Fed up with supermarkets

[SelfScanHell]

Sainsbury's reduced me to tears today.

Our DC has recently finished GCSEs so we decided to move from the usual online shop to taking them to learn how to do a shop in real life. They are autistic and can struggle in busy environments.

It was challenging but we managed to do a whole week’s shop using the ‘smart scan’ (they’ve used it before and prefer it) and got to the check-out. A few hiccups but managed with headphones and music. In the past we’ve had the ‘items needs to be checked’ thing every other time we visit, and just put up with 10 items being checked, never an issue.

Today we had the message, only 1 staff member seeing to about 20 check-outs. Other staff just said ‘sorry I can’t do that’. New staff member eventually appeared and told us the WHOLE trolley needed checking - an overflowing trolley with a week’s shop for a whole family. There was nowhere to do this, nowhere to move the stuff from our trolley, no extra bags, no counter space, just the floor for space to move the shopping to. No suggestions of how this was to be done. I was left standing by the trolley piled with food, next to a confused DC with the staff member just staring at me.

My first instinct was just to abandon the trolley to them. I should have said ‘OK I’ll go for a coffee and you do it’. But I wanted to manage the situation for my DC and felt sorry for the staff member who looked clueless, standing there blankly with no way to achieve this. So off we went to join a new queue for a normal till and do it all over again. Thankfully my DC managed, I’m so proud of them.

After getting the shopping into the car, and DC settled with music, I went back to complain at this new ‘whole trolley checking’ rule without the resource in place to do it. Plus, I’m lucky as my DC managed this time, what about someone else who is standing with a mountain of goods with nowhere to put them. After being given the manager’s email to send a complaint to him, I went back to the car and just started crying. Sometimes it’s just too much. First attempt at a full Sainsbury’s shop for DC has taught them they might be expected to pile their shopping on the floor to be checked (no way that’s happening).

I am tempted to ask if all ND people should avoid Sainsbury’s, but being less antagonistic I’ll ask, AIBU to say:

• If Sainsbury’s have to start checking everything in a packed trolley they should provide the staff and space to do this (not on the floor)

I had a whole trolley check once, they directed me to a normal till, where it was all scanned as normal and compared to my scanner.

It’s bad luck it was triggered when it was your DC’s first time, but the theft rates mean they need to do checks.

Sounds like he coped well, and will have experienced this in case it ever happens again.

Having a ND son doesn't exempt you from the random checks super markets do to prevent theft. YABU for that.

YANBU for Sainsbury's not having adequate staff available or trained to do the checks.

But ultimately what are you complaining about and what do you hope to achieve? Just suck it up as one of those things, someone probably called in sick and they're short on staff, shit happens.

If it's that much of an issue to have a minor hiccup, do your shop elsewhere. If anything it's probably a valuable lesson for your Son that life doesn't always follow a script, no matter how much you wished it did!

The Sainsbury's setup with their tills (or lack thereof) and lack of staff is entirely their own fault and this isn't the first thread I've seen where people have had issues. They are purposely not putting enough staff in this area to save money. The last time I shopped there, I had to use one of those self-scan checkouts (for baskets) because I arrived at the checkouts five mins too late for a manned checkout, and they closed all of them even for those of us with overflowing trolleys, and it took me 45 mins to scan everything due to there being no space to do it and how slow those self-checkouts are, and how long I had to wait every time the self-checkout got itself in a tizz. Overall their attitude to staffing their checkouts has really become appalling and they're the most expensive supermarket for my shop (even Waitrose is cheaper for me) so I'm not shopping in Sainsbury's again until they sort this out. Try Aldi or Tesco next time you want to teach your child about shopping, they seem to manage their self checkouts and manned checkouts much better.

@Helpmeplease2025 and @Sundaymorningcalla so are you saying you are comfortable with having to empty your whole trolley of food onto the floor as there’s nowhere else to move the bags to? Really?
We were not offered a till. It was up to me to suggest this instead of the floor. The staff member did not accompany us, it was just a ‘start again’ scenario.

No, as I said, I was directed to a normal till to put it all on the belt. There was no emptying on the floor.

Sounds like you had a very inexperienced or new staff member

You couldn’t pay me to do my weekly shop in person
could you teach your dc how to do an online shop then smaller shops for if they want to visit hell a supermarket in person on a Saturday?

Im aware I’m missing the point of the thread, but random checks happen will the self scans, id complain on the basis the staff need training on what to do, you should of been directed to a till

If supermarkets want to fuck over their staff by outsourcing the work of scanning shopping to customers and self service tills, the very least they can do is to make the checking process easy and convenient!

Just a thought but if they want fewer thefts, maybe increase shop floor staff and not make customers do what the till workers used to do!

The minimum you should have been offered is a new trolley to transfer your shopping in to.

YANBU at all IMO. That was shit.

💐

Its bloody stressful enough as it is without these whole trolly checks.

If it happens again DEFINITELY cheerfully announce you're going for coffee and will be back when it's done 👍

That's ridiculous, you shouldn't have had to do anything anyway, they should have been doing it all.
My son wanted to use this method in Tesco recently and the same thing happened- all the shopping needed scanning again. The member of staff did it all herself. My son thought it was stupid and we have never used it again. It didn't save any time and I was paranoid I'd forgotten to scan something.

Just get it delivered!! I have ever since my latest baby. It’s a dream!! Don’t think I ever want to do a full shop in store again

@HopingForTheBest25 and @JoshLymanSwagger totally agree.
The area was so cramped I think the staff member was at a loss what to do - it must have been hard for him too. This is a Head Office issue trying to maximise profits. This was a massive store and they only had 3 manned checkouts open.

I would have bid them a good day, and walked.

We usually do but with a hoped for move to Uni in 2 years it’s time for DC to learn how to shop. We’re rural and rarely shop in person so feel this is a skill set we need to help DC build. Unfortunately Sains is the closest to us.

Yeah. This is what should’ve happened. The staff member was completely wrong and you should’ve demanded a manager then OP. Especially if they were putting your things on the floor. Screw that.

I know it’s only 26 votes so far, but am really surprised how many people think it’s ok for a shop to expect you to put your food on the floor because they haven’t arranged resources for their changes.

I agree.
To be clear they had not put my stuff on the floor, it’s just the floor was the only option. It was a very cramped area with no bench space, and if you even stepped back you’d probably collide with another shopper coming in. This made it doubly uncomfortable for my DC but we have to try and give them good experiences of coping.

You're not unreasonable to say and think that supermarkets are not adequately staffed these days, its terrible
You're not unreasonable to also think perhaps (you didnt say this exactly) that technology is actually making things more complicated than it needs to be

I wouldnt do one of the scan and go shops because of this very reason, they have to check, how can they not?

And Im careful and picky about how I pack my goods, I wouldnt want someone messing with that. If you choose to do the scan and shop thing, then you have to accept that this is what happens

Lastly I think in order to demonstrate and learn independence skills for a young person of his age, you dont do the 'weekly big shop', thats not what he would be doing if he were living independently anyway, you need to do a small basket shop, that you go to the till with. You overreached the task and caused stress where it wasnt necessary.

I can see why it is annoying. But you say you took the dc to learn how to shop in real life, and that is real life. It happens.

I would have gone and got another trolley so the assistant could scan it all into that, instead of the floor. But you are right, they should have space for this.

So you agree she's not being unreasonable then 🙄

They won’t need to do a huge trolley shop. You could take them a few times for a smaller shop.

The supermarket was obviously hopeless though

Yanbu.
I had half my trolley checked and few weeks back. It was a massive shop for me. Like you, no space to do it.
I literally smiled and said, good luck.
When they had gone through maybe 50 items, they confirmed that I hadn't missed anything.
Watched me pay before taking the tags off items.
I then went to the escalator to leave when the put the trolley brake on and another manager eventually arrived to tell me that it had been triggered because I had alcohol. I politely pointed out that said alcohol had been rescanned at the self checkout, had had the tag removed only on production of the receipt and now here we are.

I can understand why that may have worked for you, however I would not have left my DC surrounded by strangers as this would not have helped at all. Just abandoning the trolley would have been better for us (but felt that would be unhelpful for overstretched staff).

YANBU. It's ridiculous how under-staffed they are. I did a big food shop at a 8pm on Friday (perfectly normal time to do a food shop I think, before the weekend and after dinner) and there were no tills open. Thankfully they opened one for me, but I was tempted to abandon my trolley rather than put it all through self-service.

The only time I ever tried to do self-scan they took half of it back out to re-scan and ruined my carefully packed bags. It's just not worth it.

So hang on, supermarkets are making it more and more likely that customers scan their own shopping (by reducing staffed tills) but are then randomly assigning checks, so a member of staff has to check the whole lot afterwards? A trolley? Oh fuck that.