No more Tesco for us

We went to our local Tesco early this morning for our usual bi-weekly general shop. Since we were last in they have removed a load of checkouts and put in a special trolley self service checkout area. There were no normal checkouts open.

It took an extra 25 minutes or more just scanning an item and waiting for the system to catch up, weigh it and accept that it was on the out going platform, needed multiple staff interventions to unfreeze the system. Because of all this hassle the security tag on a bottle of Rum was not removed and set the alarms off when we finally left. Being Tesco no one took any notice and I just cut it off when we got home.

I will never take a trolley through a Tesco self checkout again, It is unlikely I shall ever set foot in a Tesco again.

Sorry for the rant, I was within an ace of just leaving the whole lot there.

 

M&S Food starting to do the same. They are having problems too and the look on the staff faces said it all.

 

Using self-scan?

I do x2 £200 shops each month with Clubcard Plus which gives 10% off my shop. Would not dream of using a conventional shopping till. That way it also avoids queuing.

The system they have at Sainsbury is amazing nowadays as you can self scan with your own smart phone. It works brilliantly too.

 

it has been happening for years, our Tesco did it about 5 years ago (possibly more) - we dont shop in Tesco for a variety of other reasons, but we always found self scanning as you shop to be very efficient in both Tesco and Waitrose.

The other form of self scan where you shop and scan everything at the end is pants.

Funnily being a University town, we never had any shortage of checkout operatives, until the summer hols, and the students went home - the checkout queues doubled.

 

They have just installed the same at our local Sainsbury’s. Total PitA, took my wife 25 mins to do what used to take 10 mins. They are totally useless for a big shop.

 

Gosh what a terrible experience

 

I hear echoes of my mother here and she’s 82!

 

i once participated in a multi discipline research project to design a shopping trolley that was a scanner/till/checkout.....

the future is arriving.....https://www.theguardian.com/technol...esh-opens-first-till-less-grocery-store-in-uk

 

Yes, you always forget to scan something, like items where the barcode is on the shelf (e.g. fruit you buy per item). Then you run back to the shelf etc.

Good you didn't, the poor staff was already overworked without having to put all that stuff back on the shelves.

 

The future is ‘Amazon Go’ (no tills and no self-checkout - literally just grab and go)

 

I have anger management issues with self service tills. I avoid them completely now, even if it involves queuing for a while.

 

I'll use self service tills if I only have a few items but otherwise will go to a regular till. Tbh I avoid Tesco anyway as I find them more expensive than most other places I can go to and their stupid clubcard vs non-clubcard pricing gets on my tits.

 

Same here, until I decided to pay by card again. At most places I have switched to Apple pay or pay with another (meanwhile very common) dedicated app on the phone, but you need signal for it, and in those supermarkets built like faraday cages you never know.

 

I haven't been in a supermarket for 14 nearly 15 years, I hate the places with a passion - I've been getting deliveries for all that time and it's only failed once!

 

very rarely happened to us when we went shopping at branch..... at Waitrose, those items can be scanned after at the till. Never an issue.

Mind you we almost exclusively shop online now for everything

 

Possible here but not under CHF 100, too much. Motivates you to buy stuff you don't need.

 

A bit like with booking gig tickets the supermarkets have cottoned on to the idea that you can get the customer to do much more of the legwork - that used to be done by humans, or perhaps a computer at their end - and still charge the same price.

15 years ago I met a chap who told me he was working on future systems for supermarkets where your entry to the store was recorded and every price that was displayed within the store was particular to you only. At the time it sounded unfeasible to me but now with phones and scannable barcodes less so.

 

Certainly they already have special pricing for loyalty card holders across a vast array of items...

 

Thin end of the wedge eh? And factor in digital (programmable) currency and as well as a specific price I can imagine a 'sorry, you are not authorised to purchase this item' message.

I don't like where this appears to be going.

 

much of the food might well end up in the bin