Lawyer explains why you should always avoid self-checkout in stores

Lawyer explains why you should always avoid self-checkout in stores. Once upon a time corporate greed decided that it would replace some of its cashiers with machines in order to save costs on manpower.

“The rationale was economics based and not focused on the customer,” Sylvain Charlebois, director of the Agri-Food Analytics Lab at Dalhousie University in Nova Scotia, told CNN. “From the get-go, customers detested them.”

Companies can save up to 66 percent by replacing human checkouts with machines.

However, this attempt to cheat customers of a proper service and workers of fair-paying jobs has largely failed, as many of these ventures do.

According to CNN, 67 percent of shoppers found the kiosks malfunctioning. They often require human supervision to solve problems anyway.

The machines are expensive to install, often break down resulting in fewer purchases from customers and, even funnier, increase shoplifting.

The first independent takeaway was by Piggly Wiggly in the 1900s. However, in exchange for customers being able to check out, Piggly Wiggly offered lower prices.

Anyone who’s been in the shops lately knows that’s certainly not the case these days.
Yet despite the failure of self-control, corporations are doubling down.

A lawyer says the companies are even criminalizing high-paying customers and accusing the innocent of theft.

Attorney Carrie Jernigan took to TikTok to tell her 1.2 million followers that one of the top three things she would avoid after practicing law is using self-control.

Jernigan says those who intentionally steal while self-monitoring have gotten really good at it.

As a result, big stores show no mercy to customers who accidentally steal something by forgetting something in their cart or not scanning properly.

Even worse, they follow customers who actually paid for the item.

“Big companies aren’t going to spend their time and resources trying to figure out if you did it on purpose,” Jernigan said.

And those who actually paid could face charges if the store’s asset protection department finds them short when it counts inventory.

“So they’ll start watching videos for hours to see the last person who walked away with a Mario Lego set because they’re two short.” And, for some reason, they point out that they think you did it,” Jernigan added. “Because of who these big box stores are, they usually have to present very little evidence to get an affidavit to sign, charges are filed that can put you in jail for up to a year, and then you’re fighting for your life trying to determine What day were you at Walmart, what did you buy?

Even if you get the charges dismissed, you can waste a lot of time and money fighting the case.

“My mom accidentally left some $3 worth of lemon oil in the cart after buying $300 worth of groceries. “She was charged with theft and had to do community service,” one TikTok commenter wrote.

“It took me 7 months and cost me $6,000 to clear my name after I was falsely accused and the evidence should have exonerated me immediately,” claims @catladikaren.

Fortunately, the solution is simple because consumers actually have the power. Just don’t go with it. Just don’t use self-checkout machines.

You may have to wait in line, but you will make sure the person gets paid.

And if these companies are having trouble filling positions, there’s a simple solution for that, too. They can only offer their employees better wages and benefits. With the average CEO making 351 times more than the average employee (a 1,322% increase since 1978 for CEOs and only 18% for employees) … it’s not like they can’t afford it.
Another option is to stop shopping at big chains altogether.

Watch Jernigan’s full video below.