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The failure of self-checkout technology

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Re: The failure of self-checkout technology

#351

Post by mc32 »

CM30 wrote: post #248

It feels like almost all the issues with self-checkout technology come from the attempts to minimise shoplifting, which don't even seem that effective at doing that. In theory, a system that let you scan products the same way checkout staff do without any weight checks or bagging area rules or other interruptions would be incredibly efficient. Especially if you could do things like scan the same product multiple time…

Self-checkout relies on high trust. There are places where this works and shrinkage is manageable, but that seems to be higher income areas.

So it works in Norway or Japan, but put this in Indonesia or Honduras or even in small city USA and it’ll run into problems. It can work in areas of larger cities where most of the clientele are high income, but it’s bound to fail in most other areas.

Re: The failure of self-checkout technology

#352

Post by KptMarchewa »

GrumpySloth wrote: post #331
KptMarchewa wrote: post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All Lidls in Poland already have self checkout, and it's one of the best implementations I've seen, as expected from Lidl.

Except the speaker screams at you, very loud. The best ones I’ve used are at Rossmann. Completely silent, and don’t measure the weight of anything, so you never get to the “sorry, your shopping’s weight is off by 1g” part. The UI is also very efficient, where in Carrefour they seem to periodically add more popups to the process.

Still better than Biedronka ones.

I'm usually using ANC headphones when shopping, so it's not a big deal for me, I dislike all the usual peeping, squeaking and alert bells in contemporary shopping environment.

>The best ones I’ve used are at Rossmann. Completely silent, and don’t measure the weight of anything, so you never get to the “sorry, your shopping’s weight is off by 1g” part.

Agreed, but this is due to specific requirements of a drugstore - measuring weight is meaningless if you have 100s of nail polishes or toothpastes weighing pretty much the same.

Re: The failure of self-checkout technology

#353

Post by spdif899 »

bombcar wrote: post #311
goosedragons wrote: post #267

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's 100% that. One of the grocery stores near me has no weight checks or baggage area rules. I can easily bag my groceries into my backpack directly, at other stores my backpack is too heavy to be considered my bag and so if I want to do that the attendent has to override it so I never bother. Then since there's no weight check you never run into the "unexpected item in bagging area" or "please place item in bagging…

It’s strange here. The Walmart is tuned quite lax, very forgiving. The local grocery store screams for an attendant if a fruit fly farts on the scale.

In my area there are two grocery chains across the street from one another.

One has a self checkout that lets you bag your items however you want, has a wireless scanner for scanning at your convenience, and just has one polite attendant monitoring to help with issues or enter birthdate for alcohol.

The other has one that screams at you about unidentified items in the bagging area if you so much as look in its direction, and cameras jammed in your face with a screen wrapped in white LEDs to make it obvious you're being recorded.

Guess where I prefer to shop :-)

Re: The failure of self-checkout technology

#354

Post by aceki »

_heimdall wrote: post #337
hackan wrote: post #92

I love self-checkout, honestly. Machines need to improve, but still. There's a store here where u simply DROP all items in the self-checkout basket, and it automatically computes everything! I suspect it uses NFC or similar, but it works, and its wonderful, simply drop everything in! And wait, there's more: did I say drop everything in? I meant, the bag you are using to hold everything? just put it in that basket, in…

That sure is a lot of single use NFC tags though. These kinds of convenience features are almost never aligned with the strong passion many today have for reducing waste and helping lower our environmental impact.

RFID tags are already used for inventory management for some items/retailers. A system like this can just piggyback on the existing tags.

Re: The failure of self-checkout technology

#356

Post by Thlom »

thinker5555 wrote: post #329
CM30 wrote: post #248

It feels like almost all the issues with self-checkout technology come from the attempts to minimise shoplifting, which don't even seem that effective at doing that. In theory, a system that let you scan products the same way checkout staff do without any weight checks or bagging area rules or other interruptions would be incredibly efficient. Especially if you could do things like scan the same product multiple time…

> It feels like almost all the issues with self-checkout technology come from the attempts to minimise shoplifting, which don't even seem that effective at doing that. Agreed. And in some cases the issues almost feel like they're on purpose in order to drive people away from using the self checkouts. For example, when I use self checkout at my local grocery store, I have to hit a button to tell it I want to use my ow…

The first self-checkouts in Norway around 10 years ago implemented this weight thing to prevent shoplifting, but they dropped it pretty quick. Now there's just random spot checks (which can be frustrating enough when it happens). I encountered the weight again last year when vacationing in Denmark. So frustrating.

Re: The failure of self-checkout technology

#357

Post by hasbot »

Aldi recently switched to self-checkout which is a huge improvement. Aldi had always skimped on cashiers so there was always a line. Now that I'm scanning products myself I see that Aldi products have two large UPC on each box which is why Aldi cashiers are so fast. All product manufacturers should do the same.

Re: The failure of self-checkout technology

#358

Post by jen20 »

neilalexander wrote: post #304
oytis wrote: post #302

I find self-checkout pretty pleasant to use if implemented correctly. A positive experience was an Ikea store where you just scan everything and walk out with occasional checks by a security guard. Or even better at Decathlon where you don't even need to scan things - you put it in a special box, and the machine recognises them itself. On the opposite side of the spectrum there are machines at supermarkets that try t…

The IKEA implementation is very close to ideal. An actual handheld barcode scanner attached to a long cable that you can move around as needed. Virtually no delay when scanning things. No need to place items on a scale. No need to pick each item up to pass it over an awkward fixed scanning surface. No problem if you want to use your own bags. No problem if you run out of space and need to move items back to the troll…

Agreed it’s very good compared to the incredibly poor systems in most places, but suffers from the same attention problem as other systems - prompts in the middle of the scanning phase (usually the “I promise I’ll attach this to a wall) that should be treasured up for the end of the process.

Of course the scanner doesn’t know this so will happily beep each time as you scan 10 more things that don’t get registered because someone didn’t learn why modals are a bad idea.

Re: The failure of self-checkout technology

#359

Post by teddyh »

When stores near me started to have self-checkouts, I started to use them immediately, and I always preferred them. In the beginning, they had the annoying weight check for every item, but it was mostly fine, and employee interventions were rarely needed, and I don’t recall ever having an employee going through every item; it occasionally happened that one came over, gave my bag a quick glance (not even touching it), and scanned a code on the machine to unlock it and let me go. Also, quite soon, all the stores removed the weight check entirely, and you could just scan all your items and put them in the bag, pay and go. (Just remember to not put away your reciept until after you’ve used it to go through the exit.) It was fine.

Then, all the stores removed the possibility of using cash in the self-checkout, so I stopped using them. I haven’t used them since.

Re: The failure of self-checkout technology

#360

Post by plg94 »

Freak_NL wrote: post #268
alpaca128 wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In theory, a system that let you scan products the same way checkout staff do without any weight checks or bagging area rules or other interruptions would be incredibly efficient How would it be more efficient than a traditional checkout? There's no way the average person can match the speed of a cashier who does that every day, and at least the supermarkets I've visited don't have enough self checkout machines to…

The point is cost savings for the supermarket. That's it. Some customer prefer them, but usually that is the effect of deliberately understaffing the remaining cash registers, or the customer being completely unable or unwilling to interact with strangers. Supermarkets are now grudgingly admitting that self checkout systems cause a significant increase in loss due to theft, but that it is still cheaper than hiring ac…

It depends how the self-checkout is executed. In our one supermarket here in Germany (Globus) each customer gets a mobile scanner unit and you scan each item as you go through the store and put it in your cart. This has multiple advantages: You only have to touch each item once, not three times. You always know the accurate total price – no more counting in your head. And the actual checkout process is just the payment (plus the occasional random spot check), so there's almost never any lines. All in all makes for a much quicker and more relaxed shopping experience.

Unfortunately I don't know any numbers re theft, but it's still running 5 years later. Of course being in a suburban area helps.

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