41–46 of 46 posts
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Rather, you don't get a discount for using the self-checkout. The price you are paying has the cost of a human cashier built into it. If you use self-checkout, you're providing that service yourself for free, but the company still collects the premium they charge for human service.
the machines don't cost anything?
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To me it's a lot like pumping your own gas. It's weird when I go back to NJ and have to sit in the car and wait for the one dude working on 6 pumps. But if you talk to people from NJ who have never been outside of NJ it would seem obvious that someone else does it. All of the comments in this thread against self service are the exact arguments NJ people have against pumping your own gas.
I've never had a pump in NJ or elsewhere not work. Self-checkout machines on the other hand, don't work often. That's the difference.
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I've never had a pump in NJ or elsewhere not work. Self-checkout machines on the other hand, don't work often. That's the difference.
I don't know what you're basing that on, I live in Australia and I've never had a self checkout machine not work. They are consistently good and I use them all the time.
I also generally found them to work better in Australia than in the US, though the technology seems to be the same. I guess it's because of these tolerances being set differently, but that's just speculation.
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I don't know what you're basing that on, I live in Australia and I've never had a self checkout machine not work. They are consistently good and I use them all the time.
Note that the machines have many tolerances that can be set to trade-off theft vs. annoyance of the customer. (E.g. the product weight when placed in the bagging area.) The machines can we way less annoying when they are set to be more trusting. I also generally found them to work better in Australia than in the US, though the technology seems to be the same. I guess it's because of these tolerances being set differe…
I always refuse to use Self Checkout, even when a store clerk offers to operate it for me. The process always takes longer than doing it "the old fashioned way". Maybe it's because I'm over 50, but I prefer face-to-face interaction with a cashier. BTW, I'm not a technophobe by any measure. I'm probably more tech savvy than most people here.
If I have less than 5 items, the self checkout is usually faster but anything over that and then it's just too trouble to do all that stuff myself. For one single item, which happens sometimes, it can be significantly more efficient.