Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Flying Dice]

Yeah, that's the other reason to use self-checkout. The baggers are lazy shits that will dump breakables under mountains of cans and pierce meat packages so that everything in the bag gets covered in blood and juices.

[martinuzz]

That's not a reason to get self-checkout, it's a reason to get rid of baggers. I don't think we have any supermarkets here that bag for you, although they might help out elderly and disabled with putting things in the bag, taking care not to crush eggs and fruit.

[Rolan7]

I think everyplace here offers to bag for you, but I tend to just do it myself...  Just standing there feels awkward anyway.
But I think I'm the unusual one, since the cashiers often try to do it themselves, and I often get thanked for helping *shrug*.
I just want to get done faster and not be awkward that's all

Hell, two different cashiers have winked and not scanned a cheap item because I helped.  Free chocolate, woo!

[martinuzz]

Why do they use baggers, from a company perspective? Do they believe it's faster? Because it's not. Especially not when you have a simple plastic divisor the splits the take-out counter in two, allowing the first customer to pack his goods while the next customer is already getting check-out service. There's rarely any jams at take-out, except for the occasional times that someone needs help with bagging.

[Tack]

Okay, everyone needs to take a picture of the cashier's setup near their place. The places I know of, it's pretty unfeasible, the whole system sits behind the till-barricade and the goods go straight from beeper to bag.
You only really get access to them when they need to go into the shopping cart.
Of course, mom and pop shops work slightly differently. I think. Okay, I have no idea, they don't exist.

[Criptfeind]

Around here at least when you don't have the plastic divider thing (for whatever reason) the baggers do seem to speed things up. Maybe it's a difference of location or quality of shops or whatever but I find incompetent baggers pretty darn rare. A majority of them are good enough that they are probably as fast if not faster then I would be (more skilled, but they also care more about not squishing shit, so sorta a toss up) I'm thinking though the process here, and although I have no idea if it's "value added" enough to be worthwhile, but they certainly speed things up when there's only one person. The shopper puts the stuff on the belt and then goes to handle payment as the cashier scans it and then the bagger bags it, all this happening at the same time as you go though your items.

It's my understanding that amount of groceries purchased is a cultural thing, and I could totally see if you don't buy a week or twos worth of goods in a single shopping trip then baggers make a lot less sense since there's relatively little gain in the whole "bagging well I'm putting items on the belt" area. Maybe that's the cause of some bagger dislike here or something, idk.

[Frumple]

Okay, everyone needs to take a picture of the cashier's setup near their place. The places I know of, it's pretty unfeasible, the whole system sits behind the till-barricade and the goods go straight from beeper to bag.
You only really get access to them when they need to go into the shopping cart.
Of course, mom and pop shops work slightly differently. I think. Okay, I have no idea, they don't exist.

That's how it is most places around my area, yeah. The customer actually bagging the stuff, or an employee besides the cashier, is pretty rare. And getting more rare, actually -- five, ten years ago it was a bit more findable.

Though apparently their training or... something... is better in my neck of the woods. I've pretty much never had a problem with 'em bagging stuff unwisely. No punctured meat packaging, no squishy/breakable stuff in the wrong bag or under something, nothing like that. Occasionally there'll be leakage of one sort or another but that's almost always because I/whoever was getting it just didn't notice the stuff was set to do that from the beginning.

So far as speed goes, though, I haven't noticed much of a gain speed wise between cashier + bagger and just cashier. Scanning and putting away are basically one motion, most of the time, and sliding the whatever towards the bagger is about as much effort. And, uh. When I shop, I tend to shop for a month+ in terms of quantity, so it's not just a matter of habitually getting small amounts in one go.

[Criptfeind]

So far as speed goes, though, I haven't noticed much of a gain speed wise between cashier + bagger and just cashier. Scanning and putting away are basically one motion, most of the time, and sliding the whatever towards the bagger is about as much effort. And, uh. When I shop, I tend to shop for a month+ in terms of quantity, so it's not just a matter of habitually getting small amounts in one go.

Although I'm finding it hard to mentally picture the motion of swiping something to the side to be the same effort as selecting the correct bag and slotting it in in a way that won't squish shit, as one manages the bags and stuff, you're right it's not THAT much harder, if the set up is to have the bag in reach of the cashier, which often isn't the case.... For whatever reason.

Edit: To me baggers seem to shine in a store that's pretty busy, you got a constant flow of people though all the checkouts, and the checkouts themselves aren't set up to facilitate a different approach. Which is exactly how the place I have in mind for this conversation is like. There's another place I shop that has baggers as well but isn't busy enough to justify this, although they seem to hire disabled people for some of the bagger jobs, and the other baggers (they often only have like two checkouts open at a time) are in charge of helping with the self checkout.

[martinuzz]

Okay, everyone needs to take a picture of the cashier's setup near their place.

At about 0:50 you can see quite clearly what the checkout looks like, with the divisor.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JR1NNJcox0M

[hector13]

While I hated working in retail, I always gave (what I thought was) pretty good customer service, especially at checkouts. Generally didn't chat, because having the same conversation 40 times is mind-numbing, but beyond that...

Bagging was easy. Generally was complimented on actually putting breakable things on top, would always check any eggs folk bought, that kinda thing. 't ain't rocket surgery.

[Tack]

Generally it's up to the customer to put the colds and cans and such in the right place on the belt, and if you don't the cashier just gives you a look and reaches slightly further to get the right group of items.
Then it's just one bag at a time.

[Criptfeind]

Generally it's up to the customer to put the colds and cans and such in the right place on the belt, and if you don't the cashier just gives you a look and reaches slightly further to get the right group of items.
Then it's just one bag at a time.

If you're buying a lot of stuff and haven't purposefully sorted your goods (I know that such a thing is pure common sense to us probably, but these systems aren't made for people with common sense) this really isn't possible in a speedy timeframe. The cashier isn't going to reach into your cart to grab the frozen pizza to put with your other frozen foods if it's below a bunch of shit.

[Rolan7]

Okay, everyone needs to take a picture of the cashier's setup near their place.

At about 0:50 you can see quite clearly what the checkout looks like, with the divisor.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JR1NNJcox0M

The places in my particular city don't have belts (saves space I guess), but otherwise that's pretty much what we've got.  Our divisor might be just a little taller, but it's still pretty easy to reach over.

The grocery store near my first home had a belt, but I think that's rare nowadays?  Not sure if regional.  Most places around here, you just pull your cart directly up to the cashier.  Usually there's a plastic shelf that the cart slides over, or you put your basket on it, and the cashier takes everything out from their right.

Here's an example picture from Trader Joes, which doesn't have the shelf (thus reduces the size of the checkout counter even farther):
http://c8.alamy.com/comp/DDFGHX/customers-women-shoppers-with-babies-small-children-kids-cluster-in-DDFGHX.jpg

[Tack]

Okay, everyone needs to take a picture of the cashier's setup near their place.

At about 0:50 you can see quite clearly what the checkout looks like, with the divisor.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JR1NNJcox0M

Equally strange YouTube clip
Personally think the guy seems like a massive simpleton, but it shows the setup okay.
2:30 is the best spot

[Sergarr]

what the shit is "CANARY WHARF"

paging LW here since he appears to be an expert on London