I was getting used to those machines at one point, though they still weren't a great experience. The shop I was using put the machines very close together so I felt uncomfortable close to others and barely had space to put my rucksack down. I don't like the mistakes they make either ("unexpected item in bagging area" for no reason at all, "do you wish to continue?" just to hurry me along when I'm trying to think, and "have you swiped your Nectar card" which is a silly question because I haven't got one of those). I never worried about the machine getting me into trouble for shoplifting. Once it's figured out the amount to pay and knows I've paid it, I expected to just leave the shop with my groceries without being challenged. They always had an assistant or two standing behind us to sort out problems and to stop anybody cheating, so I felt they'd ignore me after that. I've noticed some places in the USA have somebody at the door who checks what's in your shopping against your receipt. The thing about that is that if they did find anything wrong, they couldn't prosecute because you hadn't left the store.
Later on I noticed a view that they were introducing machines so that they could sack the checkout staff, and that it might be a good political move to boycott the machines to stop them cutting jobs like that, and to force them to always provide the alternative. I also felt that I was a fool to do the shop's work for them if I didn't have to, so I went back to using the checkout staff. Anyway it's all history now. I don't see any point taking virus risks by going into shops when I can more easily use the kerbside pickup or mail order instead.
09 Sep 2020, 7:32 am
