I just dropped my debit card in that crack and it’s my only form of money. They had to take apart the self checkout machine.
Posted Apr 5, 2021, 9:59 PM UTC
3.4K123
Seems like a design flaw
157
Former cashier turned IT turned product designer.
The crack exists because the scanner is also a scale. It has to be physically separated from what is around it in order to work at all.
126
It could still be designed such that the machine can't eat a card.
41
Yes, but that would increase cost and reduce ease of repair significantly, to fix a fairly rare occurrence.
62
Not really. Surely a small plate beneath the crack could allow the scale to move while also catching any cards that slip between the crack before they fall deep into the machine.
6
Just a cheap soft rubber gasket that seats against one side and overlaps on the other would be plenty, wouldn't interfere with the operation of the scale or increase cost by more than a few cents or increase time or difficulty of repair by more than a few seconds.
2
Not necessarily. And if we're flexing credentials I'm an engineer
Edit: Manufacturing Engineer
-47
The scanner/scale is a module supplied by one company while the cabinet is supplied by another. Often the communication between the two companies is limited to two people who know not what their perspective companies do.
2
So, about like my industry... we usually end up with us and another OEM (or several) supplying equipment to distributors, who try to cobble together all the disparate parts for their customers... which works about as well as you'd imagine.
1
From my experience it's really easy to get back. All you have to do is lift out the scale module.
2
Could use rubber gaskets so this would not happen
0
Only if you don't want the scale to work
1
Hmm they should have just been able to print out a replacement card for you in your bank.
-2
I don’t get how. I work in retail management. That plate with the glass there is a scale plate and lifts up for cleaning. At least on ours the void underneath is sealed. If you put your card in that gap you simply lift the scale top flap and get it back, takes literally seconds
106
It’s was like some black magic fuckery. Like it was sucked in. She first lifted that part. No card. Then she opened the door down below and slid out a big part. Still no card. Then asked a guy to come over and further take it apart. Found it in fourth “take apart.” Should have taken a pic of that lol
105
Fair enough must just be a poor design compared to ours.
21
I totally get the skepticism. It was really bizarre how it a) sucked in and b) vanished to a weird spot in the machine. The more life I live, the more I think I could be in a simulation haha. Maybe this is a r/glitchinthematrix
45
Sometimes you just get that one in a million shot.
6
These actually appear to be the newer release 6 self check outs.
2
I was about to post this. I worked in a retail store for six years. This shit happened at least twice a week to me. Three seconds later and you’ve got your card back.
7
If you are going to post something that sucks, post something that no one even imagined could be a thing and will now make countless people be "hyper vigilant "
I know I now, will never be the same.
40
Same here! The lady helping me said “shit!”
Glad I could add some paranoia to your life?
22
You just made me laugh out loud when I needed it most. Thank you twice I guess.
Love your humor, we clearly share that amazing quality!
7
Absolutely! I hope your day gets better :)
6
I 100% thought this was my wife posting this, because she has the same name as OP, and these kinds of things happen to her.
But then I remembered that she's still waiting on her debit card because she already lost it.
13
Hah! Well this particular card has almost made it a year so it’s due to demise.
1
Nelson sound.
12
As someone who worked on NCR and IBM PoS systems many years ago as a tech, this is absolutely not a surprise.
Cash, credit cards, checks, change and countless "wtf is this doing in here?" items like condoms or drugs always end up in the bowels of these machines. And yes, I pocketed the cash found, but only on systems returned to my office. Not an option during field calls.
Glad you got it back though and note it is the responsibility of the retailer to service these systems, not the manufacturer. That liner should have been replaced.
8
Condoms ahaha hopefully still in the wrapper. Another weird thing is there wasn’t anything else in there that I could see...and I was looking pretty close
3
They're generally cleaned out every 3 months or so, but sometimes more frequently when the scale stops working. My guess is that this one has "seen things" by its condition.
And yes, condom was in a wrapper, just weird though.
2
Did patrolling the Mojave make you wish for a nuclear winter?
1
Nice shot.
6
I was behind a lady in line a few years ago that put her money on the belt with the groceries. It got sucked into the machine and she was screaming at the cashier like it was her fault.
5
[removed]
1
Omg! I had my license get lost down the innards of the tube at the CVS drive thru. Was leaving for long road trip the next morning and the pharmacist tech couldn’t get it out. They had to call service but luckily about 5 hours later they called and said the guy got it out.
5
that’s not the credit card slider thingy
4
I work with these (and have had to help with this exact issue) they're actually so easy to open up that its basically a non issue
4
It seemed like it until it wasn’t in the third place we checked
4
It's easy until it actually falls down the crack that you can't access. You can take the top bit off, you can pull out the scale but there's still a stupid crack it can fall into.
2
this is why i use apple pay whenever i can
some of my cards the chips wore out being taken out of my wallet
4
This once happened to the lady in front of me at a regular (non-self checkout) cash register as well. They had to take apart the whole counter and everyone was diverted to a cash register that was closed before.
3
Lordt. At least that didn’t happen!
3
I've done this too! It sucked. They had to call a manager to take it apart.
3
Once I was in my bank ATM and someone on the ATM beside me somehow dropped his card between the ATM crevices.
Luckily it was on commercial time and there were plenty of bank employees there to tell the guy not to worry, that his card would be properly disposed of, and they'd ask a new card for him right away, which would come in 14 days.
dude was full pikachu face. His card was fuckin right there, but for some reason, the ATM aesthetic plastics couldn't be removed.
3
Which crack? I see more than one that could be the culprit
3
I see some change stuck there too. You came out with a profit!
2
Happy Monday
2
If this happened at a price rite in the last week I was behind you in line.
2
In my time worming as a cashier this happened one time. It really takes a special combination of chance and destiny. Some poor lady had hers fall deep in the crack. Like way down there. It was unreachable. I think she ended up cancelling her card.
I was convinced I was going to have to. Just sad that I couldn’t get my bottle of wine
Ooh i feel that pain. I probably would have cried lol
They should have given it to you for free
I dunno what that award means (my first time) but Thankyou.
Thank you for the award!
In all honesty, at that moment, the wine would have been my biggest concern as well.
Well no haram for you
:(
When I used to be a cashier for DG, we had something similar happen. Lady dropped her card not in the machine, but in the tiny sealed space between the register and bagging area. Somehow the card literally found the one spot that wasn't sealed between them and fell all the way to the bottom into the abyss. Literally had the tell the lady to get a new card as it's impossible to get anything that get stuck down there(You'd have to move the entire register area over). Felt bad for he
If you were really "worming" as a cashiere couldn't you wriggle into the crack and retrieve it?
Ha! just saw that unfortunate typo
It genuinely made me giggle. I had some entertaining mental images of a worm cashiere decked out in smock and name tag.
I pictured a cashier on the conveyer doing the worm while co-workers cheered them on and customers stared on horror.
Ncr self serve scale just lifts out easy to reveal all the lost goodies people lose down that crack. Unfortunately it's usually just a whole lot of hair and crumbs
And a sticky penny.