Would go further and say 5 items or less allowed only. Anyone thats turns up with 6 or more items to then get forcibly removed from the premises and dumped on the footpath.

I was in a supermarket in America and they solved the problem of people showing up with lots of items by charging them an extra fifty cent per item over 10.
It was clearly signposted and definitely discouraged the trolley people from going into the express queue.

and the product is not even age restricted….so angry!

An post introduced a self service machine in the local shopping centre, its now far quicker and easier to interact with An Post. I dont have to queue for 15 mins to buy a stamp or to get a packaged weighed. Prior to the self service machines it was a pain trying to buy stamps…

You kids – I leave you alone for an hour and…
It’s probably my fault for using the word ‘evil’. Pretty strong for an automated device, no?

Resisted the urge to thumbsmack you Susan. (You’re still my fav!) Evil is not a strong enough word. Not strong enough I tell you. >:-(

Demonic?

I cannot think of a better word.Those machines HATE me, don’t ask me why. Evil fits perfectly with those feckin things >:(

Demonic it is. Quick Susan. Change it before you get more complaints….

They’re great, always use them :D

Forever Kirk. ;) Well til the next time you’re wrong. In other words if you disagree with me…. >:(

Get a room

Jambbie. Had to come back to see whether you meant Kirk or Susan. Love her too. It’s ages since she gave us a good row on a Monday though. They take the edge off Mondays! Love it ;)

@Réada – and anyone else – don’t forget my note at the end of the piece… help us find more dilemmas for the next batch of Burning Questions. All suggestions welcome!! Email is tips[at]thejournal.ie

Maybe a threesome… In fact there ya go Susan, a new topic for Monday’s opinion poll. whose up for a threesome.. :-)

Good lord. I am definitely not getting paid enough. ;)

will take more than a poll to convince irish women re that one lads!

Susan just Emailed you a suggestion. Causes arguments with myself and the girlfriend all the time

Sorry Susan. I hope my admiration and sisterly love for you has not caused the deterioration in the subject matter. My apologies. Ahem… :-/

Yep that would be me. Apoligies. Jesus up hate those machines.

Kirk. You’ve softened considerably since you started using my fada. I like you that you agree with me now. ;) Friends?

They don’t do people out of a job in tesco’s at least. Unions agreements stipulate that no ones job can be taken over by one of the machines ie same amount of people work in the store if they have no self scan machine or if they have 40 of them

Plain and simple:
If customers didn’t use the machine—a person would have been hired there. Every machine is a workplace that didn’t materialize because shoppers agree to do it for free.

That might be the case Garreth but it will certainly remove the need for Tesco’s to increase their staff numbers.

That is plainly and simply incorrect in my local Tesco store before the self scan they employed 165 staff after the self scan they now employ 175

I have proof of this where’s yours

My proof is in the unmanned checkouts. There would most likely be 180 staff if it weren’t for them.

Have to disagree with you too Raf. My Local Supervalu added 4 Self Server checkouts and two more staffed Checkouts on top of the 8 or 9 already. Where as before I would be waiting 10-15 mins in queues, there are very little queues now, which is great

I like ‘em. It’s a man thing. Can I have one for my shed…

I’m picturing the girl in Intermission, who tuts at everything.,

@Self service checkouts remove human interaction and the need for staff. Sorry.
How do you feel about ticket machines for car parks so ?

Do you think that these should also be manned by humans. So when entering a car park a human would hand you your ticket and when leaving you would pay someone behind a counter and then go back to the car so that he or she could lift the barrier ?

Self service tills meet a customer desire for faster service. Its customer driven, from what I have seen, they appear very popular amongst all age groups. They have not nor will not replace human manned tills because people with more then a few items will always require human operated tills

You must be delighted Tesco gave you a few hours on the Journal Kirk. I’m sure it beats all that boring human interaction stuff you hate so much. LMHO.

To answer your question though, yeah I’d prefer more human interaction. And don’t even get me started on automated phone answering!!!

Well, apparently not, one of the other comments here refers to a Union agreement with Tesco whereby the machines don’t replace jobs, the staff are just deployed elsewhere in the store.

I’m with you reada, jesus I hate the things. I can actually feel my blood pressure rising just looking at the things. I don’t think I have EVER once used one where I didn’t have to wait about forty minutes for a flippin human to come over with the magic card to fix wotever henious crime I’ve committed against the machine that it either screams a loud beeping noise to alert every single customer that I adm a complete moron incapable of rubbing food against a glass window properly or shouts unidentified item at me until I think my head is gonna explode and up get my french stick out of the basket to bashir seven shades out of it. just in case ye all think I’m a bit thick, I’m not….I have a postgrad to prove it but those machines just do not like me. Give me a grunting human at a checkout any day.

Which Ultan, as I’ve already said but mightn’t have shown up yet, will put off Tesco’s need to employ more.

@Reada, You’d rather queue just to be served by a person? Seems like a waste of time. Again, I’ve not seen in my local SuperValu any job losses, the new Self Service where added along with more Human Services tills also.

Should be stop using digital media – sure my kids may not job a in print media in the future, might be gone.

Yes Chris. Yes. We’ll go back to writing letters to the newspapers. But let’s get this one sorted out first.

I’d prefer my kids to have a job programming those devices, or engineering the scanners, or building the databses behind those stock systems rather than sitting behind a till going blip blip blip.

Down with well paid jobs though says reada. Up with menial labour. The Mind Boggles.

Miaow. You’re such a pussy cat p wurple. Miaow!

My Local Supervalu has them a while I I love them. Nice and quick.

Surely they’d live in Dublin then?

You must not live in Galway? As that was the stupidest comment I have ever read :D

Maybe they dumbed down the Galway machines

Looks like somebody doesn’t like your sense of humour.
That is their loss.
Fair comment Alan

Everyone knows that any IQ increase in Galway is due to the migration of Mayo people to the county.

Why would they make the machines complicated John? Your logic is flawed :P

I don’t think there’s any call for bring politics into this argument P Mac Eochaidin. The poor Mayo people have been embarrassed enough… ;)

Sorry P Mac ! We just passed a new law in the city that no Mayo are allowed with 2 miles of the Galway border. Enda Kenny will also be shot on sight!! :D

*tesco. Not tescos.

I bet you are loads of fun. ;)

i’d summarise it as “idiot” – so long as there isn’t an “idiot” in front of you!

not sure where you shop either – but been a while since i got into a deep and meaningful with the girls in Lidl etc….. maybe you should just try there if its lack of conversation u need?

Niamh, why do you say that? You assume that I’m anti-social and hate talking to people because I’d rather use a self service thingy and get out quickly? When buying groceries, I prefer the speed and efficiency that the self service checkouts (usually) provide, and I’m just not interested in small talk with a bored cashier. If that makes me no fun in your eyes then so be it.

I don’t make small talk, I just say thanks when they are finished. Seems easier to me to have someone do the work that they are paid for rather than me doing the work just to avoid speaking. It seems you get quite grumpy about being in contact with other people…..older people…families….thats why I said you sound like loads of fun. Its a subject I wouldn’t take too seriously.

Bagpackers put me off regular checkouts for life, so much shopping wrecked. Or now if I have to use a regular checkout where there are bagpackers, I donate money to them first and then ask them not to help me pack.

Hee hee evelyn, a woman after my own heart. Bag packers are definitely best avoided.

Oh goodness.. Bag packers!!
Call me anally retentive but I have a system for packing my shopping, I put it up freezer stuff first, vegetables second, then bulky items and then everything else..
Bag packers always mess it up!!

If I have a weekly shop I go to the checkout, the staff in my local superquinn are lovely, and some of the tesco guys are ok.
If I’m only grabbing one or two things I use the self service, purely because it’s quicker..

What do I get as a customer other than work to do?

Is it quicker? I doubt that. Are the prices lower since they cut down on those jobs? Yeah, right…

@Is it quicker? I doubt that.
It is unquestionably quicker if the serviced tills are busy.

@Are the prices lower since they cut down on those jobs? Yeah, right…
What job losses. What evidence have you that people were let go once the self service tills were introduced ?

@What job losses. What evidence have you that people were let go once the self service tills were introduced ?

What evidence? I am not talking about particular people having been fired. It’s obvious wherever you see an automated checkout point, there was or would have been otherwise a person working their job. This job… you are doing it now for free and the top management is laughing.

Remember when Tom Sawyer got his pals to whitewash the fence for him, even got paid to let them do it? This is what Tesco and others are doing: having people do the supermarket’s work for free.

@What evidence? I am not talking about particular people having been fired. It’s obvious wherever you see an automated checkout point, there was or would have been otherwise a person working their job.

Thats not necessarily true. It could equally be the case that the same amount of human tills remained and that a new person was hired to manage the self service tills (the self service tills are always managed by a human). So, the self service tills could be creating jobs!

So, there is no evidence of job losses at all. Im not aware of the unions representing the staff raising any concerns with regards to these machines, but I could be wrong

@This job… you are doing it now for free and the top management is laughing.
Its how you look at life really.

Kirk. I think you have enough to say for yourself without adding to your comments by copying and pasting everyone else’s. ;)

What do you mean Réada ? genuinely confused on that last comment

Sorry Kirk. Hit wrong button. Wish I had a little human of my own to type these comments for me.

More basket only options might solve that problem. Plenty of unmanned checkout spaces in your local supermarket. Just shows how little they care about their customers. It’s all about the bottom line now. Profits that is…

Hi John,
No intentional fascination with checkouts – I wasn’t aware that we had run this fun poll before. (You can see they are by different authors). The first one was prompted, it seems, by a US news story about a supermarket chain getting rid of theirs. This one yesterday was just inspired by a reader suggestion for our Burning Question series (which is intended to be light-hearted).
The reason the same pic was used was because we only use pictures we either pay a license to use or those made available to us via Creative Commons where the owner has given permission for them to be reproduced. Both Jennifer and I had gone for this because it was the best we could find! Great minds think alike etc.
So not laziness, but perhaps better described as a series of coincidences.
Thanks for the post and we’ll have a brand-new Burning Question next Monday.
Susan,
Editor,
TheJournal.ie