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The Banana Trick and Other Acts of Self-Checkout Thievery (2018)

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Re: The Banana Trick and Other Acts of Self-Checkout Thievery (2018)

#141

Post by mb_72 »

ricardobeat wrote: post #75
choward wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Mainly because I support the idea of automation and want it to work well. I must be missing something. Where is the automation? It's just the customer doing all the work instead of an employee.

I don't know what it looks like in the US, but here in Europe it is often faster / more convenient to use the self-checkout. The lines are shorter, it's easier to bag everything, and it's easier to keep an eye on all the prices. Plus there are random inspections every now and then, and usually cameras on each machine. To top it off, they don't take cash, only debit cards, so it's very easy to find any wrongdoers. I w…

"Europe" covers too many countries and supermarkets to make such a generalisation, I feel. In Estonia at our local supermarket the self-checkout lanes / machines are often extremely busy, and also introduce the chance of getting stuck behind a number of people who have problems using the machine or who are just slow.

We know who are the fastest operators at the 'manual' check-out, and it's easier to watch prices as they are scanned when one doesn't also need to be doing the scanning.

Re: The Banana Trick and Other Acts of Self-Checkout Thievery (2018)

#142

Post by sfthrower89 »

YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #26

>> “There is NO MORAL ISSUE with stealing from a store that forces you to use self checkout, period. THEY ARE CHARGING YOU TO WORK AT THEIR STORE.” I find the twisted reasoning in this comment shocking and I don't really know what to say. It is a kind of twisted reasoning that I've only seen in people who were high on strong narcotics and were carried away by waves of wishful thinking and delusions, or, again, extrem…

> I find the twisted reasoning in this comment shocking and I don't really know what to say. It is a kind of twisted reasoning that I've only seen in people who were high on strong narcotics and were carried away by waves of wishful thinking and delusions, or, again, extreme persecution complex.

I'm curious how something that is entirely a flamewar gets so many upvotes? Where's @dang with their admonishments?

Re: The Banana Trick and Other Acts of Self-Checkout Thievery (2018)

#143

Post by tinus_hn »

YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #26

>> “There is NO MORAL ISSUE with stealing from a store that forces you to use self checkout, period. THEY ARE CHARGING YOU TO WORK AT THEIR STORE.” I find the twisted reasoning in this comment shocking and I don't really know what to say. It is a kind of twisted reasoning that I've only seen in people who were high on strong narcotics and were carried away by waves of wishful thinking and delusions, or, again, extrem…

Sounds like a comment from the Shoplifting reddit which was full of people proudly showing the things they stole and posting excuses why them being a thief is someone else’s fault. It’s since been closed.

Re: The Banana Trick and Other Acts of Self-Checkout Thievery (2018)

#144

Post by furyofantares »

jedberg wrote: post #72
analog31 wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gas stations are already this way. I've pumped gas at unattended or closed stations. The credit card machine works the same either way.

It’s pretty hard to steal gas from a gas station though. They take the money first and you can’t really take extra gas since it’s all measured.

Way back when, Safeway’s 10c off per gallon rewards would just continue stacking up. I saved up until my discount was more than the price of gas, and got myself a free tank.

I’ve always wondered how much it would have let me pump. The limits I’ve seen on pumping have always been on the dollar amount, presumably because they verify they can charge that amount before you start pumping.

Re: The Banana Trick and Other Acts of Self-Checkout Thievery (2018)

#145

Post by xauronx »

mindslight wrote: post #30
YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #26

>> “There is NO MORAL ISSUE with stealing from a store that forces you to use self checkout, period. THEY ARE CHARGING YOU TO WORK AT THEIR STORE.” I find the twisted reasoning in this comment shocking and I don't really know what to say. It is a kind of twisted reasoning that I've only seen in people who were high on strong narcotics and were carried away by waves of wishful thinking and delusions, or, again, extrem…

Alternatively, it's revealing a deeper truth that had been obscured by a long chain of seemingly logical justifications. Corporations tend to abuse abstractions until they break, and self-checkout is basically at that breaking point. Comedy is especially good at deflating bullshit like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FxINJzqzn4w I for one could never stand the things for their slow and obtuse programming. I can…

So you admit openly to stealing, just to put it plainly. You chose to shop somewhere, you chose to use a self checkout, you knew there was an error, and proceeded to leave with things you didn’t pay for. No matter how you justify it to yourself, you’re a thief.

If you can justify that you can justify stealing from your employer (hey I’ve been under paid for a while, taking this unsecured device is like making up for a bit of my salary), etc.

Re: The Banana Trick and Other Acts of Self-Checkout Thievery (2018)

#146

Post by xauronx »

elliekelly wrote: post #35
jedberg wrote: post #17

I must be a rube, because I've never stolen from one of those things. When it makes a mistake I call the attendant to correct it. Mainly because I support the idea of automation and want it to work well. Maybe it's just the reliability engineer in me that wants to call out the bugs and have them fixed. Or maybe it's the former security engineer in me who got paid to find the flaws in these systems and my ethics deman…

> I must be a rube, because I've never stolen from one of those things. When it makes a mistake I call the attendant to correct it. That you know of - there are plenty of errors that are entirely innocent. It wasn't even self-checkout but in college I went to Walmart to buy a new microwave for my sorority and it was so big we left it in the cart with the barcode up instead of putting it on the conveyor belt. I just a…

There are countless people in this thread (which concerns me because I generally think of HN as a pretty highly educated and moral group) who see errors like that at the register and walk away thinking they won a prize.

Re: The Banana Trick and Other Acts of Self-Checkout Thievery (2018)

#147

Post by DanBC »

alkonaut wrote: post #32
jedberg wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you happen to live in Europe? I've only ever seen the inspections in Europe.

Yes. The article mentions various “fraud detection” schemes in place (weight etc) but I don’t get why random checks aren’t just used instead, or in addition?

In England you can't search people just because you want to.

Re: The Banana Trick and Other Acts of Self-Checkout Thievery (2018)

#148

Post by lozenge »

mb_72 wrote: post #140
mc32 wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Obviously they’d rather the company hire more workers and charge them s little extra. At least in some parts of the countryside it’s nice to see farmers’ stands with produce and a pay jar where people “self checkout”. I ack that companies take advantage of people but that does not grant people a right to be dishonest themselves and become that which they bemoan. If you think they’re ripping you off, go to the the mar…

> Obviously they’d rather the company hire more workers and charge them s little extra. It's happened the other way around - self checkout didn't exist, and when it was introduced prices didn't drop even though employment expenses are now lower. There isn't even an incentivising discount for using the self-checkout. I've seen people have no end of problems with self-checkout systems, and would rather I have an experi…

Groceries are the most low margin retail business at 1-2 percent. So the cost savings have definitely been passed on to the customer, unless you can find figures to the contrary.

Re: The Banana Trick and Other Acts of Self-Checkout Thievery (2018)

#149

Post by Freak_NL »

TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #64
mindslight wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm glad you get personal utility from the new method, but the rant is coming from a place where people are forced to use self checkouts and would rather not - eg stores where they shut all but one staffed register, creating a huge line.

That's more of a problem. In Europe the self-check outs are optional. They're also faster, because there isn't much of a queue and the people with carts all go to cashiers. I don't feel oppressed when I use them because I appreciate the speed. If that advantage disappeared, I'd be less pleased.

> In Europe the self-check outs are optional.

That varies. A current trend in the Netherlands is to remove all normal checkouts and replace them with nothing but self-scan checkouts in the train station 'to-go' formula (essentially convenience stores) of one of the largest retailers.

The same retailer (AH) is also pushing for self-scan checkouts in certain normal supermarkets (often mid-size ones) by reducing the number of normal checkouts to one or two, creating nigh permanent queues. Because self-scan checkouts don't accept cash, you are stuck using these if you do wish to pay with bills and coins (which is probably why the retailer does this; i.e., the war on cash).

At a train station, if you have a few minutes to spare to grab a coffee and some snacks, you can pretty accurately guess how long it will take with a human cashier and any potential queues.

With a self-scan checkout, the machine invariably has a bunch of failure modes that take an unguessable amount of time to correct — either by you following the instructions, or by an attendant overriding some error state.

I just go to the kiosks that do have human cashiers instead.

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