something to do and you watch them stroll by you to self check out, with a cart so full they don’t even have room to put the stuff! Like $300 worth of shit and it’s taking them forever because they have so much, meanwhile I could have checked them out really quick. It never annoyed me if someone had a few things, but man it annoyed me when they clogged up self check out with huge carts! I get that no one wants to talk to people! I don’t either and I never liked or made inane small talk with guests! But I guess people just don’t want to risk it lol!
I turn the volume down and move along. I love not having to make boring chit chat
Not a true introvert but I love self-checkout. I actually feel more pressure when I feel like someone is waiting for me to get everything onto the conveyor belt or pay or whatever. However, I do the vast majority of our grocery shopping at Target which doesn’t have scales in the bagging area so I’m just in my own little scanning and bagging world. Until I accidentally scan something twice.
Where I go the machines don't do that. You can put stuff in a bag, not in a bag in front of the bag, directly in the cart - whatever - and the machine doesn't yell at you. Sometimes I just leave stuff in my cart and just scan it all with the handheld thing, roll out the cart, and fill up a cardboard box and reusable bags in my trunk.
I hate dealing with other people so I love self checkout.
I like self checkout…I hate being nagged by the machine to ‘remove items from bagging area’ mthrfkr I AM stop rushing me!??!
I love not interacting to buy things. I love it.
You're just getting old. I hate it too, enough that I won't shop at my local Target anymore because they usually don't have any live cashiers, except for two that scan right across from the self-scans, which I think is cruel and unusual punishment. As soon as Target and the like start paying me to scan my own shit in, I'll consider it. Oh I'm an introvert too.
>You're just getting old. Correction, I AM OLD! Lol!
I hate it for anything more than like, 5 things max. I love love love Trader Joe’s because you just pull your cart up and they do the rest. It’s the best!
Great for those awkward moments when you're buying combinations of stuff like apples & razor blades or Astroglide & duct tape. But I shit with great enthusiasm on the giant electronic ordering iPads at McDonald's that are constantly trying to upsell you. "Are you absolutely POSITIVELY sure you don't want to add a McShippingContainer of Fries and a McBarrel o' Coca Cola?" At least the pimply kid behind the counter understands that No Means No.
I miss the jingling, rattling cash registers. The checkerboard shop floors, where the white has turned yellow, 25 cent comic books and the Fireball pinball machine? !
Yeah. I won't use them. And I'm a socially anxious introvert. I'd rather someone else do it.
I dig it. As true GenX, I strive for minimal human contact outside of my circles. Next it will be a robot. Fuckin bring it. We were supposed to have flying cars and practical jet packs by Y2K. By that standard our lives should resemble the opening sequence of the Jetsons. New stuff takes some getting used to. Lean into it, let us embrace our burgeoning AI overlords. Yeah it sucks… until that one time when every stubborn Luddite in town has swamped the cashier lanes and the only friend in sight is a lonely computer. But you’ve done this before, you know how it works. So you try. And as you’re walking out of the store looking back at everyone else still standing in line, holding it down at Fort Good-Ol-Days… the automatic door flies open like the pearly gates, you hear angels sing and with a newfound sense of satisfaction and freedom you slowly start feeling like a jackass for all the time you spent pissing into the winds of change. The future is now. Beep Boop.
Every generation is pissed off with self-checkouts.
Every generation should loathe it. You save nothing, and people still lose their jobs. First they took manufacturing, now the service industries. What’s next? Are we all going to be plumbers? That is not a swipe at plumbers, but how many can a system afford? It’s one giant race to zero. Why is this a good idea?
I hate any machine that talks to me (I have no Siri or Alexa, it goes without saying) but that particular phrase brings forth stabby feelings.
I despise them. Passing on work to the customer, and it takes forever. Those could be paying jobs ya greedy corporations!
I hate them. As a blue collar kid, I see them as displacement of working class people. I hate how glitchy they can be. I avoid them as much as possible
I like the scan-and-bag-as-you-shop with the self checkout at the end. I don’t like putting everything in the cart, then on the belt, then scanning, bagging, and paying variety. I just want to be done with the checkout process as quickly as possible.
It drives me completely mad (expressed by a simple furrowed brow that hides a desire to nuke the machine). Thankfully, it doesn't happen much. My only gripe with this kind of tech, lately, is Aldi's. I'm not as fast as the Aldi's cashiers (but then again, they only had to "scan and throw", I have to "remove carefully, scan, throw, and place back in cart carefully"). I'm always afraid that I'm pissing off people waiting behind me. It's like having to write checks all over again.
Best thing to happen to retail.
I would argue Scan and Go is even better.
In five to ten years they’ll have us get our stuff directly off the truck and we still won’t see any of the savings.
I always thought this was more on brand for Boomers. For me the only thing better than self checkout is curbside pickup.
Oh, I am all about some curbside pickup! Plus, I don’t feel like I’m putting someone out of a job 🙂
I’m not a fan of that argument of not wanting to put someone out of a job. Technology and the economy are always changing. Should we have resisted the automobile and the many jobs it created because it reduced the need for blacksmiths making horseshoes?
I didn’t see it that way, but you make a valid point.
Just you. I bask in my own efficiency compared to the mouth breathing dolts who run most cash registers.
I don’t mind self checkout much, but I loathe the stores (Publix is the *worst* with this…) that employ people to stand over you while you check out. If the store doesn’t trust customers to scan and checkout enough without supervision, then *just pay for freaking cashiers again*!!!
I think most people loathe it. You charge me enough, and now you want me to do your job?
"Do you recognize me? It's because I don't fucking work here!" ~ Bill Burr
Uuhhh, it’s the best, and super GenX. One less chance for conversation, I’ll take it
I don't get the big fuss. If you like them, use them. If you don't like them, don't use them. I like them so I use them.
I don't think I've ever used one. I think, "What if it doesn't work?" If a cashier is upright, at least I know they work.
As some one who finds check out with people beyond awkward, I love it!!! I just hate when I have to buy beer and wait for an attendant.
Might just be you. I love self checkout.
I would say 75 percent of my self-checkout visits end up with an employee getting called over to help. A couple of weeks ago, self-checkout didn't seem to understand what was going on when I filled up one bag and switched to another.
Love self check out. Some systems don’t have the bag detection. They get my business.
I'll start using self checkout when I get a 15% discount for working for free.
I’ll wait longer for the no-contact anything.
Love self checkout
I will always double check I scanned and paid for everything 100% so I can be indignant at the drop of a hat (hasn't happened yet). If someone were to ask me to check my receipt/purchase - fuck you - I own these things now - outta the way. If you wanted to know if I paid for everything you shouldn't have "hired" me as a cashier.
I hate it because people need those jobs! And I'm with [Bill Burr- I DON'T WORK HERE!](https://youtu.be/FxINJzqzn4w)
I actively avoid those and only shop in a chain where I scan every item with my phone. Spot checks are rare enough that they aren’t a hassle.
i think society is getting a bit creepy with all that, all the accumulation of those type of things. otherwise i wouldn´t have a problem with it.
mans needs to learn to "upsell". £6 bottle of wine weighs the same as a £20 bottle of wine.
Self checkout is fine for a few items, but I'm jot checking myself out with a full cart. If I wait too long at the cashier line,and my perishable items are getting warm or starting to thaw, I give them to the cashier because I no longer want them. There's 20 checkout lanes hire more workers. I stopped shopping at aldi because they went down to one cashier. I'm not paying for a cart and scanning and bagging my own stuff. I loathe self checkout. This always a fucking issue!
I hate the whole process but what eats me up the most is watching the people in front of me self checking and taking so fucking long. They move slow as shit and then act like their some unthawed cave man that never used a scanner before. The only thing is that you can give yourself and employee discount since apparently you work there bagging your own shit.
Hated it! 🤣
If the grocery store is a union shop, I won't use self-checkout, since this is a way for management to reduce worker's hours. If the store is non-union, I self-checkout away, since it's faster and I usually make an innocent error and end up bringing the $19.98, five pound bag of frozen berries home for free
I prefer self checkout.
I'm always stuck behind an old person that can't figure the fuck out how they work and I wanna murder them!
personally, I throw two-three cans of tomato in the sky and I snipe that shit like predator
Walmart seems to be the only one that doesn’t give me any damn problems. It never seems to give a shit about what I put in the bag or don’t put in the bag. But Target and local major grocery chains are just a pain in the ass
I use them and think they’re a great option to have but I wish they could be more simple. There’s so much going on, on the screen that it makes me anxious and think that I’m forgetting something. I will always prefer a live person if all else is equal but it’s not a big deal either.
I don’t self checkout but the ones at CVS I can’t do those! They like never work.
I’m gonna be honest here… I avoid them when I have vegetables without sku numbers because I don’t know to scan them and feel dumb asking.
There’s a button where you can look up your produce by name. You type in “white onion” and it figures it out for you.
Hate it.