Costco shoppers furious over new membership scanners cancel subscriptions in protest

Costco's new membership policy seems to be a deal breaker for some as customers are reportedly canceling their subscriptions in protest of the new scanning mandate and the double verification .

The new devices are manned by employees and scans customers' membership cards in order to mitigate subscription sharing , a problem the company has been fighting for a bit over a year. The new machinery has been seen in action online in viral videos on Facebook. The scanner is on a pole that seems to be connected to a tablet.

Once the customer scans their card, a photo registered with the account appears before the employee for extra verification. A year ago, shoppers would simply flash their cards to employees for entry. They can also scan a digital copy of their card.

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The store worker simply stands and watches the opposite screen with no other duties or distractions, making the process pretty fool-proof in terms of fishing out sharers. The new policy has expectedly gotten some angry, prompting some customers to stop shopping at the warehouse altogether. “I canceled my membership over this nonsense,” one shopper claimed.

She said the company was treating its customers like criminals. Others complained about having to scan their card twice, once to get into the store and another after they pay for their groceries. “I don't get it. It's not like people can buy anything once they get to the cashier,” another wrote.

“I don’t understand this. Still have an employee standing there,” a shopper pointed out. “It’s like self-checkout and three employees standing around watching you. America has jumped the shark.”

“I still think it’s pointless to have someone standing there checking cards upon entry,” one said. “You can’t check out without a membership card, so it seems redundant to have someone standing at the door checking.” Costco enthusiasts Ken Lofton speculated the new procedure will slow things down.

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"I can see that slowing down people getting in," he told ABC affiliate KABC. "It's not just a flash of a card anymore." Company CEO Ron Vachris was unmoved by customer gripes, claiming the new scanners are achieving the opposite. "They're speeding up our registers significantly when we get all the scanning and memberships verified at the front door," he said in an earnings call transcript seen by The Motley Fool.

Wholesale vets made a suggestion for compromise: implement the same scan-and-go technology as Sam's Club, which cuts time spent waiting in checkout lines. Additionally, members at Sam's can even pay for groceries without having to interact with a worker through the app.