Why is it when you go to a store, such as Wal-Mart, the express "10 items or less" line is always slower then the non-express lines?

Around here at our Wal-Mart nobody listens to the rules and takes like 20–30 items to them. That tends to slow things down here. =/

A manager friend of mine once told me “I love express lanes. All the impatient idiots go there thinkin’ it’s gonna be faster! Keeps my cashiers happy.”

That was not a word for word quote but it’s the best I can remember.

Man, I know what you mean. That drives me crazy!

This is done deliberately, by using that position to train new checkers. The reason is that it is to their benefit for you to buy more Stuff, and use the regular lane.

@daniel89x if that happens, the rent-a-cops comes around and are is like “move it along” i cant help to laugh EVERY time this happens. But mine will take 12 at the most…which always questions the “10 items or less” why not just “12 items or less”.

@Riser Thats good, i wouldn’t put it past em.

@Randy i know, one time i tryed going to customer service, and they asked me what i wanted. I told them i wanted to pay for this ONE $1.07 item, they told me no, so i put the $1.07 on the table and walked out…as soon as i got in my car they left me alone….

So basically no more express line for George? =[

I would guess that if you have 5 people on line, with 5 items each, but 2 people, with 15 items each, there are less transactions being done on the longer line.

Why are you shopping at walmart anyway?? :-)

The worst part where I am is that the people in the regular line have baskets FULL of items and still get out faster. Its crazy! The self check outs have helped a lot but I feel like I’m losing because I’m doing a service myself for that I’m paying for them to do by paying the higher walmart price.

Express lines are for the slow & new people. (o:

10 items or fewer. Urgghhh.

U-Scan is the way to go. Thats where you scan all of your own items and pay a machine. Everywhere in Detroit has that now.

@topserb
How many u-scans on average are in a store?

That just put that many already hurting Michigan residents out of jobs.

I guess the flip side is stock goes up.

there is an average of 4–6 in each store. but they still have 1 or 2 ppl as a cashier for all of those machines.

I don’t really know if this would also apply no Wal-Marts—in Chile there are no Wal-Marts, there are “Lider” hypermarkets which are owned by Wal-Mart and you might assume that people behave somewhat different, but anyway…

I think it’s because what really takes a long time it’s not to check the products, but the actual payment. Usually, you’re asked how are you gonna pay (cash/credit/check), if you are a member of “Club Lider” (a discount card of the store), if you would like to give away some of your payment to a charity… and, sadly, people that pay with cash are the minority, and of course paying with a check or credit card is considerably slower than paying with cash. Many times I’ve seen people paying with a check stuff that actually is worth less than the paper and the taxes of the check itself, or buying a bag of bread with a credit card and paying it in three monthly installments…

So… here in Chile, I would say that Express lines usually aren’t express at all

I use the self serve scanners too. Express lanes are for training new employees. so they really aren’t any faster.

its because they are new people working there.

i agree with scamp

express lanes are a joke. i too like the self checkout.

yeah we have the self check stuff here too…. or at least we did

over $300k in stuff was stolen because people would go up, run stuff over the scanner, run stuff with theyre hand over the bar code over the scanner, for for a few items, and walk out with a lot more…. its risky, but it you want those jobs back, get a buncha people to do it. Once the store takes a heavy enough hit, youll see them disappear.