An Assumption of Dishonesty?

At first thought, it seems like a rather simple thing.  You find yourself in the checkout lane at a supermarket with a cart full of groceries and other assorted items of all sizes and types.

PAID, Thank You!

The checkout person faithfully passes every one of your purchases over the glass of the cash register’s laser-beam scanner.

The point-of-sale computer works flawlessly as it tallies your order, presents you with the total, whereupon you swipe a piece of plastic that has become a substitute for cash, and you close out the transaction.  Done.

Perhaps – as I have until recently – you never gave a second thought to those little orange and black stickers which read PAID, Thank You that the cashier dutifully makes sure get glued to certain bulky items.

I always try to help by doing the bagging.  Recently, when the automated belt moved forward each of the one-gallon water bottles that were part of our purchase, the cashier handed me four of those little PAID, Thank You stickers which I affixed to each bottle.

The simple act of placing that PAID, Thank You tag on a purchased item is a negative sign of the times.  I just don’t like it, particularly when I’m asked to do it.

You and I, as shoppers, are assumed to be dishonest, treated as persons who can’t be trusted not to try to sneak an item or more past the cashier by leaving it in the grocery push cart, hoping that the checkout clerk won’t notice.

That is why grocery carts have no grid beneath them for bulky items.  (They did at one time, remember?) 

 

Store management might tell you that those little orange and black tags are simply an innocent reminder not to forget to remove large items from the grocery cart for scanning. 

 

How in the world can a cashier regularly neglect to scan such large items.  Besides, should a prospective thief want to pilfer goods from a supermarket, would it be gallons of water and other bulky stuff?

 

These things just don’t fit into the pockets of a prospective thief’s steal-whatever-you-can overcoat. Small, high value items are what count.  There are no PAID, Thank You stickers for those.  Just jail time.