Tesco is scrapping cash payments on its ‘scan as you shop’ service - and shoppers are furious about it

Have you used the scan as you shop service? (Photo: Shutterstock)Have you used the scan as you shop service? (Photo: Shutterstock)
Have you used the scan as you shop service? (Photo: Shutterstock)

Tesco shoppers have been left furious as the supermarket has announced it is to scrap cash payments on its scan as you shop service.

The change means shoppers will only be able to pay by card if they wish to use the dedicated checkouts in future - much to many people’s dismay.

Card payments only

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The scan as you shop service is exclusive to Tesco Clubcard members and allows shoppers to pack as they go around the store, scanning items with a barcode scanner straight from the shelves.

Once shoppers have scanned everything they want, they then pay for their items at a dedicated scan as you go checkout.

The service is designed to make the whole shopping experience much quicker and easier, but Tesco is now planning to scrap cash payments from the checkout area.

Instead of accepting both cash and card payments, the supermarket has begun notifying customers they will soon no longer be able to pay with notes or coins if they use this scan service.

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Cash payments will no longer be accepted on the service from 13 January (Photo: Shutterstock)

Shoppers’ fury

To notify shoppers of the changes, Tesco has been printing a message on customer receipts, confirming cash payments will no longer be accepted from Monday 13 January.

The message reads: “Scan as you shop is changing. The scan as you shop payment area will only be accepting card.

“Want to pay with cash? You can still do so by using self-service tills or main checkouts. Our colleagues will be able to help or answer any questions."

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The news was posted by one shopper on the Reduce Your Supermarket Spend Facebook group, where equally disgruntled shoppers responded to express their disappointment.

Shoppers wrote: “Feels like people that pay cash are been [sic] punished for paying that way. I for one don’t like using my card unless I really, really have to.”

“Well I’ll be stopping using Tesco’s weekly then.”

“Oh no why? When I do my big shop I always pay cash, always use scan as you shop too as it’s so much easier, I did it yesterday it was fine.”

“Not everyone has a card.”

“Well if they don’t accommodate me I will take my business elsewhere. Sometimes I pay card and sometimes I pay cash - I think it’s important to have the choice."

A way around the changes?

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Despite a flurry of complaints about the impending change, some Tesco shoppers were quick to point out a way to get around it.

The message on the receipt advises shoppers who want to pay with cash to head to the main checkouts or self service tills instead.

While it doesn’t state specifically if this applies to a scan as you go shop, Tesco has confirmed that this is indeed the case.

Instead of going to the scan as you go payment area, shoppers can take their scanned shop to the other store tills where they will be able to pay in cash.

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In response to the outrage from shoppers, Tesco told The Sun: "90 per cent of our scan as you shop customers check-out using card payment.

"So to make it easier and faster for customers, the scan as you shop tills at most of our larger stores will take card payments only, from the 13th January."

This article originally appeared on our sister site, Lancashire Evening Post.