SEVERAL Target customers abandoned their carts and left the store due to a lack of cashiers.
For Target shoppers, traditional employee records seem difficult to find.
Self-checkout is readily available, but store policy only allows customers with ten items or fewer to use these registers.
This leaves everyone else going through staffed lanes, but customers say there aren’t enough.
“Target’s lack of manned cashiers at my store this morning caused me and at least six other people in the time I was there to leave our things in our carts and leave,” wrote Phil (@ptr5006) in X.
“This is crazy. Do better, please.”
Another shopper posted a video of a Target store in Texas where no traditional lanes were open.
“Don’t target any open lanes at Target in Plano West. Other than just one side of the self-checkout,” Luis (@Lou_ezgee) he wrote.
“To think I came here to escape Walmart.”
A third shopper said shopping at Target has become a horrible experience due to the new checkout rules.
“Hey Target, you can’t be understaffed at registers and not have self-checkout working. You have to pick a fight,” wrote Kahlil (@damn pops).
“These things make shopping a pain.”
INDUSTRY ISSUES
Walmart took a page out of Target’s playbook and also limited self-checkout to shoppers with 15 items or fewer.
It’s no surprise that the store faced the same backlash as Target.
“Walmart, you guys suck for having a 15 item self-checkout limit,” wrote Joyce (@joycelou71) in X.
“I was already able to check off my 18 items before the lady in front of me even unloaded her cart onto the conveyor belt!”
Latest self-checkout changes
Retailers are evolving their self-checkout strategy in an effort to speed checkout times and reduce theft.
Walmart shoppers were shocked when self-checkout lanes at several locations were made available only to Walmart+ members.
Other customers reported that self-checkout was closed at specific times and more cashiers were offered in its place.
While shoppers feared that shoplifting would fuel the updates, a Walmart spokesperson revealed that store managers are simply experimenting with ways to improve checkout performance.
One bizarre experiment included an RFID-powered self-checkout kiosk that would thwart fiercely contested receipt checks.
However, this test has been discontinued.
At Target, items are being limited in auto-checkout.
Last fall, the brand researched new express self-checkout lanes in 200 stores with 10 items or less for added convenience.
In March 2024, this policy was expanded to 2,000 stores in the US.
Shoppers also identified their local Walmart stores restricting customers to 15 items or less to use self-checkout machines.
Just like Target, customers begged Walmart to open more traditional cash registers.
“What sense does it make to change self-checkout lanes to 15 items or less, but then only have two or three registers open? Make sense!” they (@ill-tempered_la) he wrote.
“Don’t worry about how many items I have when you see these log lines!”
One shopper said she was removed from the self-checkout line after an employee counted the items in her cart.
“I knew I was being tested by the devil. I started leaving everything in the cart [and] leave and go straight to Target,” she wrote in a Facebook post.
“I will never go back to Walmart.”
Target said it is “collecting feedback” from shoppers to improve long lines.
Some shoppers said they would start going to Aldi instead of Walmart or Target because of registration rules.
This story originally appeared on The-sun.com read the full story
