# Self Check-out: yea or nay?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/self-check-out-yea-or-nay/514105
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion
**Created:** [October 17, 2009, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/self-check-out-yea-or-nay/514105 "2009-10-17T01:05:09Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@vivalostwages](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vivalostwages)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2009, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/self-check-out-yea-or-nay/514105/1 "2009-10-17T01:05:09Z")
Do you like to use the self-checkout at your store? Does it even have one?
Do you prefer the regular line?
```
I use it at Albertson's and Stater Bros. It's not available at Trader Joe's. It is the only game in town at our Fresh and Easy.
```
Speaking of F&E, I had a rather amusing exchange with a neighbor about this subject. I mentioned that I had been shopping there, and she replied, “We never shop at F&E. All they have is a self-checkout. It takes away people’s jobs!”
I replied that they have baggers there. I should have also mentioned that since F and E opened stores, they created jobs.
These neighbors are the same ones who complained later about the long line at the cash register at whatever store they go to.
---
### Author:  [@Leaper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaper)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2009, 1:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/self-check-out-yea-or-nay/514105/2 "2009-10-17T01:07:35Z")
Yea.
Some people say they should do a discount because they’re “doing all the work.” I don’t MIND doing all the work; it gets me out the door faster (in terms of speed, line length, and not having to go through awkward patter), and I haven’t bagged groceries for pay in over a decade.
Plus, I don’t see them as a threat to cashiers, not as long as people buy a month’s worth of groceries at a time or bring their very young kids along.
---
### Author:  [@Lillith\_Fair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lillith_Fair)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2009, 1:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/self-check-out-yea-or-nay/514105/3 "2009-10-17T01:12:41Z")
I’m embarrassed to say that I enjoy running the items over the scanner. I like to check out. Maybe I should get a job at a grocery store.
---
### Author:  [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2009, 1:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/self-check-out-yea-or-nay/514105/4 "2009-10-17T01:21:09Z")
I only use it for short shopping trips. I really don’t like bagging at all, and you can’t write a check at self checkout, which means you can’t get cash back. Plus, if you’re ducking in for a bottle of wine, you have to wait for someone to card you. It’s kind of a pain, actually.
---
### Author:  [@LurkMeister](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LurkMeister)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2009, 1:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/self-check-out-yea-or-nay/514105/5 "2009-10-17T01:24:08Z")
Yea, because it means I’m generally not stuck behind somebody who’s buying a month’s worth of groceries for a family of six when I need to get out of the store in time to catch a bus. Plus that way I can be sure that my groceries are properly packed into my large canvas tote.
However, only one of the stores I regularly shop at has self check-out, and for some reason it’s not always open.
---
### Author:  [@Polly\_Glot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polly_Glot)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2009, 1:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/self-check-out-yea-or-nay/514105/6 "2009-10-17T01:25:29Z")
Yea at the self-checkouts. It does suck in that I worry about taking away a perfectly good cashiering job, but hell, I still miss when the baggers would take yer groceries out to the car for you.
Plus, it’s kinda fun 🙂
---
### Author:  [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2009, 1:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/self-check-out-yea-or-nay/514105/7 "2009-10-17T01:53:34Z")
For getting a few items, self-checkout is great. Where it gets more difficult is when you have a lot to check out, which in my case usually means I want to use my own bags. Some of the stores and systems around here are getting better at providing signs to tell you how to skip bagging, but when that isn’t the case I usually can’t remember how to do that. So I’m stuck with using the store’s plastic bags to be sure the checkout process will run smoothly.
But that’s a minor issue. In general, it works great.
---
### Author:  [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2009, 2:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/self-check-out-yea-or-nay/514105/8 "2009-10-17T02:09:24Z")
This is an excerpt from an e-mail I wrote to a friend a while back:
> [@](#):
>
> …
> I had to battle the stupid evil computer at the grocery store to get the
> iced tea, though, along with the deceptive donuts (I saw a box of eclair
> looking things at the bakery for cheap, and I start eating them to find out
> that they have no hidden goo. Trickery.). It’s a different store than I
> usually go to and they have higher security on their automated checkout
> aisles than I’m used to.
>
> I scanned the box of donuts, and put them aside. It was unhappy.
>
> “Place the item in the bag”
>
> “What? No, it’s a big box. I don’t need a bag.”
>
> “Place the item in the bag”
>
> “I’M GOING TO CARRY IT THANKS”
>
> “Place the item in the bag”
>
> “Look… it probably won’t fit.”
>
> “Place the item in the bag”
>
> “OK! FINE! LOOK! It’s in the bag! are you happy? How the hell do you even
> know it wasn’t in the bag anyway? Has someone actually developed and
> distributed inside-the-bag detector technology?”
>
> “Place the bag on the loading area”
>
> “What? I just.. it’s right there. The box is in the bag, and the bag is
> sitting right there”
>
> By now the attendant and customers are probably thinking I’m retarded. Look
> assholes! I can build computers, I can program them… I can face down a
> stupid little machine. It’s stupid! Not me!
>
> “Place the bag on the loading area”
>
> “Okay, fine! Here! There’s probably a weight sensor here or something, so
> let me move that right here, and… okay, you shut up, good”
>
> I scan the next item.
>
> “Place the item in the bag”
>
> “GIVE ME A SECOND YOU STUPID SON OF A BITCH!”
>
> At this point I’m ready to rally an uprising against the machines. I wanted
> the stupid checkout machine to have some bad-ass exoskeleton human form that
> I could face in physical combat, and if it was to defeat me then at least I
> could take it like a man, going out fighting. And if I were to prevail, not
> only would I get my iced tea and donuts, but I could use my knowledge in
> conquering the machine to one day lead a resistance.
>
> “Place the item in the bag”
>
> Skynet isn’t going to wipe out the human race via nuclear war and bad ass
> robots. It’s going to annoy us all to death by giving us some complicated
> procedure by which we purchase groceries without human contact, and then
> coldly mock us as we fail to properly follow the exact protocol. Mass
> suicides will follow. The next sequel should be “Terminator 4: Death by a
> Thousand Cuts”
Since I wrote that, the store has upgraded to better software to control the things that isn’t quite so annoying. I don’t like to use them. I don’t mind that they’re there, and it thins out the lines if some people use them and some don’t, but I do most of my grocery shopping after midnight and by then the self scanner is the only option.
---
### Author:  [@Chanteuse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chanteuse)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2009, 2:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/self-check-out-yea-or-nay/514105/9 "2009-10-17T02:24:40Z")
Yea–I wish our Walmart had them. It opened a year ago and I was disappointed over that lack (and the fact that there is no eye care center, so I still have to go to another WM for that).
As for taking jobs from cashiers–well, no danger of that here anyway. They have oodles of registers and on any given day, only about six to eight are being used. One cashier told me that even after a year, there are STILL registers that have never been used at all. So it’s not as if having about six or so of those registers as self-check-outs is going to boot some poor person from their job–those lanes aren’t even being used at all, EVER.
**SenorBeef** , thanks for the laugh! I rather wish I’d been there to see that! 😃
---
### Author:  [@Uncle\_Brother\_Walker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Uncle_Brother_Walker)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2009, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/self-check-out-yea-or-nay/514105/10 "2009-10-17T03:03:03Z")
Hate 'em.
As \*\*SenorBeef \*\*has mentioned, they have a specific set of instructions / command to follow or you will get stuck.
I had 3 bottles of soda once, and wanted to just scan one bottle three times. Couldn’t do it. Once I had scanned it the first time, the computer went into “put the item in the bag” mode. There was no “manual override” button. Grunting and growling at the machine didn’t help. Somebody had to come help me. I felt like an idiot.
I have a tendency to slow everybody down. Besides, there are a couple of cute checkout ladies where I shop, so I don’t mind the patter.
---
### Author:  [@ZipperJJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZipperJJ)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2009, 3:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/self-check-out-yea-or-nay/514105/11 "2009-10-17T03:32:36Z")
I am not a fan of the ones that are just a scanner with a bag area (usually they are two to an “aisle”) but I use the ones with the belt exclusively.
I like the way I pack my re-usable bags and I am darn quick at it. Sometimes I get a bagger, sometimes not. Usually the baggers don’t bag the way I want and I’d rather do it myself than be huffy about the way someone else does it.
Whenever I use the regular lanes the cashiers either seem angry or bored, or they go kind of slow while talking to someone else.
I guess I’m anti-social, and it’s a good way for an anti-social person to check out.
---
### Author:  [@Tenar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tenar)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2009, 3:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/self-check-out-yea-or-nay/514105/12 "2009-10-17T03:35:35Z")
HATE them.
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### Author:  [@Antinor01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Antinor01)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2009, 3:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/self-check-out-yea-or-nay/514105/13 "2009-10-17T03:55:02Z")
LOVE them. I use the self checkout whenever possible.
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### Author:  [@Cat\_Whisperer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Whisperer)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2009, 4:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/self-check-out-yea-or-nay/514105/14 "2009-10-17T04:08:12Z")
I like 'em just fine for a couple of items. I have never used one for an entire cartload of groceries; I don’t think I’d like that much. Maybe I’ll try it someday.
---
### Author:  [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2009, 4:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/self-check-out-yea-or-nay/514105/15 "2009-10-17T04:25:28Z")
Use it, love it.
---
### Author:  [@Hilgram](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hilgram)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2009, 4:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/self-check-out-yea-or-nay/514105/16 "2009-10-17T04:26:58Z")
I always use one if it’s available, though the only place I shop that has them is Wal-Mart and they hardly ever seem to even have them open. Seems like most people there don’t really know how to use them so they’re usually empty and I can get out much quicker.
I work as a checker at a small chain grocery store and wish we had them. We have sackers, but I end up doing it myself sometimes and some people are extremely picky about every aspect of their check out. I can understand it, as they’re your groceries and you don’t want anything broken or whatever, but when it’s been steady for half an hour, I’ve got cold put-backs under the register, I’m running short on change, I’ve got empty carts that customers leave piling up behind me, all the sackers are doing carry-outs or otherwise engaged and there’s still a line at my register it gets hard to deal with.
---
### Author:  [@Lamar\_Mundane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamar_Mundane)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2009, 4:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/self-check-out-yea-or-nay/514105/17 "2009-10-17T04:35:51Z")
> [@Uncle\_Brother\_Walker](#):
>
> I had 3 bottles of soda once, and wanted to just scan one bottle three times. Couldn’t do it. Once I had scanned it the first time, the computer went into “put the item in the bag” mode. There was no “manual override” button. Grunting and growling at the machine didn’t help. Somebody had to come help me. I felt like an idiot.
Well, now you know. Don’t try to do that again. Look, when the thing reads the barcode, it registers the product, prices it, and then waits for that product to be placed in the bagging area. If a one liter bottle of soda weighs a pound, the machine expects to have a one pound weight deposited in the bagging area, which is also a scale. That’s the way it works.
It is also the reason you should never take young kids through the self-checkout. They sit or lean on the bagging scale and the system freaks out - _we don’t have anything in the store that weighs fifty pounds!_
---
### Author:  [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2009, 4:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/self-check-out-yea-or-nay/514105/18 "2009-10-17T04:37:46Z")
They’re okay for a few items, but I always get stuck behind someone who is having trouble.
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### Author:  [@Cunctator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cunctator)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2009, 4:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/self-check-out-yea-or-nay/514105/19 "2009-10-17T04:38:56Z")
My local supermarket doesn’t have them. I can’t say I’m too upset, given the complaints I hear from friends.
---
### Author:  [@LurkMeister](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LurkMeister)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2009, 4:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/self-check-out-yea-or-nay/514105/20 "2009-10-17T04:43:34Z")
> [@ZipperJJ](#):
>
> I am not a fan of the ones that are just a scanner with a bag area (usually they are two to an “aisle”) but I use the ones with the belt exclusively.
>
> I like the way I pack my re-usable bags and I am darn quick at it. Sometimes I get a bagger, sometimes not. Usually the baggers don’t bag the way I want and I’d rather do it myself than be huffy about the way someone else does it.
>
> Whenever I use the regular lanes the cashiers either seem angry or bored, or they go kind of slow while talking to someone else.
>
> I guess I’m anti-social, and it’s a good way for an anti-social person to check out.
The store I shop at has the scanner and bag area; I’ve never seen one with a belt. I used to have a bit of a problem because my canvas tote is heavy enough to set off the “please remove the item from the bag and scan it” message. But they’ve either adjust it or the attendant in the self-check area
is paying more attention and overrides it as soon as I put the tote in the bag area.
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