A Taxing Dilemma

The word “employment” seems pretty straightforward, in that in order to be employed by a company a person usually has to be formally hired and paid. But according to some, primarily in certain Facebook groups, it also includes customers who use self-checkout. But, as they are doing the job of a store employee, are they required to report this supplemental employment to the government at tax time?

“Self-checkout is a total scam,” says Walmart customer and Facebook crank Don Levinski. “They’re just trying to get you to do their employees’ job for them! I don’t work there, I shouldn’t have to ring myself out!”

Levinski is the creator of a Facebook group called Check THIS Out with a picture of a middle finger as the group’s avatar, presumably what you’re meant to be checking out.

“They just don’t want to have to pay people to work the registers anymore,” continues Levinski. “They’re cutting their staff, putting the labor onto us, and pocketing the wages!”

While some, especially those who research their claims before spouting off on social media, would argue that those jobs have just shifted to other areas of the store such as stocking, merchandising, and pushing curbside orders, groups like Check THIS Out and curmudgeonly windbags in general are fighting against retail automation because, well, they just kind of want to be served. And this year, Levinski has a plan to make his point crystal clear.

“They want me to do their staff’s job for them?” asks Levinski rhetorically. “Fine! Then they owe me a motherfrickin’ tax form!”

And he wasn’t joking. Chuck Durante, general manager of a nearby Walmart, received a request to provide Levinski with a W-2 for the work he’d done on the store’s self-checkout.

“I thought it was some kind of joke,” says Durante. “It’s clearly meant to look official but made by someone who has no idea what a legal document would look like.”

Durante adds that he has no intention of providing Levinski with a W-2.

“The whole thing is utterly bizarre,” he says. “The guy doesn't work here. We never paid him. Why does he think we’re required to provide him with tax forms claiming he did?”

“Because frig ‘em, that’s why!” exclaims Levinski, demonstrating what kind of delicate cupcakes we’re dealing with here.

Unbeknownst to Durante and store managers everywhere, crotchety old Don Levinski was just the beginning as several members of Check THIS Out and adjacent groups were gearing up to do exactly the same.

“I don’t really mind the self-checkout,” says Paula Short, “I’m just afraid the extra work is going to push me into a higher tax bracket.”

“I refuse to perjure myself,” says Tina Frenel, who has sent several similar requests to Kroger, “so when the IRS asks what I’ve been doing for work all year you can bet your sweet bippy I’ll be writing in ‘part time cashier’!”

“If Aldi thinks I’m going to bag my own shit,” says Frank Kimmel, “then they better make with the proof of employment. And you better believe I’m claiming the quarter it costs to take a cart as a business expense!”

When told he can just return the cart to get his quarter back, Kimmel stated “That’s their job, not mine!”.

To get a sense of exactly what the Check THIS Out members could possibly gain from this action we spoke to accountant and tax expert Roberta Cannon.

“Okay, I still don’t really understand what they’re doing,” says Cannon after the third time we tried to explain the group’s reasoning. “There’s no income to report, so there’s nothing to claim. And even if there were, they’d owe taxes on it. It almost sounds like they’re taking the dumbest route possible to give the government money it’s not entitled to.”

“That’s not the point,” says Levinski when confronted with Cannon’s assertion. “The point is… like, we don’t work for them, but they want us to do their job, so like, that’s bullshit!”

Okay, I don’t think he even knows what his own point is.

“Maybe,” suggests Levinski, “we can claim all the items we ‘mis-ring’ as income.”

“Okay,” says Cannon, “that would be theft and, oddly enough, yes, you are legally obligated to claim it as income, but the entity being robbed is under no obligation to provide tax documentation.”

Wow! You learn something new every day!

“Really,” Cannon concludes, “if their claim is they haven’t been paid for work they’ve done then that’s a problem for the Department of Labor and not the IRS.”

We have chosen not to share that fact with the members of Check THIS Out.

For now, the requests for W-2s have fallen on confused and annoyed ears.

“Corporate says to ignore it,” says Durante, “That there’s no legal precedent that says a self-checkout user is a store employee. Frankly, it’s stupid I even had to bring this to them.”

“It’s pretty insulting,” says Walmart employee Jennifer Tenelli. “They come in here, make a mess, treat us like shit, and then think they have the right to say they’re one of us just because they scanned their own shit? Sorry, my sympathy for these people died the first time I had to sniff out two pounds of ground beef stuck behind the Fisher-Price crap in the kids’ department.”

“It’s weird,” adds Durante, “that they’d be okay with having to figure out and file their own taxes, essentially doing the IRS’s job for them, but draw the line at self-checkout.”

The claims of Don Levinski and his Check THIS Out cohorts may just be theater for the sake of making a point, as stupid as that point may be. They may also, however, be legitimate, in which case we will send our condolences to all the confused tax return preparers and IRS agents when the onus of dealing with these idiots falls to them. Godspeed.

UPDATE:

Intuit, owner of the TurboTax software, has recently learned of these shenanigans and is currently lobbying congress to require retailers to provide tax forms to any customer using self-check, bagging their own groceries, or returning their cart. They promise to “persuade” Congress into making the process of filing such claims “mandatory” and “complicated as hell”. The self-checkout add-on to the TurboTax software is expected to retail at $79.99. If you buy it in-store, we suggest going to an actual cashier.