Is Montana Next? Popular Retailers Considers Charging For Self-Checkout.

My mom was a cashier at a local grocery store for most of my childhood. She took great pride in her job, knowing many of her customers by first name. Some of those folks would wait longer than they had to, just so they could go through my mom's lane.

So you can imagine her disdain for self-checkout.

Of course, she wasn't the only one who wasn't a fan of self-checkout. For many Montanans, the idea of scanning our groceries and bagging them ourselves isn't something we're a fan of. Especially, if you have a cart full. However, self-checkout has become the standard across Montana; according to one news report, we might soon be paying to use self-checkout.

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That's right, you might have to pay to do someone else's job. According to a report from a Tennessee TV station, two popular retailers could be considering making the move of charging folks to use their self-checkout services.

Which two retailers are considering such a move?

According to the report from WSMV 4 out of Nashville, both Walmart and Target are looking into the options. The report states that we could see a limit to self-checkout use and there have been reports that multiple Walmarts are shutting down some of the self-checkout lanes and putting up signs saying that those lanes are reserved for "Scan and Go" members, which is a paid subscription.

So, is this heading to Montana? Walmart's corporate offices said that it is up to each Walmart store's manager what they decide to do with their store, so we will have to wait and see.

So what are they replacing those self-checkout lanes with? People. Yep, it seems there's a push to go back to actual humans checking out your groceries and other products and possibly charging you for a subscription to self-checkout. So the question is, would you pay to use self-checkout?

I can see it being convenient if you have just a few items, but I'm not sure I'm willing to pay. I mean, groceries are expensive here in Montana, so why would I want to pay an extra fee to check them out myself?