Tuesday, 19 July 2022

Trolley dash

Good afternoon. I tried to beat the sun this morning and do an early shop. The plan was to go to Home Bargains and stock up on cat food, then go to Aldi to get the fresh food and anything else I needed. Then I remembered that I wanted some more gravel for the seating area in the garden, so I went to B & Q first. The gravel around the edges is looking a bit sparse, some more is needed to tidy it up. First I have to read the instructions on how to use a trolley. 
Four bags at £3.05 each. That will be enough. 
Next stop, Home Bargains. I filled the trolley and went through the checkout. £103.20p. I handed the lady the cash and counted the notes out to her. She had to call a second person to check that the cash was genuine. She got a bit confused with the amount shown on her screen. Apparently when the figures goes over the £100, the receipt cuts out, so the excess has to be re inserted into the computer to register the whole amount. We got there eventually.
Then off to Aldi. I got a bit of a shock to find all the chiller cabinets empty, and notices on every one saying the refrigeration system had broken down. I never expected that. My shopping total here was much reduced over what I would normally spend. I wasn't in the mood after that and left the store. 
The manager was leaving at the same time, so I asked him about the problem. He said he had just finished a 15 hour shift because as soon as they knew the system had broken down last night he had to arrange transport, two articulated refrigerated trucks to come and collect all the stock as they emptied the cabinets. They had to work through the night. It had to be returned to the warehouse, because they have no room in the back to store it. The second truck was just leaving as we spoke.
I asked him what caused the breakdown. He said the refrigeration can only run when the outside temperature is below 30 degrees, once over that the heat had caused them to malfunction. The engineers are working on them to get it sorted. I find this surprising. This store had a refit only a few months ago. All the chiller cabinets are new. 
I could have gone searching in other stores for the things I couldn't buy, but what if they have the same problem. I couldn't be bothered, so I came straight home. It was a relief to get back inside the house. 

Last night I did a Billy walk at 9.30pm. Walking along the edge of a field at that time was very relaxing. I am going nowhere now. The sewing project is coming along really well. 

Thanks for popping in. We'll catch up soon. Toodle pip.   ilona

13 comments:

  1. How strange, I went to Aldi near Manchester this morning at 08.15am and we had the same notices. Ours are open shelves and it affected butter, chilled cooked meat, cheese yogurt and chilled ready meals. I thought it was just ours lol, Tilly

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    1. People are tweeting that the same thing is happening where they are.

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  2. You'd think that with all the predictions of higher temperatures they'd make sure all new chillers/freezers would be built with that in mind. Our local (ish) Aldi store has just had a refit,
    I wonder if that one had problems too? I did our shopping on Sunday to avoid the worst of the heat. Yesterday it was 37° here and today it's 28° , so it's still hot but there's a nice breeze so we've got all the windows and doors open with the cool air blowing through. I bought our cats a large sized cool mat to lie on but they won't have anything to do with it , so I put it under the bedsheet last night and it really did help.
    Liz from Wales xx

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    1. It's not quite so hot today. A bit muggy though. I want to get the gravel out of the car and lay it out on the seating area.

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  3. Good evening from Dublin well this is strange i am not long back from my local Tesco and first thing i noticed all the self service checkouts were blocked off and not working they are beside the entrance to the shop which is in a small mall. Then 2 chilled shelf sections blocked off with signs and staff appeared to be taking stuff off selves and lots of boxes all the floors. This affected mostly meat poutlry chilled food milk butter yogourts etc. I arrivered about 5.30. I was only doing a small shop as it only down the road frome me. I did want yogourt but i can get it again. What is going on? Oh dear now they have safty to get a shopping trolly lmao what next. I have not seen of those signs here yet ahh sure what the uk does Ireland follows. What next, whats dangerous about putting a coin in a trolly and returning it. Another hot upo 24 c but nice cool breaze outside. I have all my windiows open and the cats find shade outside with shrubs under trees etc and i always put water outside. Linda from Dublin.

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  4. 37c today here in the North East. Went to Te5co with daughter tonight and they had lots of empty freezers with notices about the heatwave affecting them!

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    1. We have had many heatwaves in the past this is quite strange why many Supermarkets are having this problems with freezers this year?

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  5. I have since heard that it has affected all supermarket chiller cabinets/shelves as they only work up to 30 degree temperatures.....not much thinking went into that consideration when designing/making. Tilly

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    1. Maybe some adjustments to the systems can be made in the next few days, and we can buy our yoghurt again.

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  6. It seems the fridge fiasco is happening everywhere. Maybe time the engineers upped their game and designed something which can cope. What kind of equipment do they use in other countries which are a lot hotter than here.

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  7. You might have been better off getting a builders bag of gravel for £150 ish. A large part of my back garden is slabbed and gravel, I'm very into low maintenance gardens!. Usually they put it over the side fence, to make it easier for both of us. Mind you I would love to know where all this gravel wanders off to. There must be a Bermuda Triangle for the wretched stuff. lol.

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    1. I only wanted a bit to tidy up the edges. Four bags at £3 each was just right. I don't like to see gravelled driveways where it all ends up on the footpath and road. People could come out with a brush and sweep it all up and put it back where it belongs.

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