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Many people are starving because they are locked down and not able to work, but I think that the grocery self scan that so many stores are moving towards, enabl

Many people are starving because they are locked down and not able to work, but I think that the grocery self scan that so many stores are moving towards, enables food theft; or at the very least it makes it easier. It would be interesting to see exactly how much shrinkage occurs due to the self scan.

dheera 6y ago
They also save a lot of money in cashier hourly labor. At least the ones that don't keep launching into "Please wait for assistance." mode every time you accidentally scan a fruit instead of entering its PLU code.
- dmoy 6y ago
  > At least the ones that don't keep launching into "Please wait for assistance." mode every time you accidentally scan a fruit instead of entering its PLU code. or have something vaguely spherical roll off of the absurdly tiny flat space you're supposed to stack everything, with no walls I swear I'm starting to buy big white vegetable cabbage instead of green cabbage now, just because it doesn't roll.
schrodinger 6y ago
Might still be a net win for the store if the theft is less than the cost of employing a human cashier.
Spooky23 6y ago
Agreed. Self check is such an obviously dumb approach, especially with high value stuff like meat. People do stuff like swap tags or enter invalid PLUs all of the time. Was that a cherry (11/lb) or a potato (0.69/lb)?
- nostromo 6y ago
  I've wondered if it'd even be possible for them to differentiate between organic and non-organic produce. They're probably banking on people being honest in most cases, which thankfully seems to be a correct assumption.
- strken 6y ago
  If you see a gigantic corporation continuing to use an obviously dumb approach as part of its core business, it's possible that you might not have considered all the angles.
  - Spooky23 6y ago
    Possibly. Some big corps tend to be pretty dumb when decision makers are too far away. Supermarkets are pretty easy to spot bad management in in particular.

dheera 6y ago

They also save a lot of money in cashier hourly labor. At least the ones that don't keep launching into "Please wait for assistance." mode every time you accidentally scan a fruit instead of entering its PLU code.

dmoy 6y ago
> At least the ones that don't keep launching into "Please wait for assistance." mode every time you accidentally scan a fruit instead of entering its PLU code. or have something vaguely spherical roll off of the absurdly tiny flat space you're supposed to stack everything, with no walls I swear I'm starting to buy big white vegetable cabbage instead of green cabbage now, just because it doesn't roll.

schrodinger 6y ago

Might still be a net win for the store if the theft is less than the cost of employing a human cashier.

Spooky23 6y ago

Agreed. Self check is such an obviously dumb approach, especially with high value stuff like meat. People do stuff like swap tags or enter invalid PLUs all of the time. Was that a cherry (11/lb) or a potato (0.69/lb)?

nostromo 6y ago
I've wondered if it'd even be possible for them to differentiate between organic and non-organic produce. They're probably banking on people being honest in most cases, which thankfully seems to be a correct assumption.
strken 6y ago
If you see a gigantic corporation continuing to use an obviously dumb approach as part of its core business, it's possible that you might not have considered all the angles.
- Spooky23 6y ago
  Possibly. Some big corps tend to be pretty dumb when decision makers are too far away. Supermarkets are pretty easy to spot bad management in in particular.