"To Serve You Better"

You know that when you see a sign that says, "Pardon our mess. We're remodeling to serve you better." whatever establishment you are in is lying through their teeth. Such as the grocery store that has installed the self check out lanes. Now after I've spent an hour trying to find what I like (which isn't always easy because they've discontinued it from last week) I have to check out the groceries too. Before I'd just put them on the counter and let the cashier do everything. Now I have to take the items out of the cart and scan them, put them in the bag, when the bag is full I have to put it back in the cart but that's impossible because my cart is still full of the rest of my groceries. Plus you have to slap the screen a few times because it knows you picked up the bag of groceries and it wants you to put it back. And while you are trying to scan your items the screen keeps telling you you're not doing it right. When you get to the produce, you have to type in the first three letters of the item. A whole lot of chaos happens when your screen can't find large limes, only small limes. You have to flag down some help. The help gets things going again, but then it's not ringing up the sale price. Flag down the help again and let them try to figure out how to override the price. Once everthing is scanned, then I get to scan my coupons, of which the screen only recognizes half. Flag down the help. Since I write a check for my groceries, I get to go see the help at another counter so they can take my check. So let me get this straight, I shop for my groceries, unload and scan my items, bag them, put them back in the cart, scan my coupons, go write my check, and take my groceries to the car, because there's not a bag boy in sight. What I want to know is, "When are they going to start paying me?"

I went to the store last week and discovered that things are about to get worse. Now you will be able to take a hand-held scanner with you as you shop and scan as you go. You will also have to put in a code on the produce scales so it can print a bar code label for you. Up until now only the froo froo market had those. I'll step off my soap box now, but I'm afraid I'll be looking for a new grocery store. One that doesn't want "To Serve Me Better."