Scanning error in supermarket - conundrum

[Scannerscammer]

Just idly wondering about people's opinions on something that happened the other day...

Lately every bloody time I've been to the supermarket there has been an annoying time-wasting issue such as discounts advertised on the shelf not registering at the checkout (so I had to go and check, and take picture of the ticket price), the self-service machine playing up and objecting to every item I tried to scan (so I kept having to call over the assistant) - the usual irritating nonsense.

The last time I went, a few days ago, I just had a couple of items to pick up and did self-scan on my phone. One of the items (a bottle of orange juice) scanned as a totally different item (a bottle of washing liquid) even though I had been nowhere near the aisle with laundry products.

I'm afraid I thought, fuck this, I am not wasting yet more of my time because the supermarket wants to save money by getting its customers to take on the job of scanning and checking out products but can't get it to work properly. So I paid for the two items which I had scanned and went on my merry way, having saved about a pound.

Am I a terrible thief who deserves to burn in hell and eat out-of-date value pork pies for the rest of eternity, or would you have done the same thing?

Its the same as if it had a different price sticker on it - then got to the counter and they scanned it through at that price. Not your problem.

Misleading "sale prices" are a crime under Consumer Protection laws and retailers who do this can be , and are prosecuted for it.

There's no comparison with the OP's situation. The supermarket allocated the wrong price. They aren't obliged to sell at that price but there's no obligation on OP to tell them.

The only difference is that at a staffed till the person scanning it has the right to say "hang on a minute, that can't be right" and if a manager says "no, that's not right, the real price is £x not £y", the customer can't insist on buying it at £y.

The supermarket made a commercial decision to remove that checkpoint.

Yes - presumably self-scanning on the customer's phone costs the store even less than using the self-checkout machines.

Neither did the OP.

To top it off, people like the OP are now just giving up and walking out with stuff, meaning they then have a theft to deal with on top of the above- rinse and repeat every day they are at work.

I don't regard this as theft and I'm astonished that so many people here apparently do. I don't always check that everything I've scanned has shown up on the scanner as the correct price/ correct item. I don't assume they've attempted to rob me if someone on their staff has set a price incorrectly high and it would be very unfair of them to accuse me of theft if occasionally I benefit from their mistake. They can't expect me to to all the work of packing and scanning all my goods and then get snippy if they make a mistake that benefits me.

All these people springing to the defence of supermarkets. They are corporations who screw over our farmers and underpay their shop floor staff.

Definitely this. And if you did get stopped you just have to say you didn't notice. You had two items in your shopping and two items scanned.
And yes, it's their fault for not labelling/programming correctly.

To top it off, people like the OP are now just giving up and walking out with stuff, meaning they then have a theft to deal with on top of the above- rinse and repeat every day they are at work.

The OP did not commit theft. That's just utter nonsense. You (general you) might think she had a moral obligation to point out the supermarket's mistake, but that's a different issue.

Considering absolutely loads of people use scan&go, purposely don't scan items and get freebies all the time there is nothing wrong with this at all.

I actually can’t believe someone said this was theft 🤣🤣🤣

I would have done the same thing, I don't blame the shop assistants. I'm just busy and can't be bothered with the messing around.

You have given a good description of my idea of hell though 🤢

In my local supermarket they’ve now moved to a trolley self checkout as well as a basket one. F*g madness. You might be able to find a member of staff when it’s a full moon.

I was looking around at all the customers who are now basically checkout operatives. I’m sick of it.

Supermarkets are now expecting customers to ensure their labelling and inventory system is correct.

If they’re that bothered they can pay for staff to it.

Yeah, I have never been informed that "it is the customer's responsibility to ensure that the scanned item is correct (ie. that the shop has not made a mistake). Any mistakes that the store has made must be reported to the store. If you do not report mistakes that the store has made then you will be breaking the law".

This reminds me of a time when I was in high school and the tube station barriers weren't working properly so a friend and I went through them - at our destination when exiting she and I had very different experiences. It seemed so natural to her that the logical thing to do was to clearly just walk through the gate initially, and explain if anything should happen on the other end. A bit like the OP in this instance thinking nothing of just walking out of an ostensibly frustrating situation.
It's genuinely (and I mean this earnestly), things like this that I find quite eye-opening in some weird way, almost a sense of amazement that life is just so straight-forward for some people.
For those wondering, my friend is white... I'm not.

Yes, there’s a privilege some people have that they don’t seem aware of…

Well, that's illegal and Tesco wouldn't do it. There may be occasional times when a price mistakenly falls through the net but there are strict rules about this which it will follow.

How would they prove you knew? I don't always visually check every item if I'm in a rush, just listen for the beep. As long as you paid something it's their problem.

Nah, if I'm scanning and something small doesn't register on the scale (packet of sauce mix or chewing gum or whatever) if there's no assistant nearby to sort it and loads of tills flashing red, I'll just childcare the next item in the bagging area and see if that clears it. Haven't got time to be waiting 10 minutes for someone to come help

Honestly, when I worked on tills, if something didn't scan I'd just pretend it had and chuck it through 🤣

I admit I hadn’t considered that perspective (I’m white).

I stand by the view supermarkets have done the sums that its far cheaper to have customers work as their de facto checkout operators and a few things to be scanned incorrectly (through no malice/anyone’s fault). This is the risk they take in this business model, mitigated most of the time by weighing systems and flashing red lights.

By self-checkout I haven’t signed up to any T&Cs I’m double checking what I’m scanning. Thats on them.

I realise, for a variety of reasons, everyone is not as overtly animated by this as I am in the supermarket.

🤣🤣

burn!
Na, kidding. I think my answer would depends of a lot if other factors one being if I realised lol
If I did realised, probably would have tried to find the mistake and tried again until a nice person comes to my rescue and fix it 🤯

At least you will be warm with the proximity of fire 🔥🔥🔥

I'd have done the same. I've had it up to here with self-service tills that fuck it up every single time. Serves them right,I say!

@DojaPhat
I vividly remember a scene from Grey’s anatomy where Miranda explains to her son what he ought to do as a black young man and that he can NOT do the same as his white friends coz that might get him killed.

I am not a fan of Grey’s. But this scene, gosh. Horrendous.