Pete wrote:Actually, the check verification services (Vericheck and whatnot) all do spot-checks on the amount of cash in the account. Part of their selling points for the systems (and the fees they charge) is the guarantee that they'll personally eat any cost incurred if they're wrong.

I don't pretend to have experience with all supermarkets but, at least with the major ones in Chicago - Jewel and Dominick's - I've never seen a Vericheck system in place. When visiting down south I've never seen such systems deployed at Kroger's, Publix, Food Lion, or Piggly Wiggly either. Some supermarkets used to require registration in advance for a check-cashing card (which did nothing to verify available balance, just confirmed that you were who you said you were) but I don't believe that such cards are much in use anymore (though, as previously noted, since I don't use checks at markets I'm not really in the know on that).

Now - I pay my credit card balances in full every month so as not to pay any interest charges. I'm fortunate that I can do that and I imagine others posting in this thread about credit > check may be similiarly fortunate (or can afford the interest charges). Not everyone is so fortunate and for some the ability to directly pay for real life expenses like food via check vs. adding to a continuing balance on a credit card may be a consideration in why they choose to pay via a certain method. "Food" for thought.

ToniG wrote:But, while we're on the subject, my pet peeve: people who park their cart right in the middle of the aisle while they're trying to find something (especially problematic at places with narrow aisles, like Oakton Market). My husband does this all the time. Drives me nuts.

ToniG,

I would add that related to this bad behavior is leaving the empty shopping cart, in the parking lot, sitting in a prime parking place because it's just too hard to push the cart into one of the little cart corrals. I was in Glen Ellyn last weekened, going shopping with my cousin who has trouble walking, and we couldn't park in a space right front of the store because someone had simply left their cart there after unloading it. This is another type of discourteous, selfish, thoughtless, fundamentally immoral and antisocial behavior that we've come to take for granted.

David "Mr. Courtesy" Hammond

Kman wrote:I don't pretend to have experience with all supermarkets but, at least with the major ones in Chicago - Jewel and Dominick's - I've never seen a Vericheck system in place. When visiting down south I've never seen such systems deployed at Kroger's, Publix, Food Lion, or Piggly Wiggly either. Some supermarkets used to require registration in advance for a check-cashing card (which did nothing to verify available balance, just confirmed that you were who you said you were) but I don't believe that such cards are much in use anymore (though, as previously noted, since I don't use checks at markets I'm not really in the know on that).

Kman,

One of the Jewels in my area scans your check while you stand there and gives it back to you before you leave. Personally, I haven't written a check in over 2 years.

FYI - If you use checks to pay your bills remember to include the payment coupon, align the check and coupon in the envelope without folding them, and most importantly don't staple or paper clip anything together. If everyone did this one of my customers would be very happy.

Flip

David Hammond wrote:

I would add that related to this bad behavior is leaving the empty shopping cart, in the parking lot, sitting in a prime parking place because it's just too hard to push the cart into one of the little cart corrals.

Even worse, maybe, is in crowded parking lots when people park their cars in front of the cart corrals. Those folks consciously do something they know will inconvenience others; the cart dumpers, perhaps, if we're being generous of spirit, tried to tuck their carts out of the way but they rolled into a bad place. And sometimes the stores are at fault, not providing enough of those darn corrals (probably to allow for more parking spaces; see above), so that you have to walk a long way to properly store your cart, which is sometimes not an option if you've got a crying baby that you just strapped into a car seat. But generally, you're right, it's plain laziness at work here. By the way, my husband, the cart parker, is otherwise a pretty considerate fellow (but easily distracted in supermarkets, not his normal territory), so perhaps the cart dumpers are worth the benefit of the doubt too.

What you all said!!! Actually, It would be kinda cool to see Mike G go off on his rant; I'd love to see it in person. The oh so verbose rant of "Take the two cents, damn ye, and be driven from the steps of the city to live the rest of your days among other skinflints and copper-pinchers, miserly counting out the remaining frozen tater tots in the bag to ensure your fair share against the rest of your ill-favored, accursed kind!" So Monty Python-esque, in a twisted way.

Seriously....I love it that you all can vent about this and I find it rather amusing. It's almost like someone printed a transcript from my brain of all my shopping peeves. To know there are others who think like me just kills me (and makes me very scared at the same time).

Happy Friday!!! There are always going to be people who do things to annoy us (like walking anywhere having people walk in front of you and stop, for no apparent reason). It's a way of life; let's make fun of those people!!!

HI,

I write checks. I am an ass.

Not only that, my Mother has a purse I refer to as "The Tank." It weighs at least 6 pounds. Inside the tank is her other weapon 'the grenade,' her change purse which often has a pound of coins. I will grab the 'grenade' when it has reached critical mass and pay for small items with it. Yes, you are all waiting in line as I carefully count out the pennies.

Recently I went to Anna Held Florist and Soda Fountain. I inquired with the server if he needed change, which he was very appreciative. So while I waited for my sundae to be assembled I counted out just over $4 in pennies, nickles and dimes. The quarters I keep for parking. For an ever so brief period, Mother's purse weighed under 5 pounds.

Regards,

At least for now, the Coinstar counting fee is waived if you take your money in the form of certain retailer gift cards. Most usefully for me, Amazon and Starbucks cards have no counting fee, but there are others.

This all probably all part of a scheme to get us hooked on Coinstar, at which point they'll charge a fee for all transactions, but it's chance to convert those jars of coins at home.

Coinstar's a great, ubiquitous conversion opportunity. I don't care about the fee. I Do care when I'm about to change out a few weeks worth of change and the guy in front of me has a duffle bag stuffed with pennies(I've also been in back of people who overload the machine). Murphy's law.

David Hammond wrote:I would add that related to this bad behavior is leaving the empty shopping cart, in the parking lot, sitting in a prime parking place because it's just too hard to push the cart into one of the little cart corrals. I was in Glen Ellyn last weekened, going shopping with my cousin who has trouble walking, and we couldn't park in a space right front of the store because someone had simply left their cart there after unloading it. This is another type of discourteous, selfish, thoughtless, fundamentally immoral and antisocial behavior that we've come to take for granted.

Well, one of you could have gotten out of the car and moved the cart so you could park in the space -- from another perspective you could look at it as someone saving a space for you.

I've actually thought about this a lot. I try to put my cart somewhere out of the way, but I often don't put it in the corral. I look at that as an effort to preserve employment for unskilled workers, and to encourage stores to retain a staff of people to provide services like bagging groceries and helping women carry groceries to their car. I also do not use the self-service checkout.

If stores don't need to employ people to put carts back, bag groceries or run cash registers, they won't. Do we pay more for groceries because they need them? Maybe. But you pay for jobless people in other ways.

Consider how quickly gas stations did away with pump jockeys, once people indicated they were willing to pump their own gas. So now you have to fill your own tank, pump your own gas, clean your own windshield and check your own oil -- and pay through the nose for the privilege. What do you suppose the sort of people who used to do that work are doing now?

LAZ wrote:Consider how quickly gas stations did away with pump jockeys, once people indicated they were willing to pump their own gas. So now you have to fill your own tank, pump your own gas, clean your own windshield and check your own oil -- and pay through the nose for the privilege. What do you suppose the sort of people who used to do that work are doing now?

They've all relocated to New Jersey and Oregon? (The only two states where it's illegal to pump your own gas. By law it must be done by an attendant.)

I'm not sure I like the idea of legislation that exists merely to keep an obsolete job in existence - but that's an argument that's outside the scope of this board.

I knew it was just a matter of time before someone outted me. I will write a check for 10 dollars, 30 dollars, 300 or 3000. I always have my info all filled out and the ID /Member card ready. My transactions , and I have verified this, actually are shorter than Aunt Sally or Uncle Sol digging around in their pockets and change purses for cash. Once in a while I will detect a sigh from someone behind me when I whip out the checkbook. In return they generally get a really mean sneer and possibly a "you gotta problem?" and thats where it ends.

I do this because nearly all of my purchases are related to my business. I use my business checks because I use the checks and the register for my records and bookeeping. I wonder how those of you who make business purchases pay for things?


I must point out that I dont like the unprepared and discourteous folks as much as anyone as my time is valuable too. But lets not condem all the considerate folks in the world because of a few. And thats what the heart of this issue seems to be. If someone is so self centered as to get in a checkout line and not have their papers in order it is likely they are the same folks who jump ahead of you in line at the butcher, deli or bakery.



Bob

You city folks sure get into an uproar over little things. This morning I went to one of my favorite special item markets. There was an elderly lady who has probably been shopping there for decades. She had her items out, counted out her cash, and had a bread card punched. Meanwhile, the teenage clerk wrapped each of her different meat purchases in plastic (sausage, chicken, hamburger), before putting them into a bag with the other purchase. The clerk was polite, considerate, and helpful while I am standing in live to pay for a pop. As the clerk finished loading the sack the owner came from the back of the store, said hi to me and the lady, picked up her sack, offered his arm and walked the woman to her car. Ever seen this at Jewel, Dominick's, Whole Foods. etc.?

I've driven by this store in the morning and the owner is out there daily sweeping the sidewalk, every Monday morning he is hosing off the sidewalk, and the snow is always shoveled. He hires teenagers and trains them to be polite and helpful. THe store is always clean with great choices that are not available in other stores. He also wears the old time grocer smocks. My wife used to go there 50 years ago when she was a child. THe owner tells me how nice my FIL was when he would come into the store back in the 50s and 60s.



My wife and I take her mother to the store occasionally, she is slow, but one of the few times she gets out. Being respectful and patient to the elderly is well worth the time.

Bruce wrote:Ever seen this at Jewel, Dominick's, Whole Foods. etc.?

Yes.

Bruce wrote:Being respectful and patient to the elderly is well worth the time.

Absolutely (so I'll be expecting a tad more deference from you in the future, young man).

Hammond

I haven't written a check at a supermarket in years, but I remember that the time it took them to bag up my groceries was longer than it took me to write a check.

I can say, though, that back in the day before instant bank balance checking and the like, writing a check at the market got me through the few days until payday when I'd run out of money and seriously need groceries. Every day I'm thankful that I don't have to do that anymore.

But "10 items or less" - ugh. It was truly a pleasure to shop at Wegman's in Syracuse, where they properly labeled the damn aisle "Ten items or FEWER." Get it right and I'll forgive the guy in front of me who sneaks in a few extra items.

Having just returned from my local Dominick's, I have to concur: the real culprit slowing down our exit from the supermarkets are the stores themselves, who continue to trim their workforces, to the disadvantage both of those who lose their jobs and to those who shop there. I had to wait quite a while just now in a fairly short line -- but there were no baggers so the check-out woman had to retreat from her register to pack the groceries herself. The woman in front of me (who had a sizable order) did in fact write a check but she had completed that long before her groceries were bagged. I do chat now and then with the checkout folks at my Dominick's; they are unionized and will grumble (when the bosses aren't listening) about management's continual efforts to squeeze more work out of fewer and fewer people.

Here's a supermarket question I wonder if anyone knows the answer to: some time ago my Dom's removed the plastic bag recycling bins they had had for a long time. When I asked the checker why they had been taken away, she said the program was too costly and at any rate, most of the time the bags had just been tossed in the trash anyway. My jaw dropped and I looked so horrified that she began to backpeddle: "Well, I think that's what they did, anyway..." A few weeks later the recycling bins returned, no doubt because too many people complained. But now I have my suspicions, and wonder if I'm wasting my time storing those darn bags and taking them back to the store: I could just throw them out, if that's all that's being done with them. Anybody know what really happens to those plastic bags?

ToniG wrote:When I asked the checker why they had been taken away, she said the program was too costly and at any rate, most of the time the bags had just been tossed in the trash anyway. My jaw dropped and I looked so horrified that she began to backpeddle: "Well, I think that's what they did, anyway..." A few weeks later the recycling bins returned, no doubt because too many people complained. But now I have my suspicions, and wonder if I'm wasting my time storing those darn bags and taking them back to the store: I could just throw them out, if that's all that's being done with them. Anybody know what really happens to those plastic bags?

Toni:

I'm suspicious now too. Let's not forget the city blue bags. Living in an apartment house in the Loop, we sorted and blue-bagged assiduously... One time, the topic came up with a friend of ours who worked on the cleaning staff of the building. She shook her head and laughed a little, that sort of laugh that people give when they're commiserating with the laughably duped... All the garbage, blue bags and all, went into the same compressor.

Perhaps though we earned a little sympathy and favour from whichever God is in charge of garbage and recycling.

Antonius

Antonius wrote:Toni:

I'm suspicious now too. Let's not forget the city blue bags. Living in an apartment house in the Loop, we sorted and blue-bagged assiduously... One time, the topic came up with a friend of ours who worked on the cleaning staff of the building. She shook her head and laughed a little, that sort of laugh that people give when they're commiserating with the laughably duped... All the garbage, blue bags and all, went into the same compressor.

Perhaps though we earned a little sympathy and favour from whichever God is in charge of garbage and recycling.

Antonius

Well, that's kind of the entire idea of the blue bags.

They're blue so the staff at the sort facility can grab them, and toss them into the proper container to be recycled. The process was created to make recycling easier without making a need for two crews of trucks hitting every stop, weekly.

Checks are quaint, and obsolete. It is particularly interesting that some banks still offer fee structures that favor the use of checks, despite the fact that the transaction costs for the banks, and the retailers of course, are far higher than for either a debit of credit card, where most costs are fixed, so there is very little added cost for each transaction.

The reason for this is twofold, I imagine. On the one hand, much of the incremental cost of processing a check is labor, and is distributed across the various companies and people who touch that check. So while we can easily imagine that the time to process that check is much greater than an electronic credit or debit, as evidenced by Hammy's whine at the beginning of this thread, the cost of this time is harder for the insightful thinkers at Mega-Bank Unlimited to grasp. The other reason is just that they have identified these "new forms of payment" as revenue opportunities, which they may well continue to pursue to the very extinction of their corporation as their labor costs spiral out of control

Personally, I have always been more amused by the way in which we humanize delays and obstructions - if forced to sit in a traffic jam, our anger will be directed at the car in front of us that is just not keeping up with the car in front of them, thereby allowing people to cut in front of it and slowing me down, damn it! If I just get in front of this jerk... Or perhaps the lady in line in front of us at the grocery store whose check writing is just snarling everything up. Or maybe the people in the crowded Mega-Mart who do not keep their carts properly parked off to the side forcing me to wait, or ask them to let me by. The proximate cause of the delay is not, of course, the real cause, but it is nice to have someone to blame.

Let's work on frictionless check out in between blaming ladies with checks, if time allows.

Pete wrote:They're blue so the staff at the sort facility can grab them, and toss them into the proper container to be recycled. The process was created to make recycling easier without making a need for two crews of trucks hitting every stop, weekly.

Sure, Pete, but does it still work if the bags go through an apartment building's trash compactor?

Pete wrote:

Antonius wrote:Toni:

I'm suspicious now too. Let's not forget the city blue bags. Living in an apartment house in the Loop, we sorted and blue-bagged assiduously... One time, the topic came up with a friend of ours who worked on the cleaning staff of the building. She shook her head and laughed a little, that sort of laugh that people give when they're commiserating with the laughably duped... All the garbage, blue bags and all, went into the same compressor.

Perhaps though we earned a little sympathy and favour from whichever God is in charge of garbage and recycling.

Antonius

Well, that's kind of the entire idea of the blue bags.

They're blue so the staff at the sort facility can grab them, and toss them into the proper container to be recycled. The process was created to make recycling easier without making a need for two crews of trucks hitting every stop, weekly.

No, the compressor smashed, mashed, and crushed everything into a cube. Only thing left of the blue bag was a few shreds of plastic....

gleam wrote:Sure, Pete, but does it still work if the bags go through an apartment building's trash compactor?

Ahh, I misread that. I thought he was referring to the truck itself as a compactor (which is true). Supposedly the sorters are supposed to grab any loose recyclables they see - I'm guessing the efficacy of that varies wildly.

For a couple of years in early 90s, I worked for our campus recycling company/co-op. We were responsible for collection, transportation, and processing of most of the university's recycling. While we felt it was the right thing to do, it wasn't financially lucrative. In fact, in our operation, our collection of aluminum cans subsidized our collection/processing of most everything else (e.g. white/green/amber glass, white/mixed paper, plastics, cardboard).

The university janitorial service took over the recycling operation at some point, and as with the Chicago blue bag program, it was all going to the landfill initially. Part of that was due to poor staff training and part of it was getting comfortable with the economics of processing "trash."

Stupider things have happened, but I'm having a hard time accepting that Dominick's would maintain the program only to turn around and take all the plastic bags to a dump.

(Now hoping that my drycleaner re-uses the wire hangers I return.)

Zee

I went to Teddy's Liquors, a huge store with several locations in the NW burbs of Chicago yesterday. After hauling my stuff up to one of several check-out lines, i pulled out my CC. Nope! Cash or check only. I laughed and walked away. Just catering to the Buick set i guess.

grant wrote:I went to Teddy's Liquors, a huge store with several locations in the NW burbs of Chicago yesterday. After hauling my stuff up to one of several check-out lines, i pulled out my CC. Nope! Cash or check only. I laughed and walked away. Just catering to the Buick set i guess.

Teddy's is so weird! They do have good prices, but I won't even step foot into the one nearest me because the people are so rude. What finally did it was when this one woman, who always seems to be having a fight with somebody, asked me if I would like a box or a bag for my six or so bottles of wine. "I'd like a bag, thank you." She pulls out a box and starts putting them in. 'I'm sorry; I would like a bag." (The box won't fit in the tiny trunk of my convertible, and I have other stops to make.) She stops dead and says, "You *did* ask for a box, didn't you?" "Uh, no, unless I'm hallucinating or something." This went on and on; it was really important to her that we settle this in her favor. She refused to bag up my stuff until I said, "I don't have time for this," and started walking away, as I hadn't paid yet. At that point I guess she realized that if I didn't take the bottles she would have to put them all back, so she finally agreed to sell them to me.

I mean, really. I've worked retail and I know customers can be a pain in the butt and you can get cranky but that encounter is pretty much par for the course at that place.

Cathy2 wrote:
I write checks. I am an ass.

Cathy,

It's high time you changed your sig line. I nominate the above as a suitable replacement.

LAZ wrote:What do you suppose the sort of people who used to do that work are doing now?

Either pushing up daisys or working at Wal-Mart.

bob kopczynski wrote: I wonder how those of you who make business purchases pay for things?

Ever hear of a corporate credit card? It's faster than either checks or cash.

When you find yourself in a cash register line behind a check-writer, nine times out of ten there are other reasons the person seems to take forever. Check-writing is a symptom, it's not the disease, which usually is a more general cluelessness.

I operate a small business. In both my personal and professional life, the only checks I write are printed out on my computer for bills I pay by mail. I haven't "carried a checkbook" in at least ten years, possibly longer. I used to carry a personal checkbook and a business checkbook, now I carry a personal credit card and a business credit card.

What's more, I'm old (i.e., age is no excuse) and I drive a Buick. (Which I love, by the way.)

David Hammond wrote:World-Class Asses #1: Check Writers

Hammond,

So I'm in Costco last week, two behind a check writer. Not a large purchase business check writer, but a 55-60 year-old woman buying a book, bottle of vodka, couple of roasted chickens and a few munchies.

First she hunts for a good 90-seconds for her Costco card and then, only when the cashier finishes ringing up her purchase, does she get out her checkbook.

She starts to write the check, asking 3-4, maybe 5 times how much the total is, then asks if she can get cash back, twice. Finally with pen poised she asks once again the amount. The guy in line behind her suggests she give the check to the Costco cashier to run through the register, I guess the cash registers have a function that imprints the amount, date etc. on checks.

This woman gives the poor guy the dirtiest look I've seen in ages, sneers "why would I want to do that" and the poor schnook just smiles and takes it. Funny thing was about 15-seconds later, which is the time it took for the lonely little hamster spinning the exercise wheel that powers her brain to process, she thought this was a good idea.

She hands the check to the cashier for imprinting, then decides against it, then for, then against. The damn check goes back and forth 3-4 times. Finally she decides to write the check, takes a good 2-full-minutes to do so, all the while asking the amount.

Finally she hands the damn check to the cashier, one would think Done and Done. Nope. She asks for the check back to see what date she wrote down, hands the check back to the cashier and then asks for it back to see the check number- twice. OY

When she eventually tottered away the three of us, guy behind her, cashier and myself burst out laughing.

Enjoy,
Gary