Barcode placement . . . I'm going to harm someone

[ShinyGreenApple]

I'd really love to know what people are thinking when they decide where barcodes on items go. Up until recently, the tags on most clothing items at my store were attached to the tag at the back of the neck on shirts. Apparently some genius has decided they need to be placed in the armpit of the shirts, so that most of the time I end up having to nearly turn the shirt inside out before I can scan it.

On children's skirts and shorts, a sticker is placed on the leg, only the sticker is folded so that the barcode is actually INSIDE the leg of the shorts, and that has to be turned out to scan, too.

Fishing sunglasses - sold in a soft plastic case. Is there a barcode on this case? No. It is attached to the glasses and usually situated so that it's impossible to hit with a scanner and has to be keyed in manually.

Soda/water/large packs of drinks. Now, a lot of companies have wised up and compensated by putting a barcode on almost every side of the package imaginable, which is great. But some will still insist on placing it on the bottom of the product, because of course a logical person will want to pick it up and drag it across the scanner on the counter Same with large bags of pet food. Most have wised up and have several areas to scan, but some still only have one on the bottom of the back side, gah!

Then there are bottled items on which the bottle is so intricately designed with lots of ridges and squiggles in it, which results in wrinkles and squiggles in the barcode. Ohhh, sooooo clever!

And that's not even starting on items that have to have a serial number scanned in order to be sold, and they have half a dozen different barcodes, none of which are labeled to give me any clue which is the actual serial code.

Sorry, but I had to vent about this somewhere. SC's are one thing, but when it's the product itself that's driving me crazy, I can't really do anything about it.

[Lady J'ssem]

THIS!!! This is the bane of my existance as an auditor! I hate scanning clothes cause the barcodes hide, but at least they're light and easy to turn over, most the time..... I HATE HATE HATE HATE looking for barcodes in the OAs I go to, to count. Specially since my team leader always puts me on weedeaters. Those things are murder to count and I always end up almost falling off my ladder while counting them ..... okay I'm done....

[Chromatix]

And heaven forbid anyone wants to wear these clothes out of the store.

[Whiskey]

And heaven forbid anyone wants to wear these clothes out of the store.

O_O

people do this? you know how many people tried on those clothes? How many of them could have any number of... things. I'll try it on quickly, but I'm not wearing it until its washed. The unwashed masses are generally unwashed.

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

I just love it when I get something where part of the barcode is covered up by a seam in the packaging, or it wraps around a corner of the product so it won't scan.

Sorry, did I just say "love"? I meant "abhor with the fury of a million billion trillion blazing suns."

[Geek King]

O_O

people do this? you know how many people tried on those clothes? How many of them could have any number of... things. I'll try it on quickly, but I'm not wearing it until its washed. The unwashed masses are generally unwashed.

It depends. If I'm buying a pair of pants because the computer I was just working on dumped a load of greasy dustbunny nastyness on me*, I have no problems wearing them out. Compared to gunk that leaves grease stains on my pant legs, I only care if I can see blood or smell piss on the new pair.


*Part of my job involves computers in machine shops and maitenance bays. Oil and grease particles make for some nasty dustbunnies, and they can reek sometimes. Not something I want to wear all day.

[ShinyGreenApple]

I've had people wear new clothes out of the store, but usually they're either escorted to a register by someone from apparel or any available employee, or they have the smarts enough to bring me the correct tag and explain they're wearing whatever. In one instance I escorted one of these people. The poor girl was stopping in on her way to work and her pants apparently split wide open in the back.

[zombiequeen]

I've had to wear clothes out of the store once...a bra because mine exploded on the way to my husband's house.
I was sitting in the car, and all of a sudden I heard a snap and my strap came off of my bra. I turned to hubby and said "Store, now!"
Explained what happened to the lady (luckily I had a large hoodie in the car so I put that on over my shirt), showed her the strap that came off, and she helped me out. I had to have someone unclip that security thing though, that was awkward.

[simplyanother]

In addition to making barcodes really hard to scan because of shape, or what ever...there is this tendency to put the barcode on REALLY heavy items, on the freaking bottom. They couldn't stick it on the side?

[wynjara]

One of my favorite placements is right on top- of a messy food item that should not be flipped over. Dunno about other places, but the grocery stores near me don't have the hand-held scanners. I always feel bad making them type in the codes so my pie/chicken/whatever doesn't spill everywhere.

[Chromatix]

Many checkouts over here have two laser scanners - one underneath and one to the side of the channel. The latter should deal with things with the code on top, as long as they're reasonably flat.

But maybe we just pay more attention to ergonomics.

[MoonCat]

I want to know why the people at the library put their little library barcode stickers on the top left corner of the book, right over the beginning of the book synopsis that I want to read! Grrrr.... There is room elsewhere, sometimes even a blank space they could use, but no...right over the printing...

[BrenDAnn]

My pet peeve at the c-store is 6-pack glass bottles of beer. Why the geniuses (and it's every company out there) decided it was a good idea to put the bar code on the BOTTOM of a package of very breakable glass bottles, I don't know. It results in my having to gently lay the 6-pack on its side (I actually tipped and opened a bottle one time doing this) and using the thankfully handheld scanner, then sitting the 6-pack back up. Such a pain in the rear!

[Brojekk]

I just love it when I get something where part of the barcode is covered up by a seam in the packaging, or it wraps around a corner of the product so it won't scan.

Hostess and Drakes snacks do that alot. Stuff like two packs of twinkies for example,sold on a little rack near the SCOs. Many times the cashier has to punch the number in by hand because the UPC is right on the fold and doesn't scan.

[Difdi]

My favorite barcode atrocity is this one brand of pie filling. For aesthetic reasons, they make the barcode lines the same color as the lettering on the label...which is bright red on a white background.

So, along comes a red laser scanner, and it can't see the red barcode at all, because it's exactly the same color as the laser. The scanner just seems a solid red square. It always has to be typed in by hand, because the scanner is unable to see it.