Dear Editor,
It never fails to thrill me. It’s erev Shabbos Kodesh and we’re headed off to our favorite kosher supermarket. We walk in and are greeted with the dulcet tones of our melodic Shabbos nigunim over the sound system. This is our music! Our people! Here’s where we belong!
It’s been four years since we made the big move. We left the city during the height of the Covid epidemic, eager to begin the next chapter of our lives. With many thanks to the Almighty, it’s been a positive move on all accounts. How amazed I was when we needed the services of an exterminator to get rid of the carpenter bees in our backyard. The exterminator arrived, crowned with his kippah, obviously one of ours! Then it was time for the piano tuner to tend to my piano, also one of ours! Same with the repairman for the washing machine… And the banker… and the pharmacist… and all the medical professionals. What a thrill!
The 5 Towns is blessed with fabulous rabbanim and rebbetzins, so devoted to their kehillos! Wonderful shuls! No need to worry about finding a minyan of men. Minyanim available around the clock! How reassuring for the gentlemen in our families! We dare not take that for granted. That’s not the case throughout the metropolitan area.
And then we have the absolute treasure of our community, the famed Ohel Sara Amein group, in memory of Sarit Marton, a’h. Hosted so graciously by Mrs. Laurie Marton, orchestrated with such finesse and devotion by Reb. Corinne Fuchs, this Amein group is the source of much inspiration and encouragement. Hosting remarkable speakers on a daily basis as they prepared for the Yamim Noraim, Laurie’s basement practically become our home away from home! And what a lovely, welcoming home it is! It’s a place to connect with lovely, like-minded, growth-oriented women. Torah, avodah, and gemiluth chasadim form the foundation of this group. What a berachah for all the participants! How fortunate we are to have such a valuable resource in our backyard!
Wishing all a year of mazal and berachah! A year of peace and tranquility! May we share only bsurot tovot among all acheinu kol Bais Yisrael. May all be blessed, ad bli dai! And may we all soon find ourselves on the wings of an eagle, being transported to Eretz Yisrael HaKedoshah, where we dwell together G-d willing, b’shalom ub’shalva.
Most sincerely,
Miriam Liebermann
Stores and Errors
Dear Editor,
For as long as I have been a shopper, I have been troubled by the problem of consumers being mistakenly overcharged (or undercharged) at store cash registers. This issue has become more pronounced and localized over the past thirty years, as kosher food stores have grown exponentially, both in physical size and in the number and range of available products. (This issue is unique to food stores, due to the sheer volume of shoppers and the volume of units being bought.)
As an example of this growth, in the 1970s, my local grocer dedicated an area at the back of the store for Pesach products. I do not exaggerate when I say that I was able to stand at the center of that room and reach almost every “dry” Pesach product available! (At the time, many small groceries did not carry meat, fruit, or vegetables, and dairy had its own, refrigerated section, but most other products were at arm’s length.) Today, just the frozen selections alone can take up several aisles in the Pesach section.
And here is where I come to my point. As the number of products (year-round and for Pesach) has multiplied, so has the potential for errors in pricing. There is no doubt that the mistakes, whether on the part of the merchant or the consumer, are unintentional, but they do occur, and they occur frequently.
As an example, I recently bought nectarines at one of our supermarkets. There were two categories of nectarines: one selling for $5.99 a pound and the other for $2.99 (the numbers are illustrative). When I went to the register, my $2.99 nectarines were charged at $5.99. I noted this to the checkout person, and it turned out that both types of nectarines had been stickered with the same product code! Fortunately, I had been observing as my purchases were rung up, but what if I had not? There are doubtless instances when customers are mistakenly overcharged and don’t notice the error.
Another mistake, this one on the consumer’s part, can occur when two grades of the same fruit are placed near one another. These commonly become mixed, and when the consumer picks peaches from the less-expensive bin, it is conceivable that she will mistakenly bag some more expensive ones as well. If the cheaper barcode is rung up, the purchaser will have underpaid.
Decades ago, when shopping at Waldbaum’s (ob’m!), I kept a running tally and found that there was an error (usually overcharging on Waldbaum’s part) with approximately three percent of purchases. If the average buyer brought thirty items to the register (a likely scenario), statistically an error was almost certain to occur with each checkout.
Conversely, I have periodically been undercharged for an item, usually when a cashier “looks up” an item and enters the wrong one. Of course, if I notice the mistake, I insist that it be corrected, but it is likely that I don’t catch every error. (I would much rather overpay than underpay!) There are other scenarios as well wherein an item is overcharged or undercharged.
There is not, in my view, an easy resolution to this conundrum. Store managers are human, and consumers are human, and humans make mistakes. Therefore, I believe that both consumers and store operators should resolve, before every Rosh Hashanah, to forgive any unintentional errors that have occurred in transactions that were conducted over the previous year.
I conclude with a heartfelt prayer that by forgiving these errors, we will incur favor in Hashem’s eyes, and that, in turn, He will forgive our transgressions and grant us all a k’sivah vachasimah tovah and a wonderful 5785.
Avi Goldstein
Far Rockaway, NY