Kmart--Another one bites the dust?

[DVerbarg]

In addition to K-Mart having the self-checkouts I believe that Meijer's (another discount type store along the lines of Target and Wal-Mart) has them. They are also appearing in grocery stores such as Kroger's.

I've used them a few times but have been too frustrated by them. The anti-theft measures implemented are too frustrating for me to deal with when purchasing many items and when only purchasing a couple items the express lanes are generally faster. Of course others, like Bird, benefit from them. But I have to admit that the first time I saw one I waited in line just to try it instead of using a "normal cashier". /w3tcompact/icons/blush.gif

 

[DVerbarg]

Its that scale mechanism that gets on my nerves. After you scan an item it has to go on the scale/bagging area and stay there until after the monetary transaction is begun. This presents a problem if you have a cart (buggy for you southerners /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif) full of merchandise. Hmpphh /w3tcompact/icons/frown.gif!

 

[Bird]

Dave, I'll admit that I was slow and a bit frustrated the first time I used it. If you work fast, you keep getting that audible "Please bag last item" (when you scan and bag it before the audible gives the price), but I soon learned to just ignore that, so I can do it faster than going to one of their cashiers now.

And I'll also admit that I don't understand how their anti-theft measures work; looks to me like it might not be hard for someone to get off with something, but I guess they have some system in place. I've never run into anything that caused me any delays once I learned how to handle produce with no bar code, and of course that's simple, too, once you get used to it.

 

[Knight9]

So do you get a price break for doing all the work yourself??

Kevin

 

[Bird]

<font color=blue>After you scan an item it has to go on the scale/bagging area and stay there until after the monetary transaction is begun</font color=blue>

Not with our Kmart. Example: one of the really large packages of toilet tissue, you sure aren't going to put it in one of those little bags, but the audible will say "Please bag last item"; just ignore it and keep going; no problem.

 

[Bird]

<font color=blue>So do you get a price break for doing all the work yourself?? </font color=blue>

Well, sort of . . .. I don't know about other places, but our local Kmart has, for many years, been notorious for ringing up prices that were higher than those posted. And if you didn't catch it before it was totalled up, then you had to go to the "service counter" to get it corrected and get your refund. I know a lot of people who absolutely refuse to trade with Kmart because of that. I'll assume it was honest errors; however, in one case, I bought a package of cheese that was rung up at almost twice the posted price, I told the cashier, got it corrected, etc., then a week later bought another identical package and it was also rung up at the same old wrong price. So they had known about it for a week and had not corrected it.

So when I do the scanning myself, I can catch it right then, and so far I haven't had it overcharge me when I was doing it myself./w3tcompact/icons/shocked.gif

 

[DVerbarg]

Maybe I'm just too frustrated by limitations. Once owned a retail store and as a result used to a system working efficiently for a trained cashier, not a customer. Overall I think the systems are designed well, except for that silly scale /w3tcompact/icons/wink.gif. Guess I'll just have to grow up and learn to accept this new fangled stuff (never mind the fact that at various times in past lives I was a programmer and Director of Information Technology and now work with technology as a tool all day long...)

 

[DVerbarg]

Nope, just the satisfaction of being a DIY /w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif

 

[DVerbarg]

KMart's system sounds better then others I've worked with. Most won't allow you to continue until the item is on the scale. If you could ignore and continue I would probably use the self-checkout regularly.

 

[jyoutz]

Loosing K-Mart would be very bad news for my small community. We have absolutely no other stores with a decent selection of merchandise except K-Mart and Wal-Mart. I would hate being down to a single place to shop. We are a small community but larger than any other in the surrounding area. So people who shop our Marts come from 2 counties and adjacent areas in western New Mexico.