Saturday notes from a grocer queue in Shah Alam

Supermarket shelves packed with dry goods along a narrow aisle

The grocer sits a short drive from our desk at Tadisma Business Avenue. On Saturdays the door looks calm because the queue is not at the door. It folds left into the rice bay, then right again along the freezer, so a manager standing by the fruit still thinks two tills are enough.

Nurul and Farah timed from eleven to one. Wait before the first scan ate more minutes than the PIN pad, the QR, or the cash drawer. Cashiers were fast. The line was simply longer than the floor plan admitted, and a promotional pallet narrowed the approach so people hesitated before joining.

Tender mix that window: cash, then card, then DuitNow QR. Wallet taps were rare. The owner had been told to ‘push QR’ on posters above the till. The posters faced the cashier. Shoppers in the rice bay could not read them.

We did not tell them to open a third till for every Saturday. We did tell them to move the pallet, to put one small sign at the fold of the line, and to treat the rice bay as part of the checkout, because that is where people were already standing.

Queue timing is dull work on purpose. You watch the same metre of floor until the store’s own shape becomes obvious. If your Saturday line in Shah Alam disappears around a corner, time that corner. The till is often not the delay.

Ask us onto your floor if a similar stall is happening at your till or in your cart.