Tesco Tooley Street New Tills

They are thinking of making Sainsbugs in Bermondsey Square totally self-service, too - not that I ever do a major shop there. Too small, thus poor selection and very expensive.

I fully agree with the last three contributors - and also about the increase in prices.

When they opened, 15 months ago, I found it extremely handy to do at least half my weekly shop there. I would go off-peak, for obvious reasons. Then they stopped opening the two large tills off peak - eventually losing one completely and now none.

Clearly, their main target is the 'office crowd' and not the local residents.

I, too, hate OKR - so back to Surrey Quays.....or, perhaps, finally to Waitrose, over Tower Bridge. Shame, really.

Hi all,

Further to my previous post I just wanted to let you know that the new checkout counter I mentioned was installed overnight last night so our manned tills are now more or less as we want them. You will see that each till has space for a basket or trolley so hopefully it should be much more apparent that the manned tills are still there and open for business.

beetroot wrote:

Is there any explanation for the massive rise in prices?

I can't really offer any useful insight into that from a store level as pricing is set centrally and we have very limited control over it locally. That said, we want to offer good value for money and for our prices to be competitive, so it's concerning if you don't feel this is the case. I've recorded your question as a piece of customer feedback (as if you'd spoken to me in-store about it); also, our team at @uktesco on Twitter may be able to offer some thoughts.

connie wrote:

Tesco seems intent on making the manned tills invisible and impractical so in the end they get rid of all their cashiers. It's not about making the queue go faster, it's about reducing the number of staff.

I've seen this viewpoint expressed a lot, all I can say is that in my own experience as an extremely low-ranking member of Tesco management it really isn't the case. Staff numbers in Tooley Street have actually increased during the few months I've been at the store. Self service is there as a choice and it we absolutely don't want to force anyone to use it. In line with this, we haven't changed our 'one in front' promise (if there is more than one person waiting in front of you for the checkouts, we will open another until all checkouts are open) so you should never feel that we are pushing you towards self service by understaffing the manned checkouts.

As far as the changes made in this refit go, we haven't reduced the number of manned tills or made any changes to the arrangements for how we staff them, just made use of the space a bit more efficiently and given every till access to tobacco and lottery.

alang wrote:

This business's response to long queues isn't to have more people on hand to serve them, but squeeze in more tills for their customers to do the work at.

Mostly the times we have long queues are lunchtimes and early evenings when we aim to have all tills open anyway, so the limiting factor is the number of tills rather than the number of staff on hand!

Although we appreciate that self service isn't for everyone, many of our customers are comfortable using it and it does tend to be where the largest queues build up at busy periods, so increasing the number of tills available there is likely to make the biggest difference to queueing times. That, at least, is my understanding of the thinking behind the changes.

Hope these thoughts are helpful, can I stress once again that I'm not writing in any official capacity but hoping it's useful to share how we as a team in-store are experiencing these changes.

Thanks Nicholas for your lengthy reply to our concerns. I will go at lunchtime and see how it goes (Monday is the worst day).
I have another question. Could you advise why the ground floor area is not used at all? It seems like wasted space that could be useful with tables and chairs for example (or for the lottery/tabacco counter).

Connie - the ground floor is going to be a Harris + Hoole coffee shop

connie wrote:

I will go at lunchtime and see how it goes (Monday is the worst day).

Great! I would be interested to know what your thoughts were after your visit.

Quote:

I have another question. Could you advise why the ground floor area is not used at all? It seems like wasted space that could be useful with tables and chairs for example (or for the lottery/tabacco counter).

I'm not sure why the foyer was left as open space in the original design (although I do think not having lots of sales floor stuff up there makes entering the store a bit less overwhelming). In the refit the left-hand side of the foyer as you enter the store is being converted into a Harris + Hoole coffee shop which is replacing the Costa vending machine we used to have.

Best wishes,

N.

As a result of Nicholas' post, I popped in a couple of hours ago to see whether things had improved. In my opinion, they haven't.

I had to smile though; there was a queue of about 6 people who were preferring to queue for the manned checkout counter, an exasperated customer looking around for help because their self service till wasn't working, another customer complaining about something to one of the attendants supervising the self service tills, and...guess what...loads of empty self service tills.

Of course, I accept I might have just turned up at a quiet time of the day and that Tesco consider these "battery hen" style mini-tills a massive success for the sandwich buyers of SE1... however,though others might disagree, I think the management have got this new till layout all wrong and I'm not sure its possible to have a pleasant shopping experience there anymore.

Anyway, I turned around and left without buying anything and spent £20.72 on todays shopping at Sainsburys instead. (Sorry Nicholas)

I wonder if the suits ARE watching this carefully.... and even if they are, whether they care?

Richard P wrote:

As a result of Nicholas' post, I popped in a couple of hours ago to see whether things had improved. In my opinion, they haven't.

Hi Richard. Thanks at least for trying us again! I'm sorry you were still disappointed. I understand that the slimline tills are still being reviewed so there may still be some developments there that will be of use to you -- I'll let you know as soon as I know anything is confirmed.

Best wishes,

N.

However you feel about Tesco, I'd like to thank Nicholas for being on hand to respond directly to customer feedback, makes a change from the usual 'Just fill this in', it's appreciated.

Tolstoy wrote:

However you feel about Tesco, I'd like to thank Nicholas for being on hand to respond directly to customer feedback, makes a change from the usual 'Just fill this in', it's appreciated.

Tolstoy beat me to it; I have been following this discussion and I am impressed by Nicholas' constructive and engaged contribution.

Thanks Nicholas - I like to think that it wouldn't dent profits too much to re-install maybe one line of "old style" tills so that everyone is catered for?

As per the previous posts - I totally agree. Regardless of the outcome, Nicholas' feedback has been excellent. I hope the suits are watching that!