[Grocery cart FAIL.]The scene: A (non-
Piggly Wiggly) grocery store
The players: Me, Hubs, and someone I'll call Clark the Clerk
We have a dozen items and make the fateful decision to go "self checkout".
The view: It is set up such that four self checkout stations are positioned behind one clerk station, should there be questions.
*insert ominous foreshadow music here* The next free station happens to be close to the clerk. Husband takes the scanning part, I take the bagging part. The station appears to have two scanners, one in the scale/base and one perpendicular to this. It's also got one of those bag carousel doohickeys, where it's clear the bags are having more fun than we are.
All right, you've got enough information. On with the show.
Hubs scans the first item. To do this, he goes through the following:
1. Run item over base scanner, nothing happens.
2. Run item over base scanner again, nothing happens.
3. Run item in front of perpendicular scanner, nothing happens.
4. Curse.
5. Run item
slowly over base scanner, nothing happens.
6. Wave the item in a variety of indiscriminate directions as if shaking a box of marbles.
7. Item and price come up on screen.
Hubs hands me the item which I place in a bag.
Screen reads: "Wait for attendant."
Hubs:
What?! What happened? I scanned one item. What's wrong with this thing?Me, turning to Clark the Clerk:
Hi. It's saying "Wait for attendant." Do you know what's wrong with it?Clark, not moving from his station:
Yeah. It's messed up.Me, animatedly:
Honey, the gentleman here knows what's wrong with it. He says, "It's messed up."Hubs:
Me:
Hubs:
Maybe self check-out was a bad idea. How do I cancel out of this?Screen no longer reads "Wait for attendant."
Hubs:
Wait, it cleared. Hubs scans three more items. I bag three more items.
Screen reads "Wait for attendant."
Hubs:
#%!#$!Clark, still not moving from his station:
She's leaning on the bag carousel. That messes it up.Me, jumping back faster than Mel Gibson's press rep.:
I was? Oh. If I'd known that, I wouldn't have done it. Clark:
Yeah.Hubs:
Me:
Hubs scans more items. I bag more items.
Hubs puts a bag of apricots on the scanner/scale base. It says to enter the
PLU but there is no
PLU. There is no search option on the screen. We turn to Clark.
Clark:
Yeah, I can look that up. What have you got there?Me:
Apricots.Clark:
What?Hubs, lifting bag for Clark to see:
Apricots.Clark:
Paper cuts?Yeah, we were low on paper cuts so we thought we'd stock up.Me, slowly:
A-pri-cots.Clark, scanning laminated list in front of him:
How do you spell that?Me and hubs simultaneously:
A, P, R, I, C, O, T, S.Clark, lifting his finger from the middle of the list and heading back to the As:
Oh, Apricots.Hubs:
Yes.Clark:
It's 4039.Me:
4039. Thank you.Hubs types in 4039.
Clark:
I was all like duh.Yes, you were exactly
all like duh.Me:
Well... thanks.Annnnnd, scene.
Questions
du jour:
Do you self checkout?* Does self checkout ever work for you without a problem?**
* I am not talking about what you do in the shower.
** I'm still not talking about what you do in the shower.***
*** You really should rinse everything down after that, you know.