Do you prefer any human interaction?

/s kinda

Cashiers are fast. I don't want to search for the catalog number for all my produce. The cashiers have it memorized

This thread has made me feel so incredibly millennial.

Most produce has a sticker with the code on it and most stores have now made it to where you can just scan the little sticker barcode anyways.

I have add. Proper diagnosis from a doctor and everything.

I've had to learn how to curb impatience. It is not a permanent affliction, it is a bad habit. Patience is a virtue that can be nurtured.

We were talking about this the other day. Is it faster, or does it appear faster since they have removed so many cashiers? Like 20 lanes and 1 cashier, with 4 self checkouts.

I've heard self checkout is terrible in the US, however in Europe they're generally pretty nice

I went to the US for a few days. Their self checkouts seem to be universally awful, compared to the UK or German equivalent.

While the hardware is far less reliable, and more convoluted, it's the users that seem the main issue. Self checkout is generally intended (over here) to shift the fast, small shops out of the main queues. 1 big line and a dozen or more tills. In the states they treat it as just another till. Built for trollies, and 1 queue per till. Combined with a slow user and it becomes hell rapidly.

You support taking away jobs

Well, most stores over here have around 10-16 self checkouts in the space that would be occupied by 4-6 regular lanes. So I'd say it is faster even accounting for people taking longer.

clanker

*Claptrap

That's a perennial problem. How do you connect the responsibility to the authority? The cashiers are the ones who have to face 30 angry customers, (face the responsibility) not the manager. (the one who has the authority to change things) Customers can complain to the cashier, but they have no authority. They can complain to the manager, but the manager is getting a portion of the money not spent on hiring full staff in the form of a bonus, so they're encouraged to ignore the complaint. It takes a certain critical mass of customers all spending less at the store before there's even a possibility of someone noticing a revenue drop, and no guarantee the blame will be put where it belongs if it happens.

I think that’s one of the things that bothered me most. My manager was standing right there about 30 feet away, but the customers were directing all of their anger at me, by choice. One would think a rational person would understand where to direct that anger, but I’m increasingly convinced every year that rational people don’t exist.

I remember checking groceries at frankly unprecedented speed while being a polite as possible, but one guy started yelling names at me from five or so people back. I decided to ignore him and continue serving my current customer with a smile and he yelled “Stop smiling!”. This was so shocking to me that I looked at the other customers in line to share a “Can you believe this guy?” moment to find them all nodding along in angry agreement.

I didn’t even need that job. I’m so angry at my naive younger self for not quitting on the spot and making sure all of them knew exactly why.

Yes cultivating patience is a great skill, but I have no interest in spending more time in line than I have to.

My local grocery store limits self checkout to 10 items or less. My guess is that people have a hard time counting to 10 and just assume that their cart full of groceries is probably 10 items or less.

I've never been able to do that. It seems like it always gets me on weight. Any tips?

Are cashiers in the United States of America really required to initiate meaningless conversations? I’ve also heard of the occupation of a door greater, which sounds even crazier.

The corporate ideal has their weird idea that everyone desperately wants to have conversations with employees. I think it comes from positive feedback often taking the form of, "Your employee was so warm and helpful and we had a delightful chat about X." and never, "Your employee was polite and didn't bother me with needless conversation." One of the trainings my employer has even includes a scenario, which is presented as ideal service, where the employee ends up chatting with a complete stranger about his dead wife including sharing pictures from his wallet.

That said, while I'm sure corporate cares none of my in store managers cared when I was a cashier. Indeed, I had regulars who would seek me out because I specifically didn't attempt to inject small talk into the interaction. I'd still get pulled into it by customers who initiated such but otherwise it was mostly, "Morning. Coupons? That'll be $X.XX. Have a good one."

use AI cameras that lock up after every third item and require an override each time

As a customer than once I've had those cameras trigger because I leaned in a bit too much to press a prompt on the touch screen and it flagged my head as some item I'm trying to fake scan. As an employee it is also fun to watch the cameras trigger on purses and children and grind things to a halt so it can warn me that someone's kid hasn't been scanned. Though my absolutely 'favorite' interaction with those cameras as an employee is having them trigger over me attempting to sign in using my name badge on the scanner. So it would interrupt my attempt to sign in to do something for the customer to make me sign in and reassure it I wasn't trying to steal something and then I had to sign in again to actually help the customer.

Still ought to be discounted since it's eliminating jobs.

I won’t end up single-bagging a bunch of stuff that could be bagged together (e.g. if they scanned some window cleaner, they bag it separate, not knowing that some dishwasher detergent is coming that it could be packed with).

Not that it is foolproof but unloading your cart in an organized manner helps with that. Though maybe you're talking about helpless baggers, I've seen plenty of both clueless baggers and customers who toss things onto the belt willy-nilly.