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The failure of self-checkout technology

bbc.com

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Re: The failure of self-checkout technology

#41

Post by pjmlp »

Faaak wrote: post #30

I really like those that you can find in Switzerland (either in Coop or Migros). The basic assumption is "trust the customer". Thus, the self-checkout devices don't have the annoying "you must weight the article you just scanned". You just scan them one by one, add them to your bag, pay at the end, and that's it. Sometimes (it happens to me around 1/year) you get a random search, which is not that bad as they just ra…

Trust like in Switzerland is a very rare thing in most countries, you will seldom see newspaper stands with money boxes where everyone is expected to take one single paper out and leave the money in the tiny box, anywhere else this would fail.

Re: The failure of self-checkout technology

#42

Post by mewpmewp2 »

Kathula wrote: post #10
transfire wrote: post #3

I love them. How quickly people forget… waiting in line for over 10 minutes wasn’t all that uncommon back it the day. Doesn’t really matter though. The next gen tech is coming soon. You won’t have to scan anymore and theft will be next to impossible.

>theft will be next to impossible This sounds like some tech utopia t thinking. What's gonna stop someone just grabbing something and walking out? The employees?

Maybe a door that will not open.

Although it sounds a bit too much for a store, technically it could be done.

Re: The failure of self-checkout technology

#43

Post by robertlagrant »

> They're not exactly cheap to get into stores: some experts estimate a four-kiosk system can run six figures.

The link the BBC article has to cite this is unavailable, so who knows what it means, but "run six figures" presumably is a little over £100k. That cost, for 4 kiosks, is actually much more reasonable than I expected. Compare that to the salary and other costs of 4 cashiers and that probably pays back extremely quickly.

Re: The failure of self-checkout technology

#44

Post by chippiewill »

mewpmewp2 wrote: post #31
noneeeed wrote: post #9

Curious. Obviously this is just just anecdote, but all the shops I use regularly (in the UK) have been increasing the number of self-checkouts and upgrading the systems. My local Waitrose has stripped out a whole load of basket tills and replaced them with a larger self-checkout area with upgraded hardware that is noticably better/more reliable. Perhaps this is a location or shop specific effect?

Same in my local area. Also I find it very good for my own usage, and there's variance of different self checkout machine systems. One where you use a remote to scan the products as you add them to cart, then just put away the remote. The other one where you scan at the station. I would say I see 5x reduction of actual people working behind the checkout. And I basically rarely wait in queues any longer. I have never…

> I have never witnessed a singular tech failure either.

The newer gen hardware is much better than the old stuff and is now pretty reliable. Some of the older machines were painfully unreliable.

My closest big Sainsburys only just upgraded from the original generation stuff and they perpetually had a quarter of their self checkouts broken for various reasons. I once saw them have a technician out to service all the machines one day, and the very next day 2 of them were already broken.

Re: The failure of self-checkout technology

#45

Post by robocat »

Definitely not failing in New Zealand. More being installed at large retailers all the time. Even smaller grocery stores have them. New Zealand is a high trust society and I haven't yet heard of problems with them.

The User Interface on them is often pretty crappy, but they do work even if you need to get helped sometimes.

I've never been checked, except for the scanner system at pak'n'save where you scan as you pick items into your cart using a handheld scanner and only pay at self-checkout on exit (don't need to scan items on exit).

Re: The failure of self-checkout technology

#46

Post by mbork_pl »

gregoriol wrote: post #12
noneeeed wrote: post #9

Curious. Obviously this is just just anecdote, but all the shops I use regularly (in the UK) have been increasing the number of self-checkouts and upgrading the systems. My local Waitrose has stripped out a whole load of basket tills and replaced them with a larger self-checkout area with upgraded hardware that is noticably better/more reliable. Perhaps this is a location or shop specific effect?

This article looks like written by a 60+ years old: it's definitely not a failure for 30-something technology-able people. It may be complicated for people with habits of cashiers and non-techy, but the near-future is going to be self-checkout. The real future will be no-checkout though: just take the stuff you need and go, shops would be able to detect what you got there and bill you.

Where I often see these things, their UI/UX is horrible. I'm a bit of a gadget-geek and rather a tech-savvy person, and yet I did make mistakes with them and wasted time because of the UI/UX.

> The real future will be no-checkout though: just take the stuff you need and go, shops would be able to detect what you got there and bill you.

I really hope not. That would be a privacy nightmare. And how would I then pay in cash?

Re: The failure of self-checkout technology

#47

Post by baloki »

robertlagrant wrote: post #36
Faaak wrote: post #30

I really like those that you can find in Switzerland (either in Coop or Migros). The basic assumption is "trust the customer". Thus, the self-checkout devices don't have the annoying "you must weight the article you just scanned". You just scan them one by one, add them to your bag, pay at the end, and that's it. Sometimes (it happens to me around 1/year) you get a random search, which is not that bad as they just ra…

Co-op in the UK has that as well. I don't know if it's the same for every area, but the one near friends of ours that we pop into on the way to theirs just has a scanner.

They also run facial recognition on anyone who uses them though :/

This article mentions the south of England but they’ve rolled it out country-wide since:

https://www.wired.co.uk/article/coop-facial-recognition

Re: The failure of self-checkout technology

#48

Post by ssss11 »

Sorry I didn’t read the article. I will vent though.

I’m not going to go on about the surveillance tech used in Australia as part of the self check outs but here are a few gripes, the problem is a lack of trust of the customers.

1. You have to tell it you have bags (fine) then it seems if you have lots of bags on the platform (or bags with items in them?) you have to wait for an attendant to check you’re not doing something dodgy

2. If you have other stuff in the trolley, say, your handbag or bags from other stores, or you put the grocery bags back in the trolley before you pay, you have to wait for an attendant to check you’re not doing something dodgy

3. There are other inexplicable reasons the system gets locked up and needs an attendant, I haven’t found rhyme or reason to some of them. I have though seen the attendant required to review and ‘Ok’ photos of stuff I’ve scanned and put in the bag.

Re: The failure of self-checkout technology

#49

Post by noirscape »

transfire wrote: post #3

I love them. How quickly people forget… waiting in line for over 10 minutes wasn’t all that uncommon back it the day. Doesn’t really matter though. The next gen tech is coming soon. You won’t have to scan anymore and theft will be next to impossible.

Auto-payment stuff has been tried before in some places, but it's largely a failure. It's too prone to generate false positives in both directions (not detecting purchased goods and the usual rigmarole of failing to properly identify a customer because facial recognition tech isn't that good).

Self-checkout seems to be the happy middle ground where the lost turnover/angry number of customers is reasonable enough for it to be possible.

People really don't like "computer says no" when their money is involved and that's the barrier you need to clear before auto-checkout is a thing.

Re: The failure of self-checkout technology

#50

Post by rimeice »

Faaak wrote: post #30

I really like those that you can find in Switzerland (either in Coop or Migros). The basic assumption is "trust the customer". Thus, the self-checkout devices don't have the annoying "you must weight the article you just scanned". You just scan them one by one, add them to your bag, pay at the end, and that's it. Sometimes (it happens to me around 1/year) you get a random search, which is not that bad as they just ra…

Agree, the experience could be _signiifcantly_ improved with this assumption of user behaviour. Would be interesting to do a study to see how many people acutally take advantage of the "non weighing" systems.
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