Unexpected Item In Bagging Area Dumped

We have all been there. You rush to the self-service checkout, trying to leave the supermarket quickly, when as you scan your items the annoying “unexpected item in bagging area” message screams at you. No matter what you do, from this point forward you are unable to proceed. It has to be one of the most frustrating moments about shopping.

But, fear not. Coles customers can bid farewell to the very annoying voice sounding from self-service checkouts.

The supermarket chain has confirmed it has dumped the frustrating self-service checkout’s perhaps worst feature – the loud voice which told customers when the weight in the baggage area did not match the scanned items.

Customers were then locked out of the checkout until a supervisor came to reset the machine. The whole experience drove many Coles customers crazy when shopping.

Speaking recently with The Huffington Post Australia, a Coles Spokesperson said, “We are trialling new technologies at our self-checkouts that reduce customer frustration and enable our customers to get through quicker. This has freed up more time for our team members to provide a better service experience.”

Welcomed by shoppers on social media, one Twitter user tweeted, “I can now die happy” in response to the news.

18 Comments

- - Nas01 said
  - 03 Apr 2016
    8:10 pm
That voice over advising unexpected item….is sooooo annoying.

- - june11 said
  - 21 Mar 2016
    11:10 pm
Using self service checkouts will lead to unemployment. For that reason I now refuse to use them as do a lot of relatives and friends of mine.

- - mom94125 said
  - 28 Feb 2016
    6:00 pm
yeah you can’t substitute humans though 🙂

- - mom57619 said
  - 25 Feb 2016
    10:37 pm
I just gave up on using the self checking area at all. – I hate it!

- - KrysGrace said
  - 20 Feb 2016
    8:12 pm
Oh thank gosh!! So frustrating when you want to go through quickly, no manned registers are open, no staff member in sight and the thing tells you that you need to call a staff member to proceed.

- - mom112217 said
  - 17 Feb 2016
    4:31 pm
Good to know especially when you are in a hurry so you don’t need assistance!

- - june11 said
  - 16 Feb 2016
    10:41 pm
They drive me mad. So many times they don’t scan items properly and you have to re-do them. Takes more time than going top an ordinary checkout.
Not only that, if everybody starts using them there is going to be a lot of unemployed. It takes longer to get a price check if the item won’t scan even with assistance. They also haven’t haven’t got enough room for to to put items to scan or the other side for you to pack. In the meantime the machine is talking to you all the time.. That I definitely don’t need. I much prefer a happy friendly checkout person.

- - rachelvk said
  - 16 Feb 2016
    9:57 pm
Of all the self service check outs, I actually seemed to have the least issues with the ones at Coles… Woolworths and Big W on the other hand… grrrrrrr.

- - renae said
  - 16 Feb 2016
    9:36 am
I wonder how much quicker it will be!

- - mum4107 said
  - 15 Feb 2016
    10:41 pm
Lol at the tweet. I don’t use the self serve that much, so I won’t appreciate it as much as people that do will

- - Naomi said
  - 15 Feb 2016
    9:36 pm
Big w did this to us the other day! No matter what we put in we got this annoying message. But the checkout helper was so good and just bypassed that function for the rest of our items. So good they’re changing 🙂

- - VernaB said
  - 15 Feb 2016
    6:38 pm
Yay! It seems everytime I used them that happened to me, will be glad its gone.

- - Some_Toss said
  - 15 Feb 2016
    5:44 pm
That is the bane of shopping existence. SO glad it’s gone!

- - aprilb1 said
  - 15 Feb 2016
    4:53 pm
Yes it so annoying I opt not to use them where I can

- - BellaB said
  - 15 Feb 2016
    4:45 pm
Yep. I knew what they were trying to achieve, but it didn’t seem to work well.

- - shilto02 said
  - 15 Feb 2016
    4:36 pm
Nice to see they’re listening to customers. I must admit it is annoying when that happens but I must have finally got the hang of doing it all right because I haven’t had any errors like that for awhile.

- - mom165081 said
  - 15 Feb 2016
    3:37 pm
Even with this annoying feature, I liked using self serve checkouts when not too much in the trolley. It sounds even better now!

- - mom90758 said
  - 15 Feb 2016
    3:12 pm
Eh! Eh! It happened to me too. It can be a little bit annoying, that’s right! 🙂 I’m glad they are doing something about it!