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Background: I am a grocery store cashier. We do not have baggers and haven't had any since long before I signed on here. Most of my customers bag their own stuff because (I suspect) it enables them to get the fuck out of there faster. Grocery shopping might have been at least moderately enjoyable once upon a time, but it sure isn't now.
Cashiers are supposed to help bag but ... I cannot bag as I ring stuff through because management keeps track of your "items per minute" and doing this drops my numbers waaaay down. (I should add that, as far as I know, the time between the time I finish scanning and when the customer actually pays doesn't factor into this.) So I scan until everything has gone through and only then do I offer to help bag whatever's left. The only time I bag *while* scanning is if it's a huge order and there's only one customer. WHEN POSSIBLE.
You can see where this is going.
Had this older woman come through my line yesterday. She had a full-sized buggy that was absolutely overflowing. Normally not a problem.
She also had four of those big bins you use BUT ... she had piled all her groceries into the bins while she was shopping. This meant there was no way I could even start "bagging" her stuff because she'd have to empty at least one bin first.
And then she decided to compound the problem by ... taking a couple of items out of a bin and, rather than putting them at the end of the belt (which is a MOVABLE belt, of course), she walked them down to as close as possible to where I am. Then walked back to her buggy and walked a few more items back to me. Lather, rinse, repeat.
Nor did it occur to her to put one of her bins onto the belt when she finally got one emptied out (did I mention she wasn't focusing on any one bin ... just grabbing random items from here and there in the pile?)
So by the time she got her buggy empty, there was almost no room left at the far end of the counter. I was piling things upon things upon things (being careful not to squish or crush anything). Then she starts loading. Slowly.
I finally ring out the final items and get around to the back of the counter and start loading. I didn't care if she wanted anything specially packed because I no longer had the time (or the interest) to worry about it; your stuff goes where I can fit it (again, being careful about squishage and breakage). There were now four customers still waiting to be rung out I left her with a fairly small pile of stuff to deal with and started in on the next customer.
A few minutes later, I look over and she's talking to the store manager. And she does NOT look happy.
I don't think she was complaining about me specifically because I never heard anything about it. Can't say I care much if she was. Seriously, lady, if you don't like how this store is run, go somewhere else -- I can't do a damn thing about it. I can't schedule people (we only had 2 cashiers on), nor can I authorize hiring baggers, nor can I order the supervisors to help bag (which they do when they can but again -- it's usually only one person, and they cannot twist time and space to be at two registers at the same time).
One of my coworkers said we are one of the few stores left that does any bagging at all; many other stores have now made it clear that's the customer's responsibility. So yeah ... go shop somewhere else, and good luck to you.
P.S. FWIW, her total bill was just over $400. Even at today's prices, that gives you an idea of how much stuff she had.
Cashiers are supposed to help bag but ... I cannot bag as I ring stuff through because management keeps track of your "items per minute" and doing this drops my numbers waaaay down. (I should add that, as far as I know, the time between the time I finish scanning and when the customer actually pays doesn't factor into this.) So I scan until everything has gone through and only then do I offer to help bag whatever's left. The only time I bag *while* scanning is if it's a huge order and there's only one customer. WHEN POSSIBLE.
You can see where this is going.
Had this older woman come through my line yesterday. She had a full-sized buggy that was absolutely overflowing. Normally not a problem.
She also had four of those big bins you use BUT ... she had piled all her groceries into the bins while she was shopping. This meant there was no way I could even start "bagging" her stuff because she'd have to empty at least one bin first.
And then she decided to compound the problem by ... taking a couple of items out of a bin and, rather than putting them at the end of the belt (which is a MOVABLE belt, of course), she walked them down to as close as possible to where I am. Then walked back to her buggy and walked a few more items back to me. Lather, rinse, repeat.
Nor did it occur to her to put one of her bins onto the belt when she finally got one emptied out (did I mention she wasn't focusing on any one bin ... just grabbing random items from here and there in the pile?)
So by the time she got her buggy empty, there was almost no room left at the far end of the counter. I was piling things upon things upon things (being careful not to squish or crush anything). Then she starts loading. Slowly.
I finally ring out the final items and get around to the back of the counter and start loading. I didn't care if she wanted anything specially packed because I no longer had the time (or the interest) to worry about it; your stuff goes where I can fit it (again, being careful about squishage and breakage). There were now four customers still waiting to be rung out I left her with a fairly small pile of stuff to deal with and started in on the next customer.
A few minutes later, I look over and she's talking to the store manager. And she does NOT look happy.
I don't think she was complaining about me specifically because I never heard anything about it. Can't say I care much if she was. Seriously, lady, if you don't like how this store is run, go somewhere else -- I can't do a damn thing about it. I can't schedule people (we only had 2 cashiers on), nor can I authorize hiring baggers, nor can I order the supervisors to help bag (which they do when they can but again -- it's usually only one person, and they cannot twist time and space to be at two registers at the same time).One of my coworkers said we are one of the few stores left that does any bagging at all; many other stores have now made it clear that's the customer's responsibility. So yeah ... go shop somewhere else, and good luck to you.
P.S. FWIW, her total bill was just over $400. Even at today's prices, that gives you an idea of how much stuff she had.
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