I recently finished Better Off, by Eric Brende and I've started to think about all the so-called "helpful" devices we use on a daily basis. I've really started to notice it at work, where I'm a cashier.
Our system is very outdated. It's actually a DOS system, so we're about 20 years behind some other companies out there. A bunch of the people complain about how clunky it is, which is partly justified because it is very slow, and they pray for the giant overhaul that's due in the next couple of years. In all likelihood, our computers will be replaced with touchscreens and a whole new system to learn. Therefore, each employee will have to be trained all over again, which will take time and money. So much for time-saving operating systems!
Adjoined to the computers is the credit signature pad. Everyone hates these, whether they are employee or customer. The customers complain about that the screens are scratched, their signature doesn't look neat, the glare of the sun, the screen is dirty, the buttons aren't clearly labeled, it's at an awkward label, and that they "weren't made for left-handed people". Plus, our particular machines have trouble with certain cards and a good amount of the time the cards don't work on the pads. The employees the pads because there are too many prompts that the customers sometimes miss, and when you are trying to finish a transaction quickly during a busy day, waiting for the customer to hit a button can be a little frustrating (especially when they don't hit the button hard enough)
With so many glitches that could happen and errors, be they cashier or customer, it's no wonder that the self-checkout machine was created. This is the worst error in retail history. The machines, at least the ones where I work, are very picky. They know the exact weight of each item, so if you so much as set your wallet in the bagging area the system will alert and call for an employee override. Or you could chose to skip the bagging process if you have a lot of items or awkward boxes. However, if you skip bagging for an item over a certain amount, you need an override. Same if you take an item out of the bagging area, the scale doesn't get the weight, or any number of little mess ups. To give all of these overrides, they have a cashier stand in the area to wait for such instances.
Why do we need to pay someone to work the self-checkout registers? Frankly, I don't know why we even have them in our store. There are too many items without barcodes, but luckily so far none of them have come through that area when I was there. We also have a lot of items with those magnetic inventory tags that need to be deactivated, and most of them are in items that you wouldn't expect them to be in (like air-conditioner filters and bottles of Round-Up). Some people come up with pieces of lumber which do have barcode tags, but they spend a good amount of the time trying to maneuver the wood so that the code will scan. Although you only need to pay one person to look over four machines, the finickyness of the machines and the nature of the merchandise we sell makes the whole self-checkout area a bad idea.
There are some parts of our register system that are necessary. For instance, the fact that the whole thing is a glorified adding machine is a good base. I like that you can immediately see what items are scanned and the price, and you can also go back and change any mistakes easily (for the most part). We can also look up items without them being physically there if they are too big or bulky to go through the checkout lines. The big bonus is that it adds everything for you. There have been times when I was stuck figuring out change in my head and it's taken far longer than if the machine did it. I'm not saying that the whole machine could and should replace mental math. I think the reason I had trouble with it was because I haven't had a lot of practice doing mental math. For most of my life, there was always a machine to do it for me.
Although the machines do create a lot of problems, they also solve them. If we were to get rid of the signature pads, we would have to go back to signing for credit cards on the receipt, and then we would have to think about making sure the whole store was stocked with pens. A small necessity, but pens are misplaced, go dry, or just plain get stolen on a daily basis. Plus, debit cards couldn't be used without the ability to punch in a PIN. If we got rid of the computers all together and just went with a calculator or adding machine, we couldn't look up orders or go back and change mistakes easily.
I'm torn. I realize that the computers at work make as many problems as they solve, however I also appreciate the fact that everything is all in one place (for the most part). Doing away with the entire system would mean dismantling credit, debit, and gift cards. Maybe these machines are just the result of a greater problem. People want things faster now, so the ideal system would know exactly what you were buying so when you walked out the door all you had to do was touch your card to a receiver, a receipt would print, and you would be on your way without dealing with any complicated machinery. But then of course, if that system went down, it would be complete chaos. Until the rate at people want things and the rate at which they get them is synchronized, people will be frustrated by machines that are too sensitive or not sensitive enough because they get bogged down with problems. What are we to do?
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