If you have only a few items and are familiar with the machine, I think they can be very convenient. But it seems that not many people know how to use the machines well so I often find myself stuck behind some confused shopper who keeps getting the “wrong item in bag” error.

But I did find $60 in the change slot once when I was in college in Boston. So, they’re not all bad.

Any time I use these stupid things it ends up taking longer because it always tells me to wait for an employee to approve something. I have really bad luck with any sort of office equipment-type devices.

I love them, especially when the other lanes are busy, but I've had cashiering experience, so even a large number of items fly by. Some tips that might help: Note produce numbers or get produce with the item number stickers on them; when bagging meat, make their bar codes are easily accessible and readable; if you have liquor, scan it last so it doesn't disrupt your flow midway through and so you're ready to go as soon as they check your ID.

I always bring my own grocery bags to the store, and i find it to be much easier if I just do it myself.

I love the self check out line! I always get annoyed at how many bags I walk out of the grocery store with when I let some else pack. I bring two huge reusable bags and only I can squeeze everything into them the way I want. It's just not worth the grocery store's time to pack so carefully so I'm happy to do it, for my own sake.

I love the idea, but so far the execution in my local store is not good. The way the bag weighing device is set up I can't put my re-usable totes on it, It often rejects coupons, and the last time I went to the safeway it crashed 1/2 way through so the cashier had to take me to a normal checkout to get my food through

The only grocery store in Boise without uscan is Walmart. I don't mind them for most things, and the cashiers attending the section are usually calm and more experienced, and helpful with obscured UPCs or SKUs on strange fruits or veggies - I loves me some uscan.

It really depends. You have to take into consideration the location, the number and type of items, and also if you're going to need help from the attendant, who never seems to be paying attention. With 2.5 years of grocery store experience regretfully under my belt, I prefer them -- but they seem to almost always be the little kiosks, so when you have a full cart, it doesn't really work. :(

The attendants need to be paying attention and people who know they shouldn't go to them, but still do need a firm smack up the head. Sure you're impatient with standing in line, but so are the rest of us, that know how to use them, and you are just getting in the way! :)

If I have just a very few things, I'll use it.

The problem with the ones at our local market is that if you have too many items waiting to be bagged, it will stop scanning until that is done - and they never have enough people available to assist with bagging, so it ends up taking longer than a regular checkout.

I love them for just a few items.

I wish they had an item limit (10 or 15) ... the people who use them with 40 items are just asking for trouble.

My mom wont use these because they take away jobs from people. For each of those kiosks, that means at least one person's job is being done by a machine. Out of respect to her and my pops, I avoid them... But I monstly dont use them because they are buggy and even with one or two items, it takes me a hell of a lot longer figuring out what I did wrong than it would have been to wait in line.

and FYI - These are HORRIBLE for mass soda buying. The platform is too small to hold all the 12/24 packs. At the cashier, you dont even have to take them out of the cart.

Great in theory, lousy in practice. When you've got two cans and a lemon, it seems like this is going to be a breeze. The answer is a decided Maybe. More than once I have been tempted to just walk out with the unscannable whatever simply not paid for. That will get the attendant's attention I'm sure!

I love Fresh Direct.

I love the robot check-out!
I rarely buy more than two bags worth of groceries so it's always the best choice for me.
I will admit though that they can take a few trys to get used to, but once you get the hang of it I find them to be a real time saver.

In response to chusmabilly's comment, I thought this at first too, but I live in Alberta and the grocery stores here can't even get staff these days which leads to long lines, so now the grocery store staff are getting days off and not quitting because they are all so burnt out from working too many hours.

Stop & Shop in Malden, MA is awesome. You can scan your items as you shop and then use the self check out to finish.

Hand held scanners are at the entrance to the store and I just scan my store card, pick up a scanner and then pick up items, scan them and put them into my bags. Once I'm done, I go to the self check out register, scan the hand held scanner, then my store card again and pay.

For vegetables, they offer the scales to weigh them yourself and then scan the price to add it to your total.

I no longer have to worry about the check out girl sticking her 3 inch fake nails into my vegetables and it's far more friendly than most people around here too.

no more bruising of my produce!

When I have to run in for one or two emergency ingredients, self-check is a lucky break- it's SOOOOO much faster than waiting in a line behind several people with a mountain in each basket. (Sometimes three people with five things is still too long to wait!) That said, I'm also grateful that most people use their head and don't try to self-check a cart full of produce- that's just setting yourself up for problems (technical or otherwise)!

I'm so awkward that I frequently go for self-checkout just to avoid human interaction, but some of the set-ups are awful. I've started avoiding them at Giant because I inevitably end up sweaty and frustrated, the machine beeping at me because I haven't placed my items in the bags quickly enough, my cloth bags falling off the tiny ledge they provide, and then praying for an employee to come and help me out.

I do miss the self-check out at my old library (this was probably the best place for it), though it's been good for my reading--I think if I could check a book out without having to go through the librarian, I'd be more likely to read something like the twilight series.

I only use the self checkout machines when I am purchasing less than 5 items or if the regular lines are too long. My library has 2 self checkout machines that I always use. I also self checkout ocassionally at the post office.

While I appreciate the convenience and speed behind self-checkouts, personally I dislike them. I like to talk to a person when I'm at the store, I like to have someone who knows how the machinery works, and I like the idea of helping make sure that there's a job for people. And I don't like the current trend that lets you do everything without having to speak to a person. There's just something nice about slowing down and exchanging a smile with a stranger. This might make me a 24-year-old fuddy duddy, but oh well.

They may be faster at times, but I really dislike them as a matter of principle.

Why should I have to pay to do the grocery store employee's job myself? Prices have not gone down because of the use of these machines, which I'm sure increases the stores profit.

Now, if a grocery store was cheaper because of self check-out (like stores that are cheaper because you bag your own groceries), then I'd be okay with it.

i hate these. it takes twice as long as with a cashier, and people always need a cashier to come over and help anyway because they don't know what they are doing.

I never like these things either. Maybe I'm just a luddite, but I always screw something up and I want to talk to a human. I actually like bagging my own groceries, because like redpaper I get more into my reusable bags than the staff will stuff in.

I'm glad I'm not the only one who is delighted to see these machines in the library and wants to flee a grocery store when they spot them!

Absolutely not.

For, basically all the reasons stated already. Takes jobs away from other checkers (and in my area, at most grocery stores, these are good, living wage union jobs!), provides really poor customer service, makes me do their job for them, are slower and less efficient at scanning than the ones the checkers use, invariably screw up either due to equipment malfunction or operator error, etc...

Even if the line is long, or I only have a couple of things, I will generally wait in the (One! - If I'm lucky maybe two!) actual-person-manned check out lane. It's a matter of principle.

Del
http://blog.delementals.com/

If I'm doing their work, I want a discount.

I love the self-checkout at our grocery store. All the cashiers are always rude and triple-bag absolutely everything and smash everything up and ugh. I just bring my own reusable bags and my boyfriend, so it doesn't take long at all.

I like the idea when there's quite a few real cashiers and only 2 self-checkouts. When there's more self-checkouts than real cashiers I dislike them though. I love the library's, like everyone else it seems and I'm mostly ok with Ikea's, Safeway's, Walmart and Home Depot. But once I went to Ikea and they only had self-checkout, which I thought was poor customer service. I had several things that couldn't be scanned without codes, from the as-is section and I had to have a cashier hovering.

I love it as an express check-out. I use it at the library, the grocery store and at Home Depot when I'm just buying things like paint brushes and light switch plates.

I love it for just a couple of items but because I bring my own bags to the store, find that it takes longer to use because it recognizes my own bag as a foreign item that wasn't scanned. So I usually bypass it altogether as it defeats the whole purpose of it being quick and easy. My supermarket bags my groceries and carries them out to my car when I go the traditional route and when I have my baby girl with me, that additional help is priceless.

I live in a town of about 10,000, and there are 3 grocery stores in town. The one that is the busiest happens to also be a major chain store. They have 4 self-checks, and since the store is so busy, they typically have quite a few manned registers open. My husband does raise the point often that each self-check takes a job from someone, and I definitely can't disagree with him on that front.

I must admit though that love using the self check if I have a hand basket, but it is painful watching people try to check themselves out with a cart full of groceries. Our town also happens to have a large retired population that isn't too tech savvy, and many of them aren't too adept at scanning barcodes without examining all sides of each and every product before running it over the scanner.

I use them every time I go to the store. Every single store around me that has self-checkout also has an item limit of 15 items per customer when using the self-checkout.

I really like them, because I am not an idiot & can figure out how to use machines pretty easily. The problems happen when people are incapable of figuring out how to use it!

The only thing that sucks is that it can be tricky to get the machine to stop reading my grocery bags that I bring in myself as weighted items.

Self-checkout machines hate me. I've never used one without some sort of problem that's required the intervention of the customer service person stationed there. Even when all I was trying to buy was a gallon of milk!

And most of them give you trouble if you bring your own bags since they use the weight of items to verify you've scanned everything (they aren't calibrated to adjust if you provide your own bags).

So I find them more trouble than their worth. Currently I got to a shop-n-bag where you bag your own groceries, and they don't have a single self checkout kiosk!

Love hate from me. I worked in big-box retail for 8 years so I am a scanning pro. I got used to the system super fast, so I know how to anticipate my next move. If I have fewer than say 5 things of produce, I'll do it, but any more than that and it's not worth the time savings (unless the lines for those are short and the cashier's are extra long). Our stores have a 20-item limit, so that helps. I agree with the alcohol thing, scan that last when you are ready to go. I use reusable bags and set them on the bagging side, then get the attention of the attendant and they reset the system so I can scan away. I've even memorized the sku for bananas (4011, btw). BUT, my Dad has been bugging me that they are taking jobs away... And he is probably right (though I argue that there are the new jobs of the people who make and service the machines, though it isn't an equal trade no doubt). I don't think they are going anywhere though.

Also, yes, for Home Depot, those things are BAD. Ever try to scan and then WEIGH a rake? Hahaha. No so easy.

What is the matter with some of you people? Self-checkout stations will PUT PEOPLE OUT OF WORK! The Safeway grocery store in my neighborhood CUT EVERYONE'S HOURS RIGHT BEFORE CHRISTMAS when these were installed... SHAME SHAME SHAME ON YOU WHO USE THESE!

I don't mind the self-checkout lines. What I hate are bag-your-own lines with cashiers. What's the point of having cashiers if they don't bag your groceries?

When the store is really busy, I wish that people who didn't know how to use them would just go to the cashiers. This is usually the male part of the population, and I understand that they have probably been sent there by their other halves, are not happy to be there, and want to get out quickly. But they just put a wrench in the whole process.

I wish the local grocery stores had the DIY registers for large orders, (ours are all 15 or less,) like they had in Stop and Shops out where I lived near Boston.

I love these things--for quick trips. I'm chronically ill and can't stand for very long without passing out because my blood pressure drops, especially when carrying any type of weight. So when I can go to the grocery, pick up what I need for dinner, and not have to stand in line waiting on others, the self-check out has made it possible for me to make grocery trips I was unable to before. If I have a full cart though, I'd rather the workers deal with the hassle of scanning everything and filling my bags.

I do have some complaints that I wish they would make room for our own bags, ours have racks made for the small plastic bags so bagging can be a pain, because I usually have to stack everything on the scale, then bag on the floor if the worker is too busy to reset the scale.

For those that say the weight gets messed up, that can easily be remedied by putting your bags on the scale before you start, and having the worker reset the machine so it's as if the bags aren't there.

And it seems the machines aren't the greatest yet and there are plenty of screwups. I really can't stand when the workers stare over your shoulder though! This always happens to me at the library, I think because the self-check is fairly new so they are bored or something, but really, if I need help, I can ask for it--you don't have to rush over for every little beep!

Overall though, not having to stand in lines has made many places more accessible to me, and I'm quite thankful for that!

And to step on my soap box---really people, if you aren't bringing your own bags in this day and age you need to learn a bit about recycling! It's one of the easiest things you can do to make a difference!

i love self checkout! i can scan all my items faster than any person i've ever had check me out at the grocery store, in and out. at the giant by my apartment, they now have the handheld scanners to take on your shopping journey, and at the end, all you have to do is scan the register and pay.

i love the self check out mostly cause i loathe how the checkout people bag groceries... but i kinda feel bad cause it takes jobs from people :(

I ONLY use the self checkout at stores, all kind of stores because people form lines to get to the cashiers, and self-checkouts are open. It's very handy if you have a toddler with you!
A tip - if you bring your own bags to the grocery store, and the store gives credits for reused bags - you can still get the credit from a self checkout registers.

I love the self-checkout. My store actually closes them down after about 9 pm, so if I go too late, I'm stuck waiting in line for a real cashier.

P.S. I bring my own bags, too, but I just put everything down without bags at first, and then after everything is scanned in, I throw it all into my bags. That way I don't have to wait for anyone to adjust for the weight of my bags.

They are excellent for a small purchase that doesn't involve coupons and stuff.

More than a few items and it gets to be a hassle. And most of the ones I've tried can't seem to handle coupons. Like it won't believe I've put them through the slot after scanning them.

I refuse to use these machines until they give me a reduction on the price of my groceries due to me doing the work instead of a check-out assistant!!

I use these every time I go to my local market because the cashiers are usually rude, ignorant, and slow, and always ALWAYS bag my groceries poorly. It doesn't matter if I'm buying 1 thing or a full cart, it's faster to do it myself!