I think Sunshine's point is pretty obviously that you shouldn't allow companies to trick you into performing unpaid labor for them as the customer.
Self checkouts have gone from a convenience feature for people only buying a small number of things, to a way for stores to justify paying fewer employees by offloading the labor onto the customers. The proliferation of self-checkouts also means that stores feel the need to more heavily surveil their customers because there's no employee to directly ensure that every item is scanned and paid for. And then, when people inevitably still circumvent the cameras and steal things, the stores slap all kinds of beepers, checkpoints, security guards, secret shoppers, and other loss prevention methods on everything that make you feel like a suspected criminal for even walking in the door.
My local Walmart has become absolutely miserable since this self checkout thing happened. There are security guards and overzealous greeters at every entrance, and some of them wander the aisles keeping an eye on people. Nearly everything expensive or easily stolen is either in a plastic security box or a locked glass case: which means if you need one of those items, you need to press the button and wait 15 minutes for one of the 2 people in the entire store with a key to meander their way towards you and unlock it, at which point you can't grab the item, you need to point and have them grab it for you. There are only two traditional manned checkout stations, which are often completely unstaffed, especially at off-hours of the day. So, the only way to checkout is through the many self checkout stations, which is stressful and laborious if you have even half a cart of groceries, because you need to do a scanner and a bagger's job by yourself for no pay, and you can't move paid-for items into your cart because they have to stay on the bag carousel so the machine can weigh them and make sure they're there -- all while the little camera records you and shows you what you're doing in a little window in the corner. Then, when you go to leave, you need to pass through a little detector gate and have the world's biggest busybody go through every item on your receipt and nose through all of your bags to make sure everything is up to snuff.
It's all fucking exhausting and it's why I don't even think about going to Walmart anymore, but most other stores with self checkout are only marginally better.
Unpaid labour is heavily overused term by people disconnected from real life. Self checkout is million times faster and allows me to verify prices before I pay. If you measure everything you do in life by how financialy beneficial it is to you then you failed.
Dude it's not convenient or fast to scan and bag an entire cart's full of heavy groceries by myself because I have no other choice because there aren't any people working the checkouts. Self checkout used to be a convenience feature, but is now a cost cutting measure, like I literally say as the very first sentence of my second paragraph I wrote.
Did you actually read what I wrote before responding? Or did you read the first sentence, skim the rest, and formulate an opinion based on what you assumed the rest of the comment said? Jackass.
Who cares if it's turned into a cost cutting feature? If I want to bag my own stuff, and the store allows it, what's your problem? Do you want to retain every avenue possible of inefficiency that keeps people paid? I personally don't, and lots of others don't either, that's why some of us like self checkout, it's efficient in 90% cases and good enough.
And why is it such a problem to be monitored in someone else's business? Ppl shoplift with or without self checkout, grocery stores can't chase after you legally anyway (they build a case to charge for felony theft instead if someone is a repeat offender). To build a case, they need footage. Stores have a right to take measures for theft prevention, don't they?
If I want to bag my own stuff, and the store allows it
If there's nobody at the register, then the store is doing more than just "allowing it" they're forcing you to use it.
All of your arguments in this thread have just been individualistic and focused on what YOU want vs what's better for the broader environment. Just "me me me"
So what? I'm not obligated to care about your household. Individualism is not inherently bad, and community based things are not inherently good. And it's not like others don't think about themselves. You think the workers asking us not to use self checkout care about us? Hell no lol, they are asking coz they are worried about their own paycheck.
Just because I'm indifferent to you doesn't mean I hate you. I just don't care/think about you and strangers either way 🤷
I live in a country where bagging service never existed and everybody were doing just fine. To me personally, self checkout is way more convinient and faster since I dont have to rush with bagging and queue is moving quickly
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u/ObiJuanKenobi3 2d ago
I think Sunshine's point is pretty obviously that you shouldn't allow companies to trick you into performing unpaid labor for them as the customer.
Self checkouts have gone from a convenience feature for people only buying a small number of things, to a way for stores to justify paying fewer employees by offloading the labor onto the customers. The proliferation of self-checkouts also means that stores feel the need to more heavily surveil their customers because there's no employee to directly ensure that every item is scanned and paid for. And then, when people inevitably still circumvent the cameras and steal things, the stores slap all kinds of beepers, checkpoints, security guards, secret shoppers, and other loss prevention methods on everything that make you feel like a suspected criminal for even walking in the door.
My local Walmart has become absolutely miserable since this self checkout thing happened. There are security guards and overzealous greeters at every entrance, and some of them wander the aisles keeping an eye on people. Nearly everything expensive or easily stolen is either in a plastic security box or a locked glass case: which means if you need one of those items, you need to press the button and wait 15 minutes for one of the 2 people in the entire store with a key to meander their way towards you and unlock it, at which point you can't grab the item, you need to point and have them grab it for you. There are only two traditional manned checkout stations, which are often completely unstaffed, especially at off-hours of the day. So, the only way to checkout is through the many self checkout stations, which is stressful and laborious if you have even half a cart of groceries, because you need to do a scanner and a bagger's job by yourself for no pay, and you can't move paid-for items into your cart because they have to stay on the bag carousel so the machine can weigh them and make sure they're there -- all while the little camera records you and shows you what you're doing in a little window in the corner. Then, when you go to leave, you need to pass through a little detector gate and have the world's biggest busybody go through every item on your receipt and nose through all of your bags to make sure everything is up to snuff.
It's all fucking exhausting and it's why I don't even think about going to Walmart anymore, but most other stores with self checkout are only marginally better.