The Tesco & other non-Morrisons supermarket thread

[Pete]

oh Asda Dundee West has one of those too. Completely unmanned with a red phone for emergencies.

[Nick Harvey]

There's been a completely unmanned ASDA filling station in Frome for years, though, when I say completely unmanned, their superstore is just across the road, so it's not far for someone to run in an emergency.

The nice thing for people like me, who are very concious of fuel prices, is that they are always 0.2 of a penny below the price of the other stations in the area, presumably because they don't have to pay for staff.

It's refreshing to always see them on xxx.7, when everyone else is on xxx.9.

[james2001]

I'm aware of a couple too, the one in Asda at Sinfin in Derby was put in around 2009-ish, when they demolished the old petrol station, and there's one at the Tesco in Hinckley too.

The Asda near me has had prices at .7 of a penny for a couple of years- and it's one with manned drive-through kiosks (well, there's 8 manned and 4 unmanned pumps), so it's not something exclusive to their unmanned petrol stations.

[all new Phil]

The 2 Asdas nearest to me have unmanned petrol stations that are open 24 hours - except on Christmas Day. I'm guessing that's because there is literally no one working in the store that day.

[jonathan]

ASDA put in a completely unmanned 24/7 pay at pump only filling station at their Edinburgh Chesser store about a year ago. First time I've encountered a completely unmanned filling station in the UK.

I'd kindof assumed it wouldn't be allowed on safety grounds, but it's there and has a couple of jet washes which taxi drivers can be seen using at midnight.

I also hate the receipts, and the fiddly little perspex plasticy thing they sit behind to try and stop them falling out on to the ground straight after printing.

EDIT: Here's the planning application. The Design & access statement gives a good overview of how it works and the link marked Photos shows others already in use, (direct document linking won't work it seems.)

Like Chesser, their Leith store has had a petrol station added since the store opened. I'm pretty sure it's unmanned. The Jewel store also has an unmanned petrol station. And Straiton has had one of these since they opened in 2011. Basically every store in Edinburgh!

[simonipswich]

The little Asda at Stoke Park in Ipswich are preparing to put in planning permission for a petrol station on the site that was supposed to be new flats and shops which didn't happen because of the credit crunch. We're glad they are putting in a petrol station as their petrol and diesel is the cheapest in Ipswich but it's not worth going all the way to Whitehouse to buy it. I suspect this station will be unmanned with pay at pumps.

[thegeek]

An evolution of the 'hello' sign at a new Tesco Express:


the window decals have a new font too:


Also, the 'hello' at my local superstore perhaps isn't placed in the best position:

[Critique]

I don't know what it is about them but I just *don't* like window decals they use for Express' - it might be the new font but I just don't think they're that nice to look at. Did that Express have wood panelling behind the logo too, as I notice an Express near our town centre was refitted recently and they'd made the odd decision to put wood behind it, so assume it is being rolled out elsewhere.

In other news, when in Sainsbury's today over the tannoy I heard 'Could the orange team please report to checkouts' - is this some code to do with abandoning your department due to queues at the tills or a nickname this particular store has made up for all staff due to the orange logo?

Incidentally, is Sainsbury's the only supermarket to have the nice conveyor belt self-service checkouts, which makes it acceptable to take a trolley to a self-service till? It works quite well, although the conveyor belt is split into two sections, with the first presumably weighing the item, as after scanning an item there is a full screen 'place the item on the belt' prompt that stops you from scanning. There's also a bit of a clunky delay between the first belt stopping and the second starting, and you can't scan multiple items quickly as if you scan one item it won't scan another until the belt has taken it away - if the first belt does weigh the item it'd be better if it was cumulative, adding up the weight as you scan and deducting the respective item weight as it moves off of the belt, although I can see that being susceptible to fraud.

[cdd]

Incidentally, is Sainsbury's the only supermarket to have the nice conveyor belt self-service checkouts, which makes it acceptable to take a trolley to a self-service till? It works quite well, although the conveyor belt is split into two sections, with the first presumably weighing the item, as after scanning an item there is a full screen 'place the item on the belt' prompt that stops you from scanning. There's also a bit of a clunky delay between the first belt stopping and the second starting, and you can't scan multiple items quickly as if you scan one item it won't scan another until the belt has taken it away - if the first belt does weigh the item it'd be better if it was cumulative, adding up the weight as you scan and deducting the respective item weight as it moves off of the belt, although I can see that being susceptible to fraud.

Tesco Tooley St seems to be taking the opposite approach, with self check out machines that do literally no weight verification whatsoever.

The right approach in my opinion, since if someone is going to brazenly steal something, a set of scales isn't going to act as much of a deterrent - and they save a lot of time.

[Alexia]

Tesco Tooley St seems to be taking the opposite approach, with self check out machines that do literally no weight verification whatsoever.

The right approach in my opinion, since if someone is going to brazenly steal something, a set of scales isn't going to act as much of a deterrent - and they save a lot of time.

Isn't the bagging area a set of scales too? In other words, if you scan a Pain Au Chocolat, but put a melon on the tray, doesn't it, you know, say "Verification Needed"?

[Martin Phillp]

Is this Tesco in question using the new Self Checkouts which use the minimum amount of space possible?

The smaller tills are designed for the 'meal deal' crowd with smaller carrier bags, these have recently been added to Tesco Surrey Quays in addition to the larger tills.