Basic Customer Service - Praise the Self-Checkouts!

I used to work as a Retail Manager. I know, I know, I was young and naive. So much still to learn. Mainly that being a Retail Manager is a really, really shit job. But one of the noticeable features of the time I spent telling people how to stack shelves was the number of initiatives my employer launched across the company. And, perhaps understandably, a lot of these were focused on Customer Service. One month we would have "Delivering Great Service through Customer Value", the next month we would have "Delivering Great Value through Customer Service", the next month would be "Delivering Great Customers through Service Value." Of course, none of these really address the key concerns of customers. I mean, we never had "Delivering Great Service Through Making Sure The Shelves Are Full Of What You Want". Or "Delivering Great Service Through Sacking Some Of The Barely Articulate Dicks On The Tills". Or even "Delivering Great Service Through Punching Urine Stinking Shoplifters In The Head Until They Can't Stand Up Anymore". But at least there was some understanding that people coming into a supermarket would want a basic standard of customer service.

However, in recent years, I've noted that all supermarkets seem to have abandoned any commitment to customer service. The major players in the retail market now have so many outlets that they will literally employ anyone. I reckon the new criteria in interview for winning a job in a supermarket is not shitting yourself in the interview. Customer Service is no longer a realistic expectation for the many of those who work in supermarkets. Hell, basic communication skills seem to be a push for many of them.

In recent years, I've not just had shit service, I have had the very definition of offensive behaviour. I've had an angry, male cashier shout at me across a supermarket for not taking a receipt. I've been followed round supermarkets by hyperactive security guards, probably for no other reason than I hadn't combed my hair that morning and therefore must have looked like a shoplifter. I've had morons drive trolleys into me, I've been called a liar and had people deny that the product I am looking for has ever been in stock despite having bought it the previous week and there still being a label on the shelf for the product! Any human interaction in supermarkets these days seems to be a invitation to the frustration and anger.

Which is why I loved the day I discovered those "Self-Checkouts". You can scan your own products, you can pay using your card, you can bag your own products. On a good day, you can go into a supermarket and have no interaction with some of the monstrous examples of humanity who currently work in the retail industry. All hail automation! All hail progress! Making supermarkets bearable again.

Except...

Those self checkout machines never really work. There always has to be some problem. Sometimes the machine doesn't print your receipt, making you wonder whether all of your credit card details are going to fall into the hands of the next shopper. Or maybe the machine doesn't recognise one of the more obscure products you're buying. Like a loaf of bread. Or some crisps. Or maybe milk. Anyway, whatever happens, these automated checkouts fail in some way. And then you have to attract, using a mix of waving, shouting and begging, the attentions of the person running the self-checkouts. Who, generally speaking, holds such an illustrious position because he or she lacks the interpersonal skills to be one of the catatonics on the tills.

It is almost like the supermarkets want you to have to interact with their employees when you come in through the doors. Like the management are misanthropic sadists, who want to force you to have the sort of mindless, pointless conversations which make you want to chew off your own arm with empty frustration and rage. They fuck up the Self-Checkouts deliberately, so you have to further ruin your day by interacting with some of the pond life* that they employ.

Hmmm, actually thinking about, the modern retail managers are misanthropic sadists. Maybe I should go back to the job...

*I'm not saying everyone who works in a supermarket is pond life. In my experience of working in one, there are some lovely people employed by supermarkets. Sadly, they don't seem to have such people in customer service roles in Greater London.