The Shop Rite Saga

As I do almost every Friday around noon, I do the shopping for the weekend at the local Shop-Rite. Now we are getting close to both the Easter and Passover holidays and the store was a bit more crowded than usual. Add in a shuttle bus of senior citizens and getting through the aisles gets to be a bit challenging.

Usually this store has sufficient cashiers, so the lines aren't too long. This is a large store with probably close to twenty check-out lanes. Yesterday, they had about half opened, a few more would have been nice. But the problem was not in the volume of people, but rather the stupidity of the cashier protocol.

With one woman already 3/4 through checking out and another with a small order in front of me, I thought I had picked a decent line. Not unusual for me, I was mistaken. There was an error in the first woman's order which caused a void. Damn. In this store the cashier cannot just say 'oops, my bad', make the correction and everyone goes on with their lives. No, he needs to call over the roving floor attendant to put her key into the machine, push a couple of buttons and walk away. Not too bad if she isn't busy or if she is in freakin' earshot of the cashier.

This happens so often it's not even funny. The check-out area is the length of a runway at JFK and this cashier with the voice of a mouse is calling from the far end "need the key on 17." Ok, but Miss I-Have-The-Key is on register 1 and can't hear you. So we wait, and we all look in the same direction for this magical woman to appear. Now if it was me, I would be screaming every 20 seconds "bring the damn key"...but they never do. They call once, and wait a good 5 minutes to call again. Last time this happened, a woman left the line, ran over to the courtesy desk and had them announce it on the intercom...else we would still be waiting there.

And when this woman arrives with the key, does she ask what the problem is...no. She just sticks the key in, punches in a code and walks away. So if it doesn't matter what the issue is, why does she need to do this?

The same thing happens when they need change. "Need change on 12"...and did ya not think about that before you ran out of singles, fives and tens?

I don't get it. I worked in a store as a cashier a hundred years ago, before the register told you how much change to give. Back when you actually needed to know how to add and subtract. And you kept track of what was in your drawer so the line never stopped. Seems to me the easier things become, the stupider people become.

Next Friday really starts the holiday grocery store insanity. Will things go any smoother, I doubt it. But this week instead of checking out which line to pick, I'm going to look at which cashier might have the biggest mouth.

Can you hear me now?

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