Self checkout machines in Supermarkets.

terra_ferma

r2-hinds wrote: »

Just wondering what sort of problems people encounter with these machines and how people think they can be improved.

Odd questions, sounds like the title of an essay.

JimmyTheWig

lovingtescoforever wrote: »

I work on these machines and they really are so easy to use. Frustrating as most of the time it's the customer who causes problems not the machine being funny...

A machine should be designed with the customer's level of skill in mind. If a user does something wrong, the machine should have been better designed so that the user didn't do what they did.

dlusman

JimmyTheWig wrote: »

A machine should be designed with the customer's level of skill in mind. If a user does something wrong, the machine should have been better designed so that the user didn't do what they did.

So if a car is driven into a brick wall at 70mph it is the car designers fault - not the driver ?

At some point you have to take some responsibly for your actions , and not blame everyone else.

WestonDave

Given that these machines fundamentally work on a weight system (take x grammes from one side, put the same on the other = machine happy, put different on the other side = machine protesting) it might be an idea to put some instructions to that effect on or near them so that people stop putting their umbrella on the bagging side or stop putting so much through that they have to remove bags from the bagging side only for it to squeal because its now reading too low.

(Saw someone prior to Christmas a few years back trying to put a whole trolley load through one of these - unfortunately the assistant monitoring was too shy or stupid to tell the woman that is wasn't going to work. So we had customer filling bagging space, removes bag to make space for the rest of the trolley load, machine squeaks, assistant puts the bag back on and cancels the error, repeat until bored. Still it kept us amused in the queue!)

There are a few other frustrations which are more shop policy than the machines per se - a nearby Tesco tends to put labels on individual fruit, so you go in, put 6 loose apples in a bag, go to the self serve, try to find them on the weight menu only to realise you've got to take them out of the bag, scan them one by one and put them back in the bag!

Cycrow

WestonDave wrote: »

Given that these machines fundamentally work on a weight system (take x grammes from one side, put the same on the other = machine happy, put different on the other side = machine protesting) it might be an idea to put some instructions to that effect on or near them so that people stop putting their umbrella on the bagging side or stop putting so much through that they have to remove bags from the bagging side only for it to squeal because its now reading too low.

actually thats not how they work, only one side is actually weighed, the bagging area. The other side isn't.
Each item has a weight range, so the machine checks if the extra added weight is within that range.

most of the ones i've used do have labels all over them saying not to put stuff on the bagging area, but these are mostly ignored.
it doesn't help that some people cant follow simple instructions. Had a women with her car who was sat in the bagging area, then complaining its not working. Even after being told 5 times about it, she refused to accept that was the problem, and eventually left her shopping and stormed out the storm

Also, it is possible to remove bags from the bagging area. You just have to do it after the last item you scanned as been placed in and weighed. Most of the time they remove the bag at the same time scanning the item, which then confuses the machine as the weight doesn't match

WestonDave wrote: »

There are a few other frustrations which are more shop policy than the machines per se - a nearby Tesco tends to put labels on individual fruit, so you go in, put 6 loose apples in a bag, go to the self serve, try to find them on the weight menu only to realise you've got to take them out of the bag, scan them one by one and put them back in the bag!

unfortunately some items are done singularly rather than by weight.
Some of these will work find, and ask for a quantity when you scan 1, but not all of them have been setup correctly, so will only do them individually. Or in some cases, the quantity options has been removed on purpose due to people abusing it. You could also ask the assistant to put it through for you if you have alot.

Sometimes the strange behaviour is actually done on purpose, on ours, you had to have approval when ever you buy the single donuts, which alot of people found strange. It was because people would use that to get free stuff, usually putting crates of beer and such through as a single donut, so they had to stop customers from using it themselves

JimmyTheWig

dlusman wrote: »

So if a car is driven into a brick wall at 70mph it is the car designers fault - not the driver ?

At some point you have to take some responsibly for your actions , and not blame everyone else.

If the driver didn't know that they weren't supposed to drive into a brick wall at 70mph then it's not their fault.

If people are deliberately puttin unknown items into the bagging area because they like the sound of the voice that tells them off about it then fine, blame the customer. If the customer is doing what they think is right then the machine is at fault.

lovingtescoforever

Cycrow wrote: »

actually thats not how they work, only one side is actually weighed, the bagging area. The other side isn't.
Each item has a weight range, so the machine checks if the extra added weight is within that range.

most of the ones i've used do have labels all over them saying not to put stuff on the bagging area, but these are mostly ignored.
it doesn't help that some people cant follow simple instructions. Had a women with her car who was sat in the bagging area, then complaining its not working. Even after being told 5 times about it, she refused to accept that was the problem, and eventually left her shopping and stormed out the storm

Also, it is possible to remove bags from the bagging area. You just have to do it after the last item you scanned as been placed in and weighed. Most of the time they remove the bag at the same time scanning the item, which then confuses the machine as the weight doesn't match



unfortunately some items are done singularly rather than by weight.
Some of these will work find, and ask for a quantity when you scan 1, but not all of them have been setup correctly, so will only do them individually. Or in some cases, the quantity options has been removed on purpose due to people abusing it. You could also ask the assistant to put it through for you if you have alot.

Sometimes the strange behaviour is actually done on purpose, on ours, you had to have approval when ever you buy the single donuts, which alot of people found strange. It was because people would use that to get free stuff, usually putting crates of beer and such through as a single donut, so they had to stop customers from using it themselves

You simply can't trust customers.

I hate people who lean on the bagging area and when parents can't control their kids!... :mad: part of me does believe that they get them to do it on purpose so they can get free stuff on occasions...

The worst thing I've seen is a mother getting their kids to search through the self checkouts bins for coupons..:eek: she was too embarassed to do it herself...

Very sad how low people go..

System

My friend that works for Sainsburys tears up abandoned coupons and receipts which didn't have a Nectar card scanned on the transaction so no thieving customer can root through the bins and pick them up.

lovingtescoforever

ScarletMarble wrote: »

My friend that works for Sainsburys tears up abandoned coupons and receipts which didn't have a Nectar card scanned on the transaction so no thieving customer can root through the bins and pick them up.

I do the same. Company policy to rip them up. However some colleagues are lazy..

I don't rip of receipts however but that's becuase there has been ocuasions when someone has come back for their receipt... But I do, do a tear on the nectar points making them unclaimable.

Lois_Lane

NBLondon wrote: »

The ones that niggle me (as the next customer in the queue) are those who scan and stack the goods on the far side; then pay; then take another 5 minutes to pack. Now I realise that some people might do this because putting a (loaded and therefore heavy) rucksack or cycle pannier on the scale would probably confuse the till. But if you are using the carrier bags, that's why they are on a little rack for you to pack as you go.

I was shopping in Tesco and the Manager was obviously trying to encourage more people to use the self-scans and took my shopping to them and scanned it for me, putting the items into the bagging area. I got my own bag out and started packing them and he said it worked best to leave the packing until the end.


The annoying thing was, I had a money-off voucher that couldn't be used at a self-scan till!


LL