Grocery shopping has always been an adventure for us and when the kids were young that was our date night and when they added the excitement of scanning the stuff ourselves it became a game (again, we're aware that we're weird!)
We used to spend hours at bookstores on date nights, skipped dinner out , went out for coffee and bought books instead. Loved it.
We use them for all of our shopping, small and large trips, even the massive pre-Christmas ones, and never have any trouble paying with any method, some gift cards don't scan properly but just hit the little button to call the cashier over & poof, it's fixed! Sobey's is my FAVOURITE because you scan your AM card first and you know immediately if the bonus offers have worked or not and the one we use even says the price of everything you scan. It even takes your coupons!
Ahh, love this idea of scanning am card first so you can watch for your points. You can do the same at a regular checkout but I never think to purposely have it scanned first. I will try to remember next time.