Sainsburys staff given targets to promote scab tills

[rich!]

If I have a large amout of stuff I'll go to a human checkout. But for any amount up to what will fit on the bagging area of a robot machine, then the robot is usually my first choice.

At a conventional checkout, you lift all your stuff onto the counter. You can try and do it in the order you want things to be packed but the cashier won't necessarily scan in this order. Then as soon as you have done that you have to rush round to the other side and start putting things in bags. Usually this has to be done in a bit of a hurry as you will be asked for payment before you're quite finished. So then you are trying to do the card payment simultaneously with packing up the remaining stuff. Generally you feel under time pressure because there's someone behind you in the queue whose stuff is already piled up and, if you've done your payment, the cashier will already have started scanning their stuff through. So then you end up with a load of half-packed items to take somewhere else and sort them out properly.

On the other hand with the robot, you can generally take your time. Pick up item, scan, straight into bags in the order you want. Pretty much one action per item instead of several with a human checkout. No feeling of time pressure. Work is removed from a cashier but I don't really feel it's transferred to me. I have to do some work either way, and with the robot it's actually easier work.

Please don't call it a robot. That makes the robots sad.

 

[rich!]

My approach to the self-serve tills is to go and queue in front of a real till. If someone from the shop is insistent that I use the self-serve till, I hand them my goods and explain that I don't know how to use their till. So far it's always worked.

 

[teuchter]

*reminds self not to get stuck behing teuchter 'taking his time'*

I've just remembered, I had a plan to take the various piles of copper coins that I accumulate along to the supermarket and use them to pay with in the self service machines. I expect I could spend a good ten minutes feeding them in. I wonder if it's possible to fill the machine up completely?

 

[danny la rouge]

My approach to the self-serve tills is to go and queue in front of a real till. If someone from the shop is insistent that I use the self-serve till, I hand them my goods and explain that I don't know how to use their till. So far it's always worked.

I do this.

 

[William of Walworth]

Come to think of it... in the past few months I've seen three abandoned trollies full of shopping due to there not being enough tills open. It must be a regular thing in supermarkets.... protest abandoning.

I think the biggest retail sin is keeping people waiting, not the technology involved.

Hard core militancy man!

 

[butchersapron]

I'm curious. Did my other posts answer the questions you had for me?

I'm also curious as to what you feel about the self scan machines. Do you avoid using them, preferring to hand your money to the supermarket via a person using a machine?

In no way at all I'm afraid fred.

I avoid using them.

 

[maomao]

My approach to the self-serve tills is to go and queue in front of a real till. If someone from the shop is insistent that I use the self-serve till, I hand them my goods and explain that I don't know how to use their till. So far it's always worked.

Do you ever add 'and I build robots for a living' to the end of that sentence?

 

[maomao]

Mute button works btw, bottom centre of screen at Tesco.

 

[Puddy_Tat]

Those screens don't stand up very well to a repeated beating with a four-pack of beans.

yes, but cheese first or after?

 

[newbie]

I think the biggest retail sin is keeping people waiting, not the technology involved.

that's one of the available philosophies. M&S have lots of well trained, presentable staff available to manage the customer experience, from helpfulness to extra tills as queues build up. Which is, of course, paid for.

However the likes of Lidl & 99pshop have the opposite idea, minimal staff, long queues, little attention to the customer but low prices.

It's obvious which is gaining market share, ie which sin the public chooses.

 

[J Ed]

Honestly I don't find Aldi that bad for waits, not much worse than Tesco

 

[Obnoxiousness]

http://www.thegrocer.co.uk/channels...t-new-look-lincoln-extra-store/357397.article

These seem to be the next step in automated cashiers...

 

[newbie]

No personal experience, I don't know where the nearest Aldi is.

 

[Onket]

Mute button works btw, bottom centre of screen at Tesco.

If the light on the top still flashes we're only halfway there.

 

[Obnoxiousness]

Personally, I think it's quicker through the Lidl and Aldi tills because there is no bagging up at the till... the items just go from trolley to conveyor belt to cashier, and then back into the trolley. There is more of a sense of urgency in the Lidl and Aldi stores, whereas the Tesco and Sainsbury stores seem to have shorter queues, but the time involved in "checking out" is very similar.

 

[maomao]

If the light on the top still flashes we're only halfway there.

It's my experience from my own job that if people have an audio and a visual alert for something they depend completely on one (usually audio IME) and ignore visual alerts completely if audio fails.

 

[Citizen66]

B&Q had all their self service tills robbed at a store in the middle of the night. £6,000 cash was stolen and at least £50,000 worth of damage was caused.

The burglar took a a bunch of 25kg bags of wood chip from a B&Q car park display and used them to build a makeshift ladder about 10 feet high. He then cut a square hole in aluminium sheeting and insulation material and climbed through on to a shelving unit inside. Once in the store, he forced four self service tills, and took a quantity of notes which he put into his rucksack before leaving the same way that he got in.

This, in my opinion, is a big design problem... leaving cash in these things overnight. They really need to revisit the cash input/output system.

On the plus side at least it was a DIY job.

 

[CNT36]

I've noticed the in town supermarkets around here seem to have less proper tills open. It is usually one possibly two people on the fag counter with a queue and several rarely used self service machines. It seems mainly a way of increasing the workload of the few staff they still keep on as anything else. I'm guessing team fag counter are also responsible for fixing, bailing out and instructing users of the scab tills.

In other news I just called First Great Western to complain about being forced to use one of their self service ticket machines last night. I hate the things at the best of times. There was a replacement bus service going from the bus station down the road that had a guy standing on the door asking for tickets. He asked if I had one and I replied that I didn't and asked to buy one. I had to buy one from the train station and mentioned the ticket office was closed and was told to use the machine. I moaned a bit and did. I asked the complaints people if I should drive the train as well. Apparently if I want assistance I can ask for it but none was forthcoming last night. I will ask every time. It will be interesting to see how the one member of staff manages to take tickets at the bus station and help me on the machine simultaneously. I know partially sighted people and people with learning difficulties who would have been fucked and would of been embarrassed having to ask for help and probably have to argue about it letting everyone around know their personal business. I was also told it would take ten minutes to get to the machine and back. I know people who would take longer than that what with problems walking and struggled with the machine based on the times I've had to show them how to watch a recorded programme on the digi box. These people are usually sensible and leave enough time but maybe wouldn't of if they had the likes of me in their ear telling them were selling tickets on the bus which they were doing on Saturday. On the plus side I accidentally got a return ticket I didn't need for 10p extra and left it on the screen of a ticket machine when they transferred us from the bus to the train hopefully saving someone a few quid.

 

[Citizen66]

In Leyton Tesco the woman behind the ciggie counter (most times I've been there it is only one) is also expected to do the national lottery tickets AND act as customer services. So people wanting to get quickly served with a pack of twenty regularly have to wait whilst some fucking around over returned items is happening. I think about twice I've ended up arguing with people in the queue tutting at her to go and take it up with the people making her do the workload of three or four people.

 

[_angel_]

In Leyton Tesco the woman behind the ciggie counter (most times I've been there it is only one) is also expected to do the national lottery tickets AND act as customer services. So people wanting to get quickly served with a pack of twenty regularly have to wait whilst some fucking around over returned items is happening. I think about twice I've ended up arguing with people in the queue tutting at her to go and take it up with the people making her do the workload of three or four people.

I know someone who was on the kiosk and meant to oversee a load of the self service tills, as well as do the serving - impossible - and the store got a fine because they couldn't oversee the alcohol sales properly.

 

[Obnoxiousness]

Does anyone know if there has been any research into customers impatiently walking away, or avoiding a store altogether? And how much revenue stores lose due to under-staffing?

 

[maomao]

Does anyone know if there has been any research into customers impatiently walking away, or avoiding a store altogether? And how much revenue stores lose due to under-staffing?

I'd bet money it's less than they lose to shoplifting.

 

[danny la rouge]

Does anyone know if there has been any research into customers impatiently walking away

I've done that, too. (Not the research, the walking away).

 

[FridgeMagnet]

I fairly regularly move between robotills when one doesn't work and won't let me cancel - I just pick up my stuff and start again on the one next to it. Nobody gives a toss. Don't think I've completely walked out though.

I've definitely walked out of shops with staffed tills where there's a dozen people in front of me when I get to the end of the queue and it's not moving and all I want is a loaf of bread.

 

[cantsin]

Why not campaign for better employment rights such as increased minimum breaks etc rather than barking up the wrong tree? Self-scan tills never hurt anybody.

do you want to explain wtf y're on about here ? No worries if not. thanks .

 

[8ball]

....I object to paying to do the work they used to pay their staff to do...

You're not paying yourself enough then. Putting smoked salmon through as loose carrots is suitable reimbursement, I find.

 

[cantsin]

my

Is there any stats to show they have reduced the number of staff employed?

have spoken to two local Tesco till workers, they're absolutely clear that this = staff reductions - they're not up in arms, it's all zero hrs, but you want stats to back what is patently inevitable ?

 

[Citizen66]

Robots don't buy cars (or bogof offers either).

 

[DotCommunist]

eventually all shops will be staffed by robots. robots will load up robot vans to deliver food to empty houses. The aliens will come looking for fabled terra and see our mighty buildings and our clever robots and wonder 'where did the terrans go?'

 

[8ball]

Robots don't buy cars (or bogof offers either).

This seems to have escaped capitalists since the days of Ford.