Sometimes Technology Can Be Too Much Of A Good Thing

I tried a new checkout system at my local food store today.It was suppose to save me time, I think I lost ten minutes.

You might have this in your food store. If not it might be there soon. You get a little scanner when you walk in and scan the items you are buying as you shop. You also bag them as you go. Then when you are ready to leave you go to the cash register and the scanner dumps your items into the computer. All you do is scan coupons and pay.

Easy right? Should be a great time saver right? Wrong!

I found myself wasting time trying to bag one item as I scan it and hold the scanner and basket in the other hand, all at the same time.Oh yeah, I forgot about my third hand holding the shopping list. Instead of saving time, I was wasting it.

I could have gone through the self checkout (this I like) in less than half the time it took me to go through the store scanning and bagging one item at a time.

When I left the employee trying to sell customers on the system asked me how I liked it. She was shocked when I told her it was more trouble than it was worth.

In this case, I say keep the new technology. I’ll stick to the old way (which is fairly new anyway).