The Self-Checkout Nightmare May Finally Be Ending

I really enjoy using the self checkout. I don't have to talk to anyone, it's faster than the employee scanning, and I bag my shit better and not have to worried about smashed bread or fragile items. It's not for everybody and I get it but it leave it for the people do want to use them.

Man, I love the self checkout. Also didn't they already show that rising costs everywhere WEREN'T from theft, but instead corporations artificially inflating their prices during the pandemic and then leaving it there?

Take away my self checkout, and I'll steal out of spite

"Nightmare" says you. "The only thing that makes grocery store checkout tolerable" says I. I'll wait longer for a self-checkout rather than subject myself to a human who will try to make conversation with me (which forces me to take out my earbuds), be annoyed by the fact that I want to use my own bags, underload my bags, take forever, ask me required scripted questions, and put the bread underneath a can.

I'm just going to copy/paste my comments from the last article 2 days ago that was saying this same thing:

This is the second third article in the last month I've found here on the Fediverse pronouncing the death of self checkout and honestly I just don't see it. Most of the stores around me have only just recently expanded their self-checkout areas and I vastly prefer using it unless I've got more than 25 items.

I'd honestly probably stop going to a store that decided to not allow me to check out on my own. Small talk and having to make a minimum wage worker suffer through it is just not something I want when I'm running to the store for a gallon of milk. I vastly prefer being able to throw in some earbuds, get my shopping, check out, and get out to having to interact with anyone while I'm just trying get my shit.

I actively choose to shop at stores that have self-checkout because they have self-checkout. I don't know why the author is writing as if everybody hates them.

If you read the article they are only a "nightmare" for big box retailers who are crying about theft. I love the self checkout and generally use it every time unless I have a specific reason not to

The mistake here is in assuming that it's either all or nothing; that self checkouts are either great, or some kind of disaster.

The reality is that they're great for some applications, but suck ass for others.

Here's the deal; if it's just me with a few items, yeah, the self-checkout is awesome, but if it's me and my wife and we have a shitload of groceries for the entire family, guess what? Self-checkout sucks ass and it's way easier to go through a regular checkout stand where there won't be a hundred little different ways for the system to get jammed up and require an employee intervention.

What part about this do people not understand?

I have to think that a lot of the hostility to regular checkout stands comes from relatively young Lemmy users who don't actually have to shop for families of their own.

I despise Fry’s Electronics but they got manned checkout correct. A single fucking queue sharing all the resources (cashiers). Like at a bank. Having to pick & guess which mini-queue would go faster always gave me anxiety. And the “less than 15 items” queue was not always quicker.

Self checkout, in lots of cases, brings grocery checkout to a single queue, and for that reason, I welcome it. Obviously, stores that forcing people to pick self-checkout mini queues should be burned to the ground

Just as a mildly interesting story, I thought I'd share:

The best self checkout experience I had so far, was at a Japanese clothing store in Germany. There was a box at the checkout station, and each clothing item had an RFID in their labels. You just toss all your items in the box, it detects which exact products you're gonna buy, and if the list of items shown is correct, you just pay and go.

A few years ago I heard of a similar concept for groceries, but that one was experimental and I don't think they've implemented it ever since. But this one at the clothing store was not a test, and it worked flawlessly.

I love self checkout

It's so much faster than waiting in line to pay and I don't have to talk to anyone if I don't want to

I like self checkout as a concept. I don't like the implementation or what it stands for.

In Sweden we have had a version of self checkout for 20 years in the largest stores, and here it seems to work fine.

Instead of having to scan everything at a station, each product is scanned with a handscanner when walking through the store, and put directly into shopping bags. Then only the payment and possibly a randomly occuring verification is left before leaving the store.

The random testing is usually just an employee scanning three to five items from your bags, and occurs like once every four months (as long as you're not actually stealing and caught).

Please, no. It's my jam.

Oh wait, it's for self checkout. Not self scanning.

I prefer self checkout because I get to bag my groceries the way I want. It's infuriating to line up my groceries in the correct order only for the cashier/bagger to mix them all up in my bags anyway. If I insist in bagging them myself, then I have to awkwardly do it while the cashier and the next person in line watch and wait for me to finish. At least for self-checkout, there are multiple counters and no single person waiting for me.

Still, 60% of consumers said they prefer self-checkout as of 2021

Ah yes, the 'Nightmare' that a clear majority of people prefer.

This is yet more 'wahhhh shoplifting' bullshit from companies whose interests are directly opposed to the interests of their customers.

People want self checkout to be less shit, which it easily could be. In Australia I didn't even have to put things in the bagging area, just scan them. It made the whole process so much smoother.

Still, 60% of consumers said they prefer self-checkout as of 2021

And it's fucking weird how vocal and entitled some of the 35% are in wanting the majority's preference to go away because they don't like it.

I simply won't use them if there is cashier available.

I'm not your fucking employee & prices never once came down due to their prevalence.

They expect me to do free labor for a huge evil corporation, but give me a scanner far worse than they give their paid employees, which scolds me every 10 seconds for not having enough space to put things.

Meijer is the only one that has their self checkout figured out. 2 different sections in my store with 10-12 checkout stations. So a minimum of 20 self check out stations open and they’re always open and working. They never give me the errors like Walmart and Kroger.

Walmart might have 20 checkouts as well but half aren’t working or open plus there’s 3x the people at Walmart so there’s usually a 15 minute wait.

Kroger is the worst with the errors. They might have 20 checkout stations but 5 might be open.

Going to Walmart or Kroger is always a hassle. I avoid those 2 unless I need one or two items.

Aldis and Meijer are my go to.

The article doesn't match the headline very well. Maybe they aren't going to expand as much but they mostly aren't going away either.

I am much more comfortable using self checkout

It is GREAT as an option but not as the primary. I love it for small trips for a small number of things .

However for any medium to large shopping trip I would prefer to have someone there scanning while I unload and load.

Well if you really want me to buy even more shit online (let's be real, from Amazon) this is a good way to do it.

At best I don't like small talk or dealing with other people through meaningless interactions. At worst I might have minor social anxiety. I hugely prefer to just walk into a shop, grab what I need, check myself out, and leave.

At this point I'm also just as fast (if not faster) than the paid cashiers and baggers (who need and deserve chairs or stools by the way).

So yeah, if self checkout goes away, I'm buying as much stuff online as possible and generally making fewer trips to the store.

Boomer AI wrote the title.

This is the best summary I could come up with:

Don’t ring the funeral bells just yet, but the self-checkout kiosk horror show could be nearing its end.

Stores across the country are reversing course on the machines, and consensus is growing among analysts and insiders that self-checkout has been a disaster for consumers and retailers alike, according to a new report in the BBC.

Dollar General made enormous bets on self checkout tech in 2022, but it recently announced the project flopped.

Shoppers are reportedly 21 times more likely to sneak items past machines than human cashiers, but consumers also constantly steal unintentionally because the self-checkout process can be so cumbersome.

Not only do self-checkout machines double theft rates, they actually increase labor costs thanks to employees who get taken away from their other duties to help customers deal with the confusing and error prone kiosks.

But a growing number of consumers are souring on self-checkout, thanks to endless frustrations, accusations of theft, and wasted time.

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