Supermarket Self Service Tills

[hexagon789]

No it's fine... RailForums members have no particular duty to resolve my petty issues with supermarket shopping

We sympathise in spirit!

 

[SteveM70]

but the amount of food disposed of is very small these days

Don't you believe that, that's all I'll say!

(I have personal experience - it's not 'very small')

You are incorrect, though it does vary by chain, and even by store.

It also depends on what you consider “disposed of” to mean. Most supermarkets use food charities for disposal of short life stock from warehouses, and most stores have arrangements with local charities.

The proportion of stock which isn’t sold at full ticket price also varies - the shorter the date life at manufacture the higher it is, and also it’s more in smaller convenience stores than big superstores.

 

[Baxenden Bank]

Are there any significant losses from shoppers mis-using the weighing scales in the grocery section? I've often wondered, and I am not advocating this, but what is there to stop you weighing expensive fruit such as raspberries, but selecting a cheaper fruit to produce the bar code and price label? The checkout scales will check that the weight is correct, but have no way of knowing whether the goods are correct.

Mushrooms as something else - and I'm not giving any secrets away there. Local cafe owner caught doing it by the carrier bag full on a frequent basis. A friend whose stock control said he had too many mushrooms but there were none on the shelves, and the opposite problem of selling more of the alternative than had been delivered. 'I no speak English' says the cafe owner, no problem said the produce manager who simply printed off the banning letter in the apporpriate language - it already having been translated by head office.

 

[Hadders]

Don't you believe that, that's all I'll say!

(I have personal experience - it's not 'very small')

You are incorrect, though it does vary by chain, and even by store.

I am very aware of wastage and disposal figures in supermarkets. Of course it will vary by store but it also has to be seen in the overall context of sales of around £140 billion per year.

It also depends on what you consider “disposed of” to mean. Most supermarkets use food charities for disposal of short life stock from warehouses, and most stores have arrangements with local charities.

The proportion of stock which isn’t sold at full ticket price also varies - the shorter the date life at manufacture the higher it is, and also it’s more in smaller convenience stores than big superstores.

Food doesn't go to landfill these days. It generally goes to food banks or local charities.

Items reduced to clear is not a disposal and most supermarkets include the cost of reductions in the overall wastage figure. This often confuses people as they think the overall wastage figure is what has been disposed. It isn't - the vast majority of supermarket wastage is the cost of reduced to clear, not stock disposals.

 

[JamesT]

I find the variation in pricing of “reduced to clear” interesting. I have a friend who shops in her local Tesco and can often pick up piles of stuff marked down to 10p. Whereas I find the reduced shelf in my store is usually more like 10-20% off, a lucky bargain might be half price. Presumably my store is slightly better at keeping its excess stock down so they don’t need to discount so much?

I mostly continue to use the manned checkouts, but that’s mainly habit. I do prefer using card over cash whenever possible. With card I can just look at online banking and see how it’s going, whereas cash is often “I took £50 out last week but only have £18.23 in my pocket, what did I spend the rest on?”

 

[Bald Rick]

As ever, it's a balancing act between the overall customer experience and minimising loss.

Surely anything involving self service tills with scales is a balancing act

 

[Hadders]

I find the variation in pricing of “reduced to clear” interesting. I have a friend who shops in her local Tesco and can often pick up piles of stuff marked down to 10p. Whereas I find the reduced shelf in my store is usually more like 10-20% off, a lucky bargain might be half price. Presumably my store is slightly better at keeping its excess stock down so they don’t need to discount so much?

Lots of different factors to consider:

• How good is the store at managing their inventory integrity (stores don't usually order stock themselves these days - they make sure that what they physically have in store matches what the system thinks they've got. The stock control system does the rest)
• What is the sales density of the store - in a small store with high sales there will generally be fewer reductions than in a large store with a low sales density
• How large is the fresh food range. Is it too big or small for the sales the store has
• What are the demographics and socioeconomic of the customer base - is the store stocking the right range
• Never under-estimate the impact of the weather. Both hot and cold
• Events also play a huge part, not just the obvious like Christmas or Easter but things like England having a good run in the World Cup (other countries are available as necessary!)
• Impact of promotional activity and new products. Promotions will often see sales canibalised from other products in the range
• What local activity is happening. For example stores heavily dependent on schools or universities for trade need to plan for when they are on holiday (or even have a teacher training day. Even closer to home festivals, carnivals or even a football match can have a huge impact
• Competition - anything new opening or closing nearby that will impact business
• How robust is the store on stock rotation, merchandising standards and managing reductions

I could go on....

Surely anything involving self service tills with scales is a balancing act

Very good

 

[cb a1]

I find the variation in pricing of “reduced to clear” interesting. I have a friend who shops in her local Tesco and can often pick up piles of stuff marked down to 10p. Whereas I find the reduced shelf in my store is usually more like 10-20% off, a lucky bargain might be half price. Presumably my store is slightly better at keeping its excess stock down so they don’t need to discount so much?

In addition to Hadders point, there's also the time of day.
My Tesco does the final major reduction typically between 7pm and 8pm.
Turn up before 7pm and there'll be nothing less than half price.
Turn up after 8pm and there'll just be a couple of badly damaged sprouts left.
Hit the sweet spot as the reduced food is put out, join the queue of fellow bargain hunters and get cheap grub.

That said, the racism you may well encounter is awful.

 

[hexagon789]

It also depends on what you consider “disposed of” to mean. Most supermarkets use food charities for disposal of short life stock from warehouses, and most stores have arrangements with local charities.

The proportion of stock which isn’t sold at full ticket price also varies - the shorter the date life at manufacture the higher it is, and also it’s more in smaller convenience stores than big superstores.

Even taking charity donations into account, which vary by supermarket, the amount of food waste which is simply 'wasted' is in my opinion still pretty shocking.

I am very aware of wastage and disposal figures in supermarkets. Of course it will vary by store but it also has to be seen in the overall context of sales of around £140 billion per year.

I appreciate that, but it's still worth a not inconsiderable amount of £££

I find the variation in pricing of “reduced to clear” interesting. I have a friend who shops in her local Tesco and can often pick up piles of stuff marked down to 10p. Whereas I find the reduced shelf in my store is usually more like 10-20% off, a lucky bargain might be half price. Presumably my store is slightly better at keeping its excess stock down so they don’t need to discount so much?

Obviously it varies by supermarket in terms of times and % reduction, but many use a system where the price is affected by quantity and expected sales of item - a less well-selling product and say 30 of that product will be marked down more heavily than a single item of a fast-selling product line.

 

[Mojo]

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but in the supermarket, one staff member can manage 10 self scan tills. the customers do most of the work, only needing staff input occasionally. far more productive.

Occasionally? In my experience it requires staff intervention on most of transactions; the likelihood of intervention increasing proportionately to the number of goods Im trying to purchase.

 

[Kite159]

My preferred option when doing medium - large shops is to use the "scan as you go" devices. Not only does this save time as I can pack my bags as I go meaning it can take less than a minute at the till itself (assuming no security check). Helps if the store is large enough to get it's own tills set aside for scan as you go customers rather than making them join the queue for the normal self scan.

Also has the benefit of seeing the price of the goods matches the shelf edge label, especially if it's an item on promotion.

 

[Mojo]

The biggest problem I encounter with the self-service machines is that I generally don't want to put my shopping in a carrier bag; I want to put it in my rucksack. Unfortunately a rucksack is often heavy enough that if I place it on the scales the machine refuses to believe it's just a bag and a member of staff has to verify it.

I assume the aim of this is to make sure people can't hide things in a rucksack and just buy a small nominal item to make it look like I was a genuine customer to the staff.
I don't quite see the point of this; if I really wanted to steal the merchandise (which, for the record, I don't) I could surely just keep the rucksack on my back and use a carrier bag for my nominal item, and the computer would be none the wiser?

I find that even if you put a normal shopping bag on the scales, or select the using my own bag option (where available) it still insists on human verification, so I don’t bother, and scan all my items, pay, and then pack them into bags at the end.

 

[Ianno87]

My preferred option when doing medium - large shops is to use the "scan as you go" devices. Not only does this save time as I can pack my bags as I go meaning it can take less than a minute at the till itself (assuming no security check). Helps if the store is large enough to get it's own tills set aside for scan as you go customers rather than making them join the queue for the normal self scan.

Also has the benefit of seeing the price of the goods matches the shelf edge label, especially if it's an item on promotion.

Oh yes, I would never not use Scan as you shop for anything but the smallest of shops these days. It's a bit weird having upwards of £200 of shopping in the trolley and spending less than 30 seconds at the till!

 

[biko]

I really dislike those self service tills with scales. They only give trouble and in my experience nearly always require staff. I’m glad they don’t exist where I live.

I always use the app of the supermarket in which you can put your shopping list and then scan all products with your phone and directly put them into the bags. At the end, I can just show a code on my phone screen to the self service till and I can pay everything. Very quick and only a handful of times, staff checks a few items in the bags.

 

[py_megapixel]

I really dislike those self service tills with scales. They only give trouble and in my experience nearly always require staff. I’m glad they don’t exist where I live.

I always use the app of the supermarket in which you can put your shopping list and then scan all products with your phone and directly put them into the bags. At the end, I can just show a code on my phone screen to the self service till and I can pay everything. Very quick and only a handful of times, staff checks a few items in the bags.

Yes, that's being gradually rolled out by I think all of the major British chains of large supermarkets. It looks like a good idea though I've never personally used it as they require having a loyalty card for the relevant supermarket.

In addition, Sainsburys, Tesco and Asda have handsets in some of their larger stores which customers can pick up (Waitrose have had these for ages) if they prefer not to use a smartphone.

 

[ta-toget]

In addition, Sainsburys, Tesco and Asda have handsets in some of their larger stores which customers can pick up (Waitrose have had these for ages) if they prefer not to use a smartphone.

I wouldn't be surprised if they don't replace those at the end of life, given that they've now shown it can work on smartphones. The benefit would be negligible, and I'd suspect the union of customers not having a smartphone and those wishing to use self-scan-as-you-go is pretty small.

 

[py_megapixel]

I wouldn't be surprised if they don't replace those at the end of life, given that they've now shown it can work on smartphones. The benefit would be negligible, and I'd suspect the union of customers not having a smartphone and those wishing to use self-scan-as-you-go is pretty small.

Interestingly a lot of them have come in quite recently! Though I do agree that they probably won't be kept far into the future.

Incidentally, I'm fairly certain that the self-scan handsets are in fact just Android devices running a slightly modified version of the same app that can be downloaded to a smartphone.

 

[Mcr Warrior]

Not used them, but how do you weigh (and so price up) loose produce using a handheld self scan device?

 

[py_megapixel]

Not used them, but how do you weigh (and so price up) loose produce using a handheld self scan device?

The fruit/veg section generally has a machine where you place your bag of produce on a scale and select which type of produce you are weighing. The machine then prints a barcode which you scan with the device.

 

[Ediswan]

I wouldn't be surprised if they don't replace those at the end of life, given that they've now shown it can work on smartphones. The benefit would be negligible, and I'd suspect the union of customers not having a smartphone and those wishing to use self-scan-as-you-go is pretty small.

The union would be large, the intersection would be small.

 

[Gloster]

One change that self-scan tills have made to my buying habits is that, even when I go through a staffed till, I pay a great deal more attention to the shopping. Previously, I would have a rough idea of what the total should be and would only check the receipt if it seemed a bit high. Now I watch the whole process.

When the self-scan tills appeared I found that there were a lot of errors, seemingly always in the supermarket’s favour. In one chain offers such as ‘Two-for-One’ did not seem to get put into the system when they came into force and the items would go through at full price. And this could be well into the afternoon of the first day or even on another day.

The machines in another chain had a habit of either demanding more money after the full amount had been inserted or giving short change. The staff were a bit fed up with (and possibly distrustful of) me, but I finally got them to accept that I was right after an occasion when they could see that I hadn’t touched the change and it turned out to be short. Their argument that, “It’s only 2p,” was met with, “Yes, but it’s my 2p.”

These seem to have been sorted out, although how many wrong totals there were until it was is open to question. You can still get the problems of someone not covering over the original barcode of a reduced price item and it going through at the full price. I also had a packet of biscuits, value about a pound, going through at £12.99.

 

[ta-toget]

The union would be large, the intersection would be small.

Indeed. I gave up studying maths for a reason… (Or maybe my giving it up is the reason for that mistake.)

 

[RailAleFan]

When the self-scan tills appeared I found that there were a lot of errors, seemingly always in the supermarket’s favour. In one chain offers such as ‘Two-for-One’ did not seem to get put into the system when they came into force and the items would go through at full price. And this could be well into the afternoon of the first day or even on another day.

Errors in the supermarket's favour will always register on your concious more than errors in your favour which i'm sure there are; I think it's more or less net zero over time.

Processing of multi-buy / meal-deals / BOGOF can only be applied once all items have been scanned and you proceed to payment in order to work out the most optimal application of the offers in your favour.

 

[Mcr Warrior]

Errors in the supermarket's favour will always register on your concious more than errors in your favour which i'm sure there are; I think it's more or less net zero over time.

Aye, that'll be right, for sure!

 

[Gloster]

Errors in the supermarket's favour will always register on your concious more than errors in your favour which i'm sure there are; I think it's more or less net zero over time.

Processing of multi-buy / meal-deals / BOGOF can only be applied once all items have been scanned and you proceed to payment in order to work out the most optimal application of the offers in your favour.

I am aware of the greater likelihood of remembering when you feel you have been cheated, rather than when you win. However, I was watching carefully after I had first become suspicious. Unless the machine miscalculates the total or gives you more change, it is difficult for an error to be in your favour. What are the chances of buying two of something that the system wrongly thinks is a BOGOF?

And I did soon get to know that the tills in most of the chains only took off the reductions when you went to payment. This was always the attendants first explanation and I soon learnt that I had to take it into account.

 

[Ianno87]

And I did soon get to know that the tills in most of the chains only took off the reductions when you went to payment. This was always the attendants first explanation and I soon learnt that I had to take it into account.

As you are scanning, I press "Sub Total" as I go, which checks that offers have been applied correctly, before getting all the way to the end.

 

[Baxenden Bank]

I am aware of the greater likelihood of remembering when you feel you have been cheated, rather than when you win. However, I was watching carefully after I had first become suspicious. Unless the machine miscalculates the total or gives you more change, it is difficult for an error to be in your favour. What are the chances of buying two of something that the system wrongly thinks is a BOGOF?

And I did soon get to know that the tills in most of the chains only took off the reductions when you went to payment. This was always the attendants first explanation and I soon learnt that I had to take it into account.

At least once, and quite recently too.

I scanned my basket of goods which incuded a sandwich 'meal deal'. It deducted the saving twice so I paid about £1.30 for a sandwich, fruit juice and chocolate. Having said that, I didn't fess up because the previous week I thought I had selected the correct items for a 'meal deal' but in fact the chocolate was '2 for £x' big yellow shelf sticker, rather than '£3 meal deal' big yellow shelf sticker. I think they do it deliberately to catch out those not quite paying attention.

I don't bother challenging very small mistakes, sometimes they are in my favour, sometimes the shop.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

The fruit/veg section generally has a machine where you place your bag of produce on a scale and select which type of produce you are weighing. The machine then prints a barcode which you scan with the device.

Somewhat surprises me that the machine prints the barcode rather than simply displaying it for you to scan. Must add quite a bit to the cost and complexity of the machine, and it seems a complete waste of a sticky label - since I have no use for the label after scanning it, and end up throwing them away as soon as I get home.

I find that even if you put a normal shopping bag on the scales, or select the using my own bag option (where available) it still insists on human verification, so I don’t bother, and scan all my items, pay, and then pack them into bags at the end.

That's exactly what I would normally do if using self-service. It also has the advantage that you can scan the items in any order and then pack them how you want (heavy stuff at the bottom, highly squishable stuff on top etc.), instead of having to faff about trying to scan stuff in the order you need to pack them.

 

[SteveM70]

What are the chances of buying two of something that the system wrongly thinks is a BOGOF?

Not massive, but like all promotions it relies on head office people keying promotions correctly - start date, end date, and the deal. They sometimes make mistakes

Somewhat surprises me that the machine prints the barcode rather than simply displaying it for you to scan.

Its there in case you’re chosen for a security check at the checkout. Without it, the checker has no way of knowing what you told the scales the product was, and what you should have paid

 

[Mojo]

Somewhat surprises me that the machine prints the barcode rather than simply displaying it for you to scan. Must add quite a bit to the cost and complexity of the machine, and it seems a complete waste of a sticky label - since I have no use for the label after scanning it, and end up throwing them away as soon as I get home.

Depends what technology the handheld machines have; some [laser] scanners are unable to read barcodes displayed on screens (some supermarkets like Sainsbury’s for instance have only recently upgraded their semi-attended terminals as previously they wouldn’t accept nectar cards off mobile phones and you had to type the number in manually).

Additionally, they might require the barcodes for rescans, and in some shops like Waitrose the regular semi-attended terminals don’t have scales so they serve two purposes.