The end of scab tills

[farmerbarleymow]

Went into a big Morrisons yesterday and they had automatic gates after the self-scan tills. They just opened automatically after a pause of about a second so don't appear to be of much use really I suppose.

 

[Silas Loom]

There is a piece of justification that keeps being repeated in this thread and I want to challenge the logic of it. This is that self-service tills are inherently faster (often written as “more efficient”) for the customer.

I buy the idea that if you have a small — maybe (maybe!) medium-size — basket of goods, it may be inherently quicker to scan the items yourself. But if you take a step back, there’s no way it can inherently be faster to unpack, scan and repack an entire trolley of items yourself. It must logically be faster for two people working in parallel to do that lengthier task together. One is packing while the other is scanning. That just has to be faster.

I think there are a few things going on that feed the perception of the self-service tills being faster even for larger shopping lists. First, they engage the consumer in pressured and rapid work. The mere task of picking out items, scanning them and then packing them, all while feeling the pressure of the queue behind you, will create a sense of time moving quickly.

More importantly, though, shops provide loads of self-service tills and far too few employee-operated tills. The result is that you generally don’t have to queue long for a self-service but you do for an employee-operated. This cause of “inefficiency”, though, is a choice on the part of the supermarket. They are making you feel that using an employee-operated till contains queuing time, as compared with the self-service. You experience this queuing as frustration. Combine this also with the first point and you now compare time-feeling-slow while waiting for the employee-operated till, versus time-feeling-fast while using the self-service till. And thus you feel that the self-service tills are just inherently faster, even though they logically can’t be.

Your case would be even stronger if you noted the friction caused by the additional loss prevention controls in self-service as a further delaying factor.

 

[kabbes]

It's faster in general as they take up less space so you can fit in more tills so you spend less time in a queue.

You are right that there is a problem with people taking trollies full of stuff through a space only designed for baskets, the shops need to police this better.

It’s not a matter of policing. At my local supermarket, all shoppers are now expected to use the self-service checkouts. Frequently, only one employee-operated till is open.

There is little difference in space because the self-service tills need the space around them to cope with a trolley. You could probably fit five employee-operated ones in the space they have for six self-service. And the time saved by working in parallel would make up for the lost till.

If supermarkets were motivated by efficient use of the customer’s time, they would focus on efficient queuing systems and use employees to work in parallel with the shopper. But they are not actually interested in whether the customer saves time. That’s not what is motivating this change.

 

[kabbes]

Your case would be even stronger if you noted the friction caused by the additional loss prevention controls in self-service as a further delaying factor.

Don’t get me started. The other week, I painstakingly went through most of the trolley with the assistant having to come and go through the menu to validate what I was doing about every other item. It was so painful. Then, when I was almost done, he accidentally pressed “void whole transaction” instead of “accept item”, because these options were next to each other in his menu. He was very apologetic but what could he do? I just had to start from the beginning, only this time my items were starting from the position of already having been bagged.

It may have been that I couldn’t be fucked to redo everything on that occasion, and that a third of my trolley came with me for free.

 

[nogojones]

You do release that this is an incredibly privileged position and not one everyone shares?

What? People lifting from Tesco will drag the company under? You been hitting the Xmas supply of acid early this year?

 

[brogdale]

There is a piece of justification that keeps being repeated in this thread and I want to challenge the logic of it. This is that self-service tills are inherently faster (often written as “more efficient”) for the customer.

I buy the idea that if you have a small — maybe (maybe!) medium-size — basket of goods, it may be inherently quicker to scan the items yourself. But if you take a step back, there’s no way it can inherently be faster to unpack, scan and repack an entire trolley of items yourself. It must logically be faster for two people working in parallel to do that lengthier task together. One is packing while the other is scanning. That just has to be faster.

I think there are a few things going on that feed the perception of the self-service tills being faster even for larger shopping lists. First, they engage the consumer in pressured and rapid work. The mere task of picking out items, scanning them and then packing them, all while feeling the pressure of the queue behind you, will create a sense of time moving quickly.

More importantly, though, shops provide loads of self-service tills and far too few employee-operated tills. The result is that you generally don’t have to queue long for a self-service but you do for an employee-operated. This cause of “inefficiency”, though, is a choice on the part of the supermarket. They are making you feel that using an employee-operated till contains queuing time, as compared with the self-service. You experience this queuing as frustration. Combine this also with the first point and you now compare time-feeling-slow while waiting for the employee-operated till, versus time-feeling-fast while using the self-service till. And thus you feel that the self-service tills are just inherently faster, even though they logically can’t be.

An important observation; I constantly marvel at the speed and efficiency of the experienced till workers that I encounter in Aldi. They are usually so quick that i can't keep up with the flow to put them back in the basket/trolley. The scab tills would take me at least 3 times more.

 

[magneze]

It's faster in general as they take up less space so you can fit in more tills so you spend less time in a queue.

You are right that there is a problem with people taking trollies full of stuff through a space only designed for baskets, the shops need to police this better.

They now have extra big ones for trolleys.

 

[DotCommunist]

co op scab tills don't have the weighing bit, praise be. And its the co-op so slightly better than being in the pocket of big Tesco.

 

[A380]

co op scab tills don't have the weighing bit, praise be. And its the co-op so slightly better than being in the pocket of big Tesco.

You might think you have gotten away with nicking from a Co-op scab till, but then a few days late you will get a visit from the enforcers of the local Woodcraft Folk elfin group. ..

 

[StoneRoad]

I agree with kabbes

The wide-spread use of scab-tills is not aimed at saving the customer's time. Certainly doesn't for more than a basket's worth, or if you want to buy drink, high value items or anything else with an alarm tag ...

OH uses them sometimes, but only for a small number of items or if the real tills are very busy and there isn't a staffed "10 items or less" one open.

 

[mentalchik]

I find it depressing that some of the poorly paid retail staff on here feel compelled to place themselves in danger simply to protect the dividends of corporate shareholders.

and i have repeatedly explained it's not just about that....protecting the store i work in also protects my job....shops that become too unprofitable get closed.....people again talking about making things difficult for the staff....

 

[mentalchik]

I agree with kabbes

The wide-spread use of scab-tills is not aimed at saving the customer's time. Certainly doesn't for more than a basket's worth, or if you want to buy drink, high value items or anything else with an alarm tag ...

OH uses them sometimes, but only for a small number of items or if the real tills are very busy and there isn't a staffed "10 items or less" one open.

Of course it isn't...it's to reduce staff and will happen if we like it or not

 

[UnderOpenSky]

Thankfully, at present the ale 'deals' don't require any loyalty card.

 

[brogdale]

and i have repeatedly explained it's not just about that....protecting the store i work in also protects my job....shops that become too unprofitable get closed.....people again talking about making things difficult for the staff....

I don't deny this is what they may have told you; I just don't believe there is any evidence from the corporate retailers that 'shrinkage' comes close to affecting their investment strategies. The main factors that impact their profitability are reduced turnover from poorer customers, higher interest rates on their debt and property revaluations of their massive estates.

 

[mentalchik]

plus am one of those weird people that think stealing is just wrong...sorry

 

[brogdale]

View attachment 404651

...at my local Sainsbury's, I should have added. Certainly won't be going to Tescos, then.

 

[brogdale]

plus am one of those weird people that think stealing is just wrong...sorry

A challenging moral position to maintain in the context of a system predicated on theft.

 

[Orang Utan]

plus am one of those weird people that think stealing is just wrong...sorry

Then direct your ire towards the big fish intead of the tiddlers

 

[emanymton]

I didn’t say I didn’t care about keeping it. I needed a job to pay the rent and feed myself, just like everyone else. I was desperate to keep it - my career in retail was actually brought to an abrupt and involuntary end on account of getting fired.

I misunderstood then, sorry.

 

[emanymton]

It’s not a matter of policing. At my local supermarket, all shoppers are now expected to use the self-service checkouts. Frequently, only one employee-operated till is open.

There is little difference in space because the self-service tills need the space around them to cope with a trolley. You could probably fit five employee-operated ones in the space they have for six self-service. And the time saved by working in parallel would make up for the lost till.

If supermarkets were motivated by efficient use of the customer’s time, they would focus on efficient queuing systems and use employees to work in parallel with the shopper. But they are not actually interested in whether the customer saves time. That’s not what is motivating this change.

I'm sure it will vary. My local Aldi recently added 6 self service tills in the same space there used to be 2 manned tills (there are still about 6 manned tills left as well) and it is now so much better. Not through any desire on their part to give a better service.

But it used to be that if I went a around 6 after work I could be stuck in a queue for 10 minutes just to buy milk or something, now I just go straight to the self service with no queue.

 

[Orang Utan]

Yeah my local medium sized Sainsbury’s now has trolley-only self-services with more room. Must be handier for wheelchair and mobility scooter users as well

 

[Puddy_Tat]

Yeah my local medium sized Sainsbury’s now has trolley-only self-services with more room

my local (fairly big) sainsburys does

they still have a hissy fit if you put more than one bag on the bagging area when you start...

 

[Orang Utan]

my local (fairly big) sainsburys does

they still have a hissy fit if you put more than one bag on the bagging area when you start...

they don't seem to give a shit either way at this one. People just go to whichever till has the smallest/no queue. It seems to work better than the more cramped enclosed self-serve areas in the superstore Sainsbury's that I also frequent

 

[phildwyer]

In the USA they've started shouting at you if you forget to scan an item. The machines I mean, not the people. They're very nice about it--"PLEASE ENSURE YOU HAVE FULLY SCANNED YOUR ITEM BEFORE BAGGING"--but it's at ear-splitting volume, so the whole store stares.

 

[8ball]

plus am one of those weird people that think stealing is just wrong...sorry

I suffer the same affliction, much as I have tried to shake it.

The best I have managed is a kind of Transubstantiation belief where sometimes smoked salmon can turn into loose bananas when placed on the scab till scales.

 

[brogdale]

I suffer the same affliction, much as I have tried to shake it.

The best I have managed is a kind of Transubstantiation belief where sometimes smoked salmon can turn into loose bananas when placed on the scab till scales.

"transubstantiation"

Though we're really talking about human error resulting from a lack of training for unpaid labour here, aren't we?

 

[brogdale]

I've had a brief look around the relevant union advice for retail workers and it all looks fairly sensible; if you see shoplifting report to a manager and only ever take any further action if you have been specifically trained to do so. I think any 'have-a-go-hero' style intervention risks the worker and leaves the corporation vulnerable to claims of false imprisonment/asssault etc.

 

[Orang Utan]

I have only once attempted to tackle a shoplifter after I was reluctantly enlisted to help the security guards corner a smack addict in the warren of tunnels under the Trocadero/Piccadilly Circus. He pulled a syringe out, so I instantly decided it was not worth contracting Hep C or HIV on a salary of £8K just to stop Richard Branson’ from losing dozens of pounds in lost profits from Celine Dion CDs.

 

[Puddy_Tat]

I have only once attempted to tackle a shoplifter after I was reluctantly enlisted to help the security guards corner a smack addict in the warren of tunnels under the Trocadero/Piccadilly Circus. He pulled a syringe out, so I instantly decided it was not worth contracting Hep C or HIV on a salary of £8K just to stop Richard Branson’ from losing dozens of pounds in lost profits from Celine Dion CDs.

stealing celine dion CD's ought to be considered its own punishment...

 

[ElizabethofYork]

Had a result just now. Scanned all my basketful of shopping at the co-op, and just as I was about to pay I got a "call assistant" message flash up. The assistant pressed a button, without really looking what he was doing, then a message saying "please take your shopping" appeared - so I did. Without paying.