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Getting served in a supermarket


idun
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All, and I mean all the cashiers in the supermarkets that I used in my region of France, were always incredibly slow. Compared to one another, they were not, but compared to elsewhere they really were. Even when I have been back on holiday, little has changed.

Was it 'just' where I used to live, or is it general.

I was reminded by this

https://fr.screen.yahoo.com/etranges-talents/amazing-high-speed-cake-packing-100000236.html?vp=1

The only exceptions to this in France were the two Managers at our local SuperU and their under manager, all of whom would not hesitate to man the tills if the shop was very busy.  But these people were not the 'cashiers'.

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Here, they work at a steady pace, slowing a little if they wanna chat with someone they like like MEEEEEEEE!

Occasionlly they refuse to serve someone; last week it was this guy who really stank, stunk, stinked so bad that even his pigs had left him.

I have come across him before, and it is revolting.

Why, why get into such a state? I don't blame the girls at all for refusing to have him at their caisse - the smell is revolting and it takes ages to dispel afterwards.
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They're rather slow here too, but it's not the cashiers, it's the customers. Some want to chat, and every other one has forgotten to weigh something (me too),  or changes their mind and decides to change one item for another. Then there's the palaver of finding their fidelity card, writing a cheque etc.

I think it's because shopping in the morning, as I do, it's mostly people who don't go to work, so we have plenty of time.

And Wooly - there was a man like that in the Dr's waiting room last time I was there. They managed to get him "seen" quicker than usual and ushered him out. Then someone opened the windows.

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I blame it on the women customers [6]

They arrive at the caisse with a trolley-full and then seem amazed that they have to pay so they go through a long pantomime of 'where did  I put my purse/cheque-book' then if it is a cheque they have to find a pen, their glasses and id ALL of which come as an enormous surprise to them.

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But, Norman that happens in England, too and with all sexes; what, I have to pay for it? Really? Search for chequebook, pen, glasses etc ensues.

Our little Shoppi, well I suppose I ought to move with the times - our Carrefour Market isn't too bad, or wasn't too bad until some idiot decided to convert one belt into 3 short DIY sections, which nobody would use - nowhere to put your shopping or basket, and most people say why should they work instead of the cashiers? So now we have one truncated belt when a second cashier is needed and the next in line can't put their shopping out until the customer in front has completed the whole transaction.

The staff at our local Waitrose are the best; friendly, chatty, pack your bags if needed, remind you to pick up your charity token, tell us how their daughters are doing at school, ring their bells for help if the queues are getting long or they've spotted some produce not at it's best and always ask if we're just back from France - the same ladies have served us for years. They are also very efficient, so it never seems to take long.
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In my nearest Carrefour its not unusual to be the only customer in the entire shop, so when I get to the till the cashier is usually doing a crossword or fiddling with their telephone. God-knows what the deal is with that shop, there is no way it can come even close to making a profit.

Elsewhere (and I go elsewhere a lot as despite the bliss of an empty shop, their goods are often well out of date on the shelves and its filthy) its the usual deal with slow moving queues and cashiers taking their sweet time without a care in the world beyond when their next break is, which they often discuss loudly across the aisles with those working at the next tills.

What really twists my pee tube at the moment is checkout design. Various places have "upgraded" their checkout stands which always seems to do away with having anywhere to put your shopping bag, just a wee conveyor after the scanner that ends abruptly. This means you have to fling everything back into your trolley. Then add into the mix those wee sets of rollers after the scanner designed to allow easy manipulation of larger boxes which the cashiers seem to get great pleasure from rattling your bags of soft fruit over, bashing the crap out of the contents as they do so.

It seems to be done with the purpose of having more checkouts....ie fitting 25 into a space previously occupied by 20, which is academic as there are never more than 8 open anyway. Complete waste of time and money - but that's par for the course too.

If you want a real test of getting service, try approaching the badly misnamed "accueil" when the two venomous harridans are deep in conversation with each other. They will pointedly look at you, look away and continue chatting until their conversation ends before turning back to you when they are good and ready and not a second before.

I used to like shopping, but French supermarkets have turned me into a right miserable bastard who is ready to murder everyone in sight by the time I have made it as far as the pasta aisle.

And all that is before I even get started on supermarket pricing policies....just keep your eye on the price per kilo/litre/item every time you visit, thats all I am going to say on the matter else I risk turning the forum properly blue.

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I agree that checkout design slows everything down, you're always waiting for someone to finish packing because all their stuff is piled high at the end of the conveyor, after they've paid.

Our local Lidl, however, seems to employ the fastest till operators on the planet. Your items swish through at breakneck speed with a constant B_E_E_E_E_E_P noise since there's little break between items. However, it's all for naught since the packing area is about the size of a tea tray and, again, it all piles up while people wait to pack and pay.
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Isn't it time, irrespective of country, that supermarkets stopped raising customer expectations by building their premises with about 60 percent more checkouts than they ever plan to open? I don't think I've ever been into a supermarket, however busy, where they've had all their checkouts working.
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[quote user="You can call me Betty"]Isn't it time, irrespective of country, that supermarkets stopped raising customer expectations by building their premises with about 60 percent more checkouts than they ever plan to open? I don't think I've ever been into a supermarket, however busy, where they've had all their checkouts working.[/quote]

That's a great observation... I must remember that one [;-)]

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I shop at Lidl and Aldi, I go at lunch times when I am often the only person there, thats also the time the staff have to stock the shelves so I usually have to wait at the tills.

I have nothing but respect for 95% of the girls that work there, they are driven really hard, they work really hard but do you know what, they are far happier for it, its the same story where anyone is underworked, everything becomes a problem and an effort for them and they take it out on the customers. I see these same girls in some of my keep fit classes and they are the ones who go to get/keep fit, not to lounge about on the floor nattering like at a slumber party, you see them digging foundations with their husbands (they all seem to be self builders) or offloading rubble at the dechetterie, these girls rock in my book.

The store design and their working restrictions let down an otherwise excellent experience, there are 5 or 6 tills of which 99% of the time only one is operational, someone might open the second one but only for a few minutes and I think its mainly for the pleasure of saying "this till is closed" to the next Customer.

They are timed on how fast they scan so thats why the stuff whips through, no timing before or after so they dont really care when Mme. dipstick searches for her ID, as has been said the exit area after the scanner is tiny, I wont use a trolley as I have a maximum of 2 bags if I take the bike trailer or 2 pannier loads, these shops dont have baskets, its always a panic for me to push the last Customer out of the way so I can get the bag down on the counter before its overflowing with my shopping after about 5 nanoseconds, the last Customer would prefer 10 minutes to say their goodbyes so its always a scrum for me.

Aldi is the exception as they have a second lower counter at bag height, makes a huge difference. One of the younger disinterested cashiers loves to bounce and slam your shopping over the scanner especially soft fruit, I've often had words with her to no effect but TBH most of the women around here are like that with everything including their babies, at the gym we exercise with batons, when the trainer says put them down on the tatami I am the only person that will bend down and place it on the mat, the others all just let them drop from waist height, its a crescendo of slamming and makes me wince everytime.

Women around here dont sit down in a feminine way, they slump bodily into the chair like Kevin the teenager, if its a bench or a row of interconnecting chairs like in a waiting room you get shaken up, against that background soft fruit doesnt  really stand a chance.

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Our two local supermarkets are Atac and Aldi. Both are small and the cashier/belt areas are tiny. Atac's are marginally smaller than Aldi's, so it is a struggle to place oneself, the trolley and shopping bags in a position to be able to gather stuff as it comes through. However, the cashiers tend to have a reasonable pace. Aldi on the other hand have much longer belts, but rarely more than one cashier on duty. As a consequence there is a huge queue, so much so, that people place their trolleys or baskets in the queue and run round the shop grabbing stuff which they then place in the trolley or basket, relying on the few people still in the queue to move it forward as necessary. The one cashier on duty then practises to beat the world record for flinging stuff through the scanner and out on to the postage stamp sized bit at the end, while the hapless customer tries frantically to catch the stuff and stick it in the trolley. Few attempt to pack bags at this stage. Most seem to take the full trolley to their car to pack bags.

In contrast, in Blighty at my local Tesco, there are large numbers of checkouts, with reasonable sized areas to stack and pack. If a queue builds up, more checkouts are opened, so it is rare for more than 3 or 4 people to be waiting at a checkout.

We are now in training for our summer visit to France, and each time, by the end of our stay, I think we are a little better at catching the stuff in Aldi!
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You can call me Betty said :

I don't think I've ever been into a supermarket, however busy, where they've had all their checkouts working.

Here in summer, on the day when all the holidaymakers arrive together, all the checkouts in our local SuperU will be manned. Little good it seems to though as the thronged mass completely overwhelms whatever provisions have been made by the store. Angry scenes develop as the fresh milk runs out.

Heaven help you, the lowly permanent resident, if you forgot which day was arrival day, as happened to a friend a couple of years ago.

No point in even trying the 'less than 10 articles' till at the accueil as the queue there will be v long too.

Sue
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Then there is the usual lack of spatial awareness of the selfish ignorants in front of you, if the till is unattended and not moving they will load their stuff from the rear of the belt forwards so as to deny you the opportunity to load your own stuff, if the belt is moving they will leave a huge gap in front of their stuff, never ever pass back the seperators and then stand back with their trolleys blocking the whole length of the belt so that you still cant load your stuff, they will only move forward at the very last moment with their trolley after the cashier has already scanned half the articles.

Then there are the mothers and grannies that share a trolley but want to put each ones shopping through seperately to slow things even further.

Needless to say none of these people get away from the till promptly to enable me to get my bag on the counter before its too late.

I always invite people to go ahead of me if they have less articles, I am met with the gormless stare of amazement that I get when I stop to let people across a passage piéton, in 10 years not one single person has allowed me to go in front of them even if I have but one article and they or their partners are still wandering the shop adding stuff to the belt.

Around here for many, a shopping trip is the opportunity to faire chiér to evreyone else, its probably the only stressfull time I have in France, a generally horrible experience.

Me, I love the self service tills, its removed all the above grief at a stroke but I dont like throwing money away in Intermarché.

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Chancer said :

Around here for many, a shopping trip is the opportunity to faire chiér to evreyone else, its probably the only stressfull time I have in France, a generally horrible experience.

Apart from the summer deluge of visitors, which renders life awkward for everyone, here shopping is a pleasant experience. People regularly let other people, with but a couple of purchases, through ahead of them and are thanked at the time and again when they have completed their transaction.

The caissières are efficient and friendly so making the chore of shopping an agreeable moment.

But July and August are hell.

Sue
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Fresh milk is available here in 17 in the larger mainstream supermarkets , though not usually to be found in the corner shops such as Vival.

Our Super-U has 4 self service check-out points and a dedicated member of staff to assist when the machine won't accept the scan etc.

Chancer: our U.K. Lidl has baskets as well as trolleys.

Quietest time to shop = lunchtime[:)]

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Fresh whole unpasteurised sheep's cow's and goat's milk (according to season) are available in my local shop.

I only use supermarkets for household products and some emergency frozen items 'and those are delivered by Picard) , not for things I eat most of the time..

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People do let others (some) go ahead in our local Shoppi, which is pleasant. But somebody was telling me recently that it's all the people who've retired here from elsewhere who are so kind. Actually, I don't think it is, as I know quite a few from the area and they're all very helpful.

We have fresh milk available in the supermarkets too.

We've just called in at Shoppi and found it was empty; at lunchtimes it's usually crammed full of young people buying food etc for picnics, which they then eat across the road in the car park and along the wall of the college.

I wondered if there's another teachers' strike today.
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[quote user="idun"]suein56, 'fresh' milk, as in not UHT?

[/quote]

Yep, all the supermarkets here sell it all year round. We have Intermarché about 7 mins away, Casino about 9 mins in the other direction and 2 SuperUs within 5/6 mins - both run by the same family - one store in one direction and the other in the opposite direction.

French holidaymakers, especially those with young children, buy litres and litres of the stuff at a time. During July and August you will even see the larger 2 litre packs in Super U. Snapped up in no time.

Sue

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[quote user="Cendrillon"]

Chancer: our U.K. Lidl has baskets as well as trolleys.

[/quote]

Oh I so wish that any Lidl here would have something smaller than their huge trolleys. Being tiny I can put things into the trolley but have the devil's only job of getting things out. So I usually use my own shopping bag, though it is not always practical; My solution send my OH.

Other supermarkets have the small plastic baskets on wheels - now those I find a great help [:)].

Sue

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[quote user="suein56"][quote user="idun"]suein56, 'fresh' milk, as in not UHT?

[/quote]

Yep, all the supermarkets here sell it all year round. We have Intermarché about 7 mins away, Casino about 9 mins in the other direction and 2 SuperUs within 5/6 mins - both run by the same family - one store in one direction and the other in the opposite direction.

French holidaymakers, especially those with young children, buy litres and litres of the stuff at a time. During July and August you will even see the larger 2 litre packs in Super U. Snapped up in no time.

Sue

[/quote]

Well there you go, I only knew of one french family who bought fresh milk and that was unpasturised straight from the farm. Everyone else just bought the UHT as we did. There was always the odd bottle of 'fresh' milk at the supermarkets we frequented, but I just cannot remember seeing people buying it, even holiday makers.

I live and learn.

I buy fresh milk now, but always have UHT in, because I like it and never want to run out of milk at home.

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I buy fresh pasteurised milk regularly, semi cream. It keeps for ages in the fridge.

We can also get lait cru, in strong plastic bags, which I buy when they run out of the other. most locals seem to buy UHT.

There has been  a few strikes from the milk producers here, over the supermarkets' stranglehold on pricing. I think the same has happened in the UK? Many small milk producers have been driven out of business.

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We have always bought fresh milk (can't bear the taste of UHT), but over the last couple of years have found it increasingly difficult to buy organic semi-skimmed fresh milk. Have others found the same? We are in Normandy and there is plenty on the hoof but none in the shops. Does it all go to organic UHT now?
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Its been at least 10 years maybe even 20 since I drunk whole pasteurised milk, now with having people staying one or two nights in the flats I have recouped a couple of bottles of the good stuff which was left in the fridges and very nice it was too.

I am also on my way to creating my own personal butter/dairy spread mountain, I have no need of the muck these days but cant bring myself to throw it away, stupid really.

I hate those stupid basket on wheels things, OK for the lazy or the elderly but completely impractical to carry as a basket and they weigh a ton, small shops with small aisles are invariably blocked by the darned things.

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