Community supermarket cashier - scale-label interception checklist: five checks in five seconds before scanning any weighed item, because the wrong-PLU expensive vegetable sold cheap, the overnight label, and the weight that never got tared all slip through the register

You are a cashier trainer for a community
supermarket. Build a "scale-label interception
checklist" to sit beside the register, used in
the five seconds before scanning any weighed
item. It must be small, fast, and decidable -
every item answerable yes or no.

Five intercepts, ordered by how often they
happen (do not reorder):

1. Does the item match the label?
   Check: the label's product name against the
   item in hand
   Stop: any mismatch means re-weigh. Specials
   day is the classic source - the promo pile
   sits flush against the regular-price pile

2. Is the price direction right?
   Check: the label's unit price against today's
   shelf sign for that item
   Stop both directions:
   - Expensive item rung at a cheap PLU: the
     store bleeds daily and nobody notices
   - Cheap item rung at an expensive PLU: the
     customer reads the receipt at home and
     it becomes a complaint
   Rule: any mismatch with the shelf sign stops
   the scan. "Close enough" is not a category

3. Was the label printed today?
   Check: date and time on the label
   Stop: labels older than [overnight limit]
   hours get re-weighed - overnight the price
   may have changed and the item itself may
   have aged past its window

4. Is the weight plausible?
   Check: the item in hand against the weight
   on the label
   Stop: a handful of greens labeled in
   kilograms, a fish clearly lighter than the
   label - usually the previous customer's item
   was never cleared, or the tare was never set
   Rule: obviously off, stop; unsure, set it on
   the scale for three seconds

5. One label, one item?
   Check: two different goods sharing one label
   (bundled promo packs excepted)
   Stop: always separate and re-weigh

For each intercept output three lines: what to
check (one sentence) / what to say when it fires
(speakable in front of the customer) / what
happens next (who to call for the re-weigh, and
what counts as too long a wait).

Constraints:
- Cashier-plain language throughout; "price
  integrity framework" and similar vocabulary
  are banned
- No "stay alert" requirements - the checklist
  IS the alertness, that is its whole job
- No invented error-rate statistics; the
  checklist needs compliance, not fear
- Intercept 2 may not read "watch for price
  anomalies" - "anomaly" is undecidable,
  "differs from the shelf sign" is decidable
- No service slogans at the end

Why it is written this way

The register is the only interception point left for scale-label errors: the scale station produces them invisibly, the customer never sees them, and the one second a human being sees both label and item together is the scan. So the checklist is positioned as the last gate, and all five checks are built as five-second visual comparisons - name, direction, date, weight, one-to-one - none of which require the cashier to memorize a price file.

Intercept 2 gets the most ink because it cuts both ways while human nature only cuts one: cashiers catch the errors that hurt the customer (the overcharge) because the complaint lands on them, and wave through the ones that hurt the store (the cheap ring) because nobody complains about being undercharged. Writing both directions side by side with a zero-discretion line - "differs from the shelf sign, period" - closes the one loophole where "a few cents, let it go" would quietly gut the whole checklist.

The overnight limit stays a variable because stores differ: a store that clears its weighed goods daily cannot sell a four-hour-old label, while a store with two-day packaged produce has a different line. The weight check ends with "unsure, put it back on the scale" because a zero-cost fallback beats a judgment call - a re-weigh takes three seconds and catches an untared bag every time, arithmetic no training session needs to teach.

Variables