Why on earth is Amanda yelling at us from M&S self-serve tills?
As BGT judge gets £100k to be voice of Marks, infuriated customers ask...
THERE’S something startlingly unexpected in the bagging area and Marks & Spencer’s shoppers are furious.
The high street store chain is facing a flood of complaints after employing Amanda Holden to pre-record the instructions for its self-service checkouts.
Earlier this month, the supermarket’s chiefs replaced the inoffensive voice of the self-service tills with those of the Britain’s Got Talent judge and her co-stars Alesha Dixon and Ant and Dec.
Now, shoppers buying lunch or a ready meal after work have to contend with chirpy greetings from the stars – Amanda’s is described as a hyperactive ‘Hello’ – and instructions from the celebs such as ‘Please scan your first item!’
Despite picking up a rumoured £100,000 for promoting the supermarket, Miss Holden, 48, has provoked the wrath of patrons, many of whom took to social media to describe her new checkout role as ‘annoying’.
Shopper Joe Wheatley tweeted: ‘Just went to get my lunch at M&S. The voice of the machine asking me to scan my first item is Amanda Holden. Think this might just be the worst day of my life.’
Nick Weatherhead from Cambridgeshire said: ‘Why are you inflicting this on me?’, while another claimed it was a ‘ridiculous gimmick & annoying’. Jez Merckel added: ‘Why is Amanda Holden bellowing at everyone from the selfserve till? It’s horrible, turn it off!’
One shopper, Tracey Eckert, complained that hearing Miss Holden’s recorded instructions had prompted her to take her custom elsewhere.
‘Nipped into Wetherby Services Marks & Spencer and Amanda Holden started jabbering on through the automated system,’ she said. ‘As I can’t stand her, I abandoned my purchases and grabbed something from an alternative source.’
Another unhappy shopper in East Sussex complained: ‘So it’s Amanda Holden in the Hastings branch? Oh dearie me. I may have to boycott M&S tomorrow in that case.’
There was equal fury in the Kensington branch of Marks & Spencer in West London yesterday.
‘I find it bonkers. It’s absolutely annoying,’ one customer, who asked not to be named, told The Mail on Sunday. ‘I’m not into celebrities and celebrity culture at all.’ And it’s not only customers who are unimpressed by her appearance at the tills, part of Marks & Spencer’s sponsorship of the new series of the ITV talent show.
One worker, who asked to remain anonymous, said: ‘People have found it really annoying.
‘After a week of work here, it does get to you. The way that they greet you is particularly annoying.
‘Some people like it but some people really don’t.’
Shoppers bristling at the sound of Miss Holden advising ‘Help is on the way!’ will be relieved to know that the changes at the tills will only last until June 3. Last night, a spokesman for Marks & Spencer defended the chain’s decision to recruit Miss Holden, saying: ‘It was supposed to be fun and engaging, and supposed to get customers talking.’
Sharry Cramond, director of food marketing at M&S, put a positive slant on the promotion. She added: ‘Our customers are enjoying the check-out takeover and are loving being told what to do at the till by their favourite celebs.
‘We’re expecting the voiceovers to be heard over 10 million times and would love to know who is proving the most popular with our customers!’