Home Depot Self Checkout Disappeared

The comparison to an x-ray scanner is... well, lay off the nitro for a while. Really though, it's a completely different type of system. There's no way to identify individual items with x-rays. Even using an RFID tag on everything (the absolute simplest way to do it) runs into problems of cost. Each and every item would be marked up to cover the cost of implementing and tagging. Are you willing to pay $4-5 more each time you buy groceries just so you don't have to stand in line for five minutes? If you go weekly you're dropping $250 to skip out on 260 minutes of standing. I've got much better things to spend $60 an hour on, personally.

This is ignoring the difficulties of such a system, which would require a large RFID scanner for each and every basket and figuring out how to eliminate crosstalk between devices which could end up with you paying for someone else's beets because they got too close to your machine. Which brings up another problem... anything sold by the pound would still have to be weighed and scanned at the point of sale and at that point you may as well just scan the other six things you have in the basket thereby negating the point of the entire system.

It wouldn't prevent theft at all, btw. It would simply mean more people walk out of the store "empty handed" because they "didn't find anything they wanted."

 

You'll typically find that the longer something has lasted, the less choice was involved in its perpetuation.

 

It was just an example. Of course I understand that an x-ray scanner is not the same type of system as a grocery item scanner. My point was that the technology to scan an entire cart worth of groceries at once is not far fetched. It's not "George Jetson." If you can look through someone's clothes at the airport in 15 seconds, surely we can scan items in a cart too. Again, -no- those are not the same technologies.

I don't follow your conclusion that implementing a new scanning device wouldn't pay for itself. Nevertheless, to answer your question... in a word, yes. I would LOVE to have the option of laying down a $5 bill in order to avoid waiting in a line of three or four full carts at the grocery store. Especially when there's a coupon addict in front of me.

 

Every (and I mean every) checkout at my local HD has been converted to a self checkout lane. There are often cashiers available to help but they are all self checkout, even at the Pro desk.

 

As a tradesman who only goes to HD on weekdays when the civilians are chasing a mouse across their desks (last time I went on a weekend I needed Xanax ) I only use the self checkout.

Time is money

 

Double scanning as I hear about it, is people accidentally scanning the item twice, paying the too large amount, getting home and then going over their receipts later on the weekend and realizing they've scammed themselves. Real upset people in some cases. Also the stores check inventory and find receipts for payment when the goods are still on the shelves.

When you get away from Cash many people zone out on the precise amount they're surrendering in value. Not sure why this is but the phenomenon is part of why stores love credit cards and such even though they have to give up all the fees to the card companies. Something about cash is real and now that we seldom even have to sign on card purchases, people are really going to be blundering into debt.

 

Ya'll Texans in this town have been altogether too polite and not complaining nearly enough. Such is life, when you put down the Welcome Mat, someone (HD) comes and walks all over you.

If it isn't working out for you, imagine you're from New Jersey and give some big shot at HD a hard time and you'll get your checkouts back. No clerk checkout at the Pro Desk? That is just crazy and if I couldn't move them off of that I'd place my order someplace else and send HD a copy of it and a detailed explanation of just why I did.

 

At Home Depot I get a 10% discount when I show my VA card to the cashier. Is there a way to do that at the self-service machines?

 

I go at 6 am when they open to avoid all the crazies and other issues.Same w/ Walmart ect

 

Harder than you imagine. They tried that locally, where a guest just put their stuff on the belt and it scanned everything at once, then sorted it and bagged it automagically. Super, super slick idea, and reduced all but the biggest grocery orders down to about a minute if it worked right. But, they had continuous problems with produce and odd-shaped packages, so ultimately, the automatic checkout disappeared quite quickly.

 

The amount of money "lost" due to self-checkouts would be utterly dwarfed by the investment required to design and implement a system like you describe. Such a thing would not be feasible for any company outside of HD/Walmart and in those cases the number of stores and lanes it would have to be implemented in would never be seen as a sound investment and if the investors are sad then nothing gets done. All hail corporate.

All this would still do nothing except lower the average checkout time, which can be done by instead cross-training staff to run the registers at a much lower cost.

And you do have the option of avoiding the three or four full carts. It's called self checkout.

 

How 'bout everybody has to work or get shot and processed by the meat runners, nobody gets paid, and everything is free.

 

These bug me in that they're only thee to save the company money by not hiring human cashiers. If I got a discount for doing their work for them I'd consider using them but I don't so I only use them if it's to my advantage.

 

Slightly off topic, but my favorite time to shop is during Steeler's football games. Even right around Christmas the stores are all empty when the Steelers are playing. Unfortunately, they failed to make the playoffs this year, so my little trick won't work till autumn when it all starts up again.

 

Around here, self checkout lines are idiot traps. And seldom faster than going to a cashier.

I don't go through them unless I have fewer than 5 things and they are all marked with an easily readable barcode and aren't age sensitive (like booze or paint).

But I see people in there all the time with full carts and helpless faces, motionless, waiting for someone to save them.

At the grocery store a few nights ago, all three self-checkout lines were stopped up like cheap toilets by people whose ambition for self-reliance was bigger and stickier than their brains.

 

Those backwards registers ARE the new self checkouts. The employees are testing the system. This recently happened at our local home depot. You will now you the scan gun to ring up your purchases instead of the old scanner. That's right, you will be using a feces encrusted scanner gun that is covered in flu and cold germs and never clean.

I'm not a Home Depot employee, I'm not doing their work for them.

 

I only use human checkouts.

I miss people interaction