Exactly how is this “hacking?”
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A question artises, why now almost all cas register receipt are printed on thermal paper? The only exception I see is for electronics store that give you an A4 invoice and some restaurants and some open air markets salesmen who make receipt on paper, and barbers too.
I suppose that if it’s some health hazard a receipt coul be made with 9 pin printers, that are still built for this precise scope.
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Sorry but given that you’ve just found out that the people on the till are not magically perfect and may tot up your purchases wrongly, why would you assume that you can just rely on some other employee to do a better job checking the first one’s work.
Why not just check your receipt yourself every time?
That is the only way you’re going to be reasonably sure you’ve paid the right amount.
Do you have a choice about whether to have your receipt checked or not?
If you do, fine. If not, then you are being required to take part in the store’s internal policing of its employees and it is therefore not being done for your personal benefit.
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Edit: That was harsh of me. Costco sells decent products at a generally lowest-in-class price, while providing its (unionized) employees with what is generally reviewed as a decent living and good working conditions. However, it’s obviously totally unacceptable that they check receipts. I’m sure that the only ethical solution is to boycott them in favor of a more ideologically pure enterprise.
You circular firing-squad types just slay me.
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Ah, you live in Bavaria as well? In my case, most stores already have video screens showing the tally, making the receipt obsolete. I only take it if there is an item that I might have to return. And there are some stores that are moving on to offering receipts via app for this purpose they say, not because they want to track you, oh no, heaven forbid! We have loyalty cards that do that already!
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Meh, Fine by me…at least with the further response 
Good. Sounds great.
I haven’t said it’s unacceptable. I have suggested that:
a) relying on other store employees to check the first employee’s work is not something a customer should do, i.e. “always check your own receipts unless you don’t care whether you’ve been overcharged”, and
b) whether you’re happy for a store to check your receipt or not, you should think about whether them telling you it’s for your benefit is in fact true or not.
It is partly a benefit to you but mainly it is for the store’s benefit. Nothing wrong with that as such but I think it is better if stores are honest about these things.
There are also discussions to be had about how stores implement these things and whether that feeds in to the wider expectation that ‘we’ are expected to/conditioned to comply and obey instructions from all sorts of people who really have no right to expect/demand compliance.
Nah, I’m sure a dirty protest at the exit would be far more effective. /s
I don’t think anyone is calling for a boycott. I’m certainly not.
Damn, we’re still getting the circular bit wrong then…
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Oh, I just came up with a psychological experiment: have a certain item be on sale, but not entered into the register as such. Let it be subtle, so that most shoppers don’t catch it. Receipt checkers are expected to catch it, and tell the shoppers to go to Register X for some cash back.
The point of the exercise is to measure if shoppers feel better about the store working hard to not let them get ripped off, or if they get more paranoid at the register.
EDIT: I suspect this experiment has already been done, and that is why receipt checkers became a thing.
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They use thermal printers because they’re faster than a printer with a moving head (they print the whole width of the paper, one row of dots at a time), and because they only use a single type of consumable. If they used separate ink, you’d get even more “hold on, I need to refill the printer” delays.
Also, because they don’t need components to manage ink or move the print head, they can be made cheap, reliable, and small enough to fit into the handheld thingies they use at e.g. restaurants.
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I don’t think it’s fair to call the baggers a nonsense position. They seem to really help move the lines along faster, since they can bag while the cashier rings. It results in a faster line and (hopefully) better packed groceries.
They also seem to use the bagging positions to hire people for the checking and front-of-house grocery jobs at my local store. Since it also doesn’t involve reading or math, it’s also a job area where people with different abilities can work; and can be just as good or better than people with non-different abilities and earn an income.
It’s also more employment, which means more money back into the community.
I’ve never been a professional bagger. My brother’s first job was bagging; he’s now a VP at a bank in an IT job. Be nice to your bagger and your cashier; they are honest, good jobs, and they are people worthy of respect, if they stay in those jobs their entire career or if they move past them.
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What’s wrong with baggers?
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So. Hold up. Yes a receipt checker is essentially auditing the cashiers. And you find this to be somehow evil or bad?
What kind of job do you do that someone doesn’t check on your work??
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I think we are Rob’s receipt checkers.
…
Hang on, does that mean I’ve joined the Gestapo? I don’t think I feel good about that.
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Consultant
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The main thing that they are there to discourage is a customer and a cashier being in cahoots, and putting an expensive item through without ringing it up. Frankly I don’t think they’re paying much attention to matching the receipt and purchases. Pretty sure that if there was a big flat-screen on my cart they’d be SURE that it was on my receipt, though.
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My understanding is that the receipt checkers:
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Make sure that you have a receipt and haven’t just filled your cart and bypassed the checkout.
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Roughly estimate that the number of purchases on your receipt matches what is in the cart.
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Discourage shoplifters with a moderate level of security before they can get out the door.
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Take a quick look at your receipt to make sure that any big ticket items that you are carrying are on the receipt, as @simonize mentions just above.
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Cool. But that isn’t the norm.
As a Developer there have to be at least 3 different “checks” on what I code between a peer review, a QC review, the code review and pen test cycle, as well as myself double and sometimes triple checking my own work.
Sorry…but I am not buying the notion from @beschizza that somehow receipt checking is some next level sign of fascism. It’s not. It’s normal to be double checked. I call bullshit on this so god damn much. We look at the average white person who doesn’t see racism and we say “Because it isn’t YOUR norm doesn’t mean it isn’t the norm for others” the same thing applies here. Just because Rob and other bloggers here at BB don’t conform to workplace norms where there are audits and checks on people’s work quality DOESN’T mean that it isn’t the norm elsewhere. AND I do not find any validity in the idea that checking others work is comparable to being a fucking Nazi. THAT IS SERIOUSLY BAD FORM.
And before I get the “Oh take a joke…it was editorial license” or anything along those lines…NO I DO NOT THINK JOKING ABOUT FASCISM OR NAZISM IS OK RIGHT NOW.
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After I’ve paid for it - it’s mine. You don’t get to touch it.
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Any “consultant” that I pay for is definitely going to be checked and double checked. Most that I have run into have a severe lack of common sense or a disconnect in comprehension.
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Well…see now you’re a nazi fascist right?!? /s
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