I broke Giant’s handheld scanner system by only buying two things

Enlarge (credit: Ahold Delhaize)

This is a silly story about the most stupid interaction I have had with a piece of technology that's supposed to make life easier, and it all starts at the grocery store.

The closest supermarket to my house is a Giant (ironically, a medium-sized one). It's nearby, well-stocked, price-competitive, and generally well-run, so my family does most of our grocery shopping there. One major feature for us is the chain's SCAN-IT service: a handheld scanner, or an app you can put on your phone, that allows you to check out and bag your own items as you go. Pretty convenient, as far as it goes, except for one major flaw: the system apparently cannot do basic arithmetic, such as determining that two is in fact less than seven.

Scan-It and the honor system

The Scan-It app is straightforward to use. You load it up on your phone while on the store's Wi-Fi network and point your phone camera at the barcodes on the things you want to buy. The store has scales throughout the produce section where you can weigh your fruit and vegetables and print a label to scan. For loose items such as bagels or muffins, the bakery has centralized barcodes hanging on signs.

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