You won’t get a discount for doing a cashier’s job, and your stores won’t be forced to close all of their self-checkouts. But the grocery shopping experience in one state is poised to change nonetheless, as lawmakers there have overwhelmingly passed a bill that would make them the first in the nation to restrict self-checkouts.
Rhode Island’s General Assembly has approved a measure that would limit grocery stores’ reliance on self-checkouts. The proposed legislation now heads to the governor’s desk for his potential signature.
But the bill as passed is significantly watered down from the original version proposed more than three years ago. That version would have required grocery stores to have a staffed checkout lane for every self-checkout station, it would have capped the number of self-checkouts at eight – and it would have required stores to give shoppers a 10% discount for scanning and bagging their own groceries.
The current version scraps the discount, removes the eight self-checkout limit, and allows three self-checkouts per staffed checkout instead of requiring a one-to-one ratio. It also says an employee tasked with monitoring self-checkouts “shall be relieved of all other duties” while doing so.
“How many times have you gone through self-checkout and had a problem, and it takes ten minutes for someone to help you?” the bill’s sponsor, Democratic Representative Megan Cotter, asked her colleagues before the final House vote. “This bill is about both jobs and consumer protection. Consumers are frustrated with self-checkout, with how poorly the systems work, how long it takes to get help from the one overstretched employee assigned to those registers, and how some stores have few if any staffed registers. You might think the market would respond to what consumers want, but instead we just keep getting more and more automation.”
Among those voting against the bill was Republican Representative Michael Chippendale, who said the state forced retailers into automation by raising the minimum wage. “Now we’re passing a bill to prevent them from automating,” he said. “We are creating problems and then we’re fixing problems by creating more problems.”
The United Food and Commercial Workers International Union, which represents grocery employees in the state, applauded the bill’s passage. “This bill means better service for customers and stronger support for grocery workers,” UFCW Local 328 Secretary-Treasurer Domenic Pontarelli said in a statement. Grocery employees “are often overburdened, having to monitor too many self-checkouts while shoppers face delays. Staffing ratios fix this issue for all parties.”
Rhode Island’s bill has now progressed further than any other, after several other states proposed their own self-checkout restrictions in recent years. Until now, the most notable version to have become law came at the local level, in the city of Long Beach, California, where the measure put on the books last fall appeared to have backfired. Several grocery stores in the city shut down their self-checkout lanes altogether, claiming there was no way they could keep them open in a way that complied with the law.
The California Grocers Association had warned that very thing might happen. And so, now, are retail groups in Rhode Island.
“Many customers actually prefer” self-checkout,” Monika P. Zuluaga, president and CEO of the Northern Rhode Island Chamber of Commerce, wrote in a letter of opposition to lawmakers. The bill, she said, “discourages the use of such technology, thus placing a business in a difficult situation of being unable to serve the majority of its customers.”
It “should remain a consumer’s choice to utilize self-checkout,” added Scott Bromberg, executive director of the Rhode Island Food Dealers Association. “There are always traditional register lanes available.” He also criticized the bill for stating that it applies to any store “that earns the majority of its gross income from the retail sale of groceries,” which he says singles out grocery stores in a way that other retailers are not.
“Big box retailers, along with hardware stores, pharmacies, dollar stores, fast food chains and more utilize self-checkout to allow them to deploy their staff where needed most,” he said. “This bill implies that self-checkout concerns only happen at grocery retailers. This puts Rhode Island grocers at a significant competitive disadvantage.”
And self-checkout restrictions may be just the start. Self-checkouts are only the latest technological tool to come under fire by skeptical state lawmakers. A backlash against the perceived inequality of digital coupons prompted San Diego to ban digital-only deals last year, and a similar measure in the state of Illinois is sitting on the governor’s desk awaiting his expected signature. Meanwhile, several states have proposed banning digital price displays, requiring paper shelf tags instead, for fear that digital tags can be used to charge different prices to different shoppers.
Critics in San Diego warned that restricting digital coupons would mean fewer digital coupons and higher prices for everyone – and that happened. Critics in Long Beach warned that restricting self-checkouts would mean fewer self-checkout stations and longer lines for everyone – and that happened, too.
If signed into law, Rhode Island’s self-checkout bill takes effect on January 1st. And then shoppers there will find out whether the critics’ or the supporters’ predictions are the ones that come true.
Image source: Coupons in the News
