Dulles Airport Surprises Passengers with Facial-Recognition Boarding

Post by phkahler » Tue, Sep 11, 2018, 2:39 PM UTC

mdorazio wrote: post #133

jtbayly wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s not the right comparison. What you want to compare is how long it takes at a staffed queue vs an unstaffed one once you get to the front of the line (for the same purchase). Things might be faster now with the unmanned ones, but the contention is that that’s only because they opened more checkout terminals. Granted, they wouldnt have done that with staffed ones because of the increased expense, but let’s not g…

This seems like a faulty comparison. Space for registers is naturally limited. A single traditional register is replaced by 3 self-checkouts at my local grocery stores. Usually they opt for 6x self checkout replacing two traditional registers, manned by a single employee who can help with problems. In these cases it's not a question of staffing, but of space and the increase in space efficiency.

Post by justwalt » Tue, Sep 11, 2018, 2:43 PM UTC

gambiting wrote: post #96

YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #86

>> “It doesn’t matter,” Maryland resident Kim Meekins said of not being informed ahead of time. “You go to different airports and they do different things depending on their technology. If it’s another safety measure to make sure everyone has a safe flight, I’m all for whatever. I didn’t need to be notified ahead of time.” "I'm all for whatever"! The hell does one engage rationally with that ?

By being so used to the security theatre everywhere that is just doesn't even register anymore. They could start doing automated anal probing at passport gates and at least some part of the population would go "meh, if it makes it safer than I'm all for whatever".

Post by devy » Tue, Sep 11, 2018, 2:47 PM UTC

Post by ambicapter » Tue, Sep 11, 2018, 3:05 PM UTC

Spooky23 wrote: post #132

Groxx wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Per item? Sure. For small numbers of items, counting time spent waiting? Heck no, I regularly get through self-checkout much faster than people who get into a regular queue, in no small part because there's often a few times more self-checkout scanners than there are open checkouts. When you have a full cart or two, the speedier scanning at a traditional checkout pays off. But usually both are available, not just sel…

Checkout queue optimization at a supermarket is pretty easy. It's all about time per scan. A good cashier (60-70 scans per minute) can be something like 50% more productive due to scan time savings. A slow cashier (10 scans per minute) is a drag. Self-checkout is all about cutting labor hours, period. It is both slower and leads to much higher shrink (as much as 150% more) than a manned casher. Stores hope to make mo…

Post by mdorazio » Tue, Sep 11, 2018, 3:14 PM UTC

rtkwe wrote: post #137

mdorazio wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This seems like a faulty comparison. Space for registers is naturally limited. A single traditional register is replaced by 3 self-checkouts at my local grocery stores. Usually they opt for 6x self checkout replacing two traditional registers, manned by a single employee who can help with problems. In these cases it's not a question of staffing, but of space and the increase in space efficiency.

As always it depends on what you want to measure. Comparing total checkout time including queuing though for 'speed (items/s)' is going to naturally favor the self-checkout because the choice between normal and self checkout is heavily weighted by the number of items a particular person has. Anecdotally I've never seen anyone go through self checkout with a full cart but see it all the time with the normal registers.…