Posted on 03/18/2024 8:17:28 PM PDT by Morgana
They were introduced as a way to cut lines, boost efficiency in store and reduce staffing numbers - and boomed in popularity during the Covid-19 pandemic.
But is the self checkout falling out of favor with big-name retailers?
In recent weeks, Dollar General, Target and Walmart have all announced sweeping changes to automated registers in stores across the US.
Experts say the rollback is linked, mostly, to fears around theft - as it is much easier for customers to shoplift items at the self checkout rather than a checkout with a cashier.
But retailers say they are also trying to provide a better shopping experience for customers by imposing limits on self checkout, making the process quicker and easier.
ast week, Dollar General announced it was pulling self checkout stands entirely from 300 of its stores with the highest level of shoplifting and mis-scanned items.
In 9,000 other locations it said it is converting some of its self checkout registers to regular cashier checkouts, and limiting self checkout purchases to five items or less in a further 4,500 stores.
The company said the changes would help reduce 'shrink'. This is the retail industry jargon for merchandise losses due to theft, damaged items and administrative errors.
'We believe these actions have the potential to have a material and positive impact on shrink,' Dollar General CEO Todd Vasos said on a call with analysts Thursday.
According to a study of retailers in the US, UK and other European countries, stores that had self checkouts had a loss rate of about 4 percent more than the industry average.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...
I'm sure theft is much easier with self checkout
But retailers say they are also trying to provide a better shopping experience for customers by imposing limits on self checkout, making the process quicker and easier.
One of my pet peeves is being stuck behind slow people in self-checkout.
Costco has introduced self checkouts. However, to leave the store, you have to show your sales receipt to a checker who matches the count on the receipt to the count of items in the cart. It’s hard to beat that system, unless one hides lifted items in their coat with deep pockets. However, items at Costco are mostly large bulky items; which are hard to hide in a coat.
Ours allow the sale of alcohol but an employee must verify age.
My Costco does it by having an employee ring up alcohol. My Walmart sends an associate to punch in an age and my grocery store does it remotely. The customer service person minding the self checkout just punches in an age on their connected phone and off you go...pretty much no waiting.
Self checkouts prove cashiers do not need to be trained.
Walmart hires a lot of 18-25 clowns who yell back and forth in conversation or are
bad singers and dancers. I looked at one of the dancers and he stopped.
That’s why it will go RFID - especially on meat
It’s easy to do
I was using the printers 10 years ago
And was programming their predecessors 15 years ago
It’s a ..... Piece of cake 🍰🍰🍰
😬😬😬
dancers eh? At least they’re ready for the next pandemic then. We can expect the tiktoks from them when it arrives.
Because of the shoplifters, my local WalMart has locked up:
Toothbrushes, Feminine hygiene products, Men’s underwear, perfumes, spray paint, some hand tools and much more.
"Futurists" sold that fiction to several large retailers decades ago, with Walmart being the biggest one.
Walmart spent a fortune chasing it and it never came through. It was predicated on RFID tags being attached to every item. The cost of the tags, the cost of affixing them to every item, and of course, dealing with theft from switching them or removing them made even Walmart finally give it up.
That system gets beat all the time. Thieves print their own bar codes, or reattach bar codes from other items with lower prices. The employee checking receipts finds the correct count but doesn't know the prices on to check them.
There are recent articles reporting Walmart is not only making you work for free but you have to pay to use the self checkout. Ah, but you can forgo the charge if you pay for a Walmart Plus membership....
Just like our country, self-checkout requires having a moral population. Otherwise it’s a new iteration of the same old problems.
On recent trips to Walmart, I have had to wait in line of two or three customers waiting for an opening at a self check out. The problem is as noted, some have lots of items that slows down the process.
However with many self check stations, the process without doubt speeds the throughput
The Walmart Plus allows one to ditch Amazon and engage vendors beyond just Walmart.
Ordering online with free delivery is a very good proposition
Checking receipts at the door is part of your contract as a member of Costco.
Walmart and other stores may post someone to check, but you are under no compulsion to stand in line bleating like sheep waiting for the guy to check your receipt. At this point, the items in your cart are you property and the store has no right to search your property.
I just do my best Dionne Warwick imitation. “Walk on by.”
Stevie Wonder could see that one coming.
It doesn’t help that many times a customer will bring a shopping cart with a gazillion items in it to the self checkout lane then spend nearly 30 minutes scanning it all. Those scan and go machines were installed so folks with just a few items could scan and go in just a few moments. Instead you have to wait because people misuse them, and they don’t care how they are inconveniencing other shoppers.
Same thing at our local Walmart supercenter. We have so many self-serv stations now that one doesn’t have to wait very long.
The person that monitors the self-serv takes care of alcohol purchases and special situations.
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