California bill limits self-service checkout stations, restricts them to 10 items or fewer
California grocery and drug stores would be prohibited from operating self-service checkout stations without adequate staffing, under a proposed law being considered in Sacramento.
The bill is being championed by organized labor and opposed by business groups.
Under Senate Bill 1446, by Sen. Lola Smallwood-Cuevas, D-Los Angeles, grocery and drug stores would be required to provide at least one cashier-run checkout station, and self-service checkout stations would be limited to no more than two such stations per one employee monitor, who must not have any other duties assigned.
In addition, the bill would require self-service checkout stations to be limited to 10 items or fewer.
The bill also would require stores that are looking to implement new technology that would significantly affect or reduce employee job duties to conduct a study prior to implementation. They would also have to notify and solicit input from employees at least 60 days before drafting the study and to provide employee or collective bargaining representatives with the study at least 60 days before implementation.
The bill is co-sponsored by the California Labor Federation, the Prosecutors Alliance of California and the United Food and Commercial Workers, Western States Council.
The bill’s author said that the intention behind the bill is to reduce retail theft and keep workers safe.
“While it’s crucial to adapt these new technologies, we must protect jobs and ensure worker safety,” Smallwood-Cuevas said.
The senator said that too many lawmakers are focused on being “tough on crime,” but that her bill isn’t about increasing prison time, “but everyone, including retailers, thinking about how we have replaced workers with these machines and then created an environment that’s become more and more unsafe.”
She added that “one worker to 12 machines is unacceptable.”
California Labor Federation boss Lorena Gonzalez Fletcher said that workers have spoken about the need for more staffing to reduce theft and dangerous encounters at their stores.
“Who knows better than the people who are spending the time there every single day,” Gonzalez Fletcher said.
Cristine Soto DeBerry, founder and executive director of the Prosecutors Alliance of California, said that deterrence comes from fear of being caught, not from the harshness of the punishment.
“When we have more workers in stores, theft is decreased,” she said.
The bill is opposed by the California Chamber of Commerce, the California Grocers Association and the California Retailers Association.
CalChamber and the California Retailers Association argued in a letter provided to the Senate Labor, Public Employment and Retirement Committee that the bill “may stifle business growth, innovation, and competitiveness in an increasingly digital economy.”
They argued that the bill would not serve as a theft deterrent, writing that “retail theft committed in stores has been brazenly committed regardless of whether there’s employees staffing checkout lanes or the presence of self checkout lanes. Importantly, many retailers have policies that prevent employees from intervening in theft instances to protect their safety.”
Regarding the limitation of 10 items or fewer at the self-checkout stations, they wrote that “to place this type of restriction in statute opens the door for meaningless litigation and forces retailers to police the number of items going through self-checkout lanes, which could create a point of friction between a customer and a retail employee, something retailers try to avoid.”
The California Grocers Association argued in its own letter that despite claims that self-service checkout stations would lead to a loss of jobs, “that is not the reality.”
“Grocery store operators make sure the workers who, otherwise would have been at the cash register, move to other departments to improve the customer experience,” the group wrote.
The bill was set to be heard by the Senate Appropriations Committee Monday morning.
