6 ms·

Self checkout is a better customer experience for me personally.

babypuncher 3y ago
I hate it, especially for large trips to the store. The scale freaks out too often after I scan an item and put it on the bed, because the weight is slightly off for whatever reason. Then I have to stop scanning and wait for an employee to come over and scan their badge to authorize the sale. I've gone back to just waiting in line at the standard checkout unless I have < 5 items in my cart.
ska 3y ago
I've never experienced one reliable enough for this to be true (for me).
- CodeWriter23 3y ago
  Try the ones at Home Depot. Pretty sure they developed it in-house. It may not prevent loss but from a customer experience, a good barcode scanning gun and legible barcodes is about as friction free as it gets.
  - kjkjadksj 3y ago
    Home depot is so overengineered. They are using 24” high res touchscreen pcs with an i7 to just run self checkout. Whoever locked in that contract must be pretty pleased.
    - Dylan16807 3y ago
      A couple hundred dollars is nothing compared to the costs surrounding that PC. Compared to how often systems like that get underbuilt and laggy, using an i7 is a good choice.
      - kjkjadksj 3y ago
        Yeah but its self checkout. Self checkout had no lag when it came out like 15 years ago. What did the engineers do to their codebase to require a modern i7, I wonder?
        CodeWriter23 3y ago
        Every other checkout I’ve used has lag time after the scan and until the scale settles. Some even have visual feedback that indicates a busy status during this repeating part of the checkout process. Not to mention the human lag time of moving the product to the scale. There is no scale on the Home Depot units. You can scan as fast as the scan gun accepts scans. I’ve scanned 2-3 items per second with these. Using an I7 is a move to future proof. These units will likely be in service 10, maybe 15 years from now.
        kjkjadksj 3y ago
        I am sure they are on a three year replacement cycle like every other piece of enterprise compute. Home depot is also not the only place to do fast scanning. Grocers have always been able to scan instantly as long as I’ve been alive at least.
- filoleg 3y ago
  Well, have you tried the one at Amazon Go stores? I've been using those once every month or so, since the year the very first one opened in Seattle, and not once have I had any issues at all. It was truly fantastic, especially since the app would notify me afterwards how long I spent at the store, and seeing that number always made me feel good. TLDR on this: my average shopping experience from the moment I entered the store to the moment I left took around 3-4 minutes, with plenty of them being under a minute long.
- kaashif 3y ago
  I've never experienced any problems with the ones that don't weigh anything. The weighing ones get it wrong often enough to be annoying. If my closest grocery store used weighing self checkouts, I'd be much more annoyed on a regular basis.
  - ska 3y ago
    Yes this may be the deciding line.
- grumple 3y ago
  This surprises me. I regularly get in line and fully complete self-checkout before anyone who was there when I started scanning, even though I'm typically checking out with more items. What's causing the struggle? Every one of these works the same at every store - scan barcode, place item on the weight plate. Repeat. Press pay button, pay with card, whatever, tap/insert.
  - ska 3y ago
    > scan barcode, place item on the weight plate. Repeat. Press pay button, pay with card, whatever, tap/insert. scan barcode, place item on plate mostly works except when barcode is crumpled or something. without barcodes it's a more of a crapshoot. Usually more than 1/2 of my basket doesn't have a barcode (fresh produce, etc.) Maybe the ones near me are just too sensitive to weight variations. Oh and one of them really loves to scan a points card 2x, then try an apply the second read as a product and fail. Every time the machine gets confused, you have to wait for an attendant. All things being equal, the cashiers are faster than self scan. If the lineup for cashiers is longer, it can still be faster, but otherwise it's slower in my experience.
lm28469 3y ago
At least where I live it's a nightmare. Instead of having someone work as a cashier and weight my veggies I now have to weight my veggies myself under the supervision of a worker who's only job is to supervise a machine that is buggy enough to need human intervention for every other client. It only serves the shop owner because he can have a single drone operating a few self checkout machines instead of a single line, but is that a net positive for society ? doubt, going to a supermarket is alienating enough, we didn't have to make it worse. And of course they had to add a gate so now you can't even leave the shop without showing the receipt, when you don't find what you want to buy you have to call and wait for an adult to allow you to leave the premise like you're a fucking toddler getting out of the playground area.

I hate it, especially for large trips to the store. The scale freaks out too often after I scan an item and put it on the bed, because the weight is slightly off for whatever reason. Then I have to stop scanning and wait for an employee to come over and scan their badge to authorize the sale. I've gone back to just waiting in line at the standard checkout unless I have < 5 items in my cart.

ska 3y ago

I've never experienced one reliable enough for this to be true (for me).

CodeWriter23 3y ago
Try the ones at Home Depot. Pretty sure they developed it in-house. It may not prevent loss but from a customer experience, a good barcode scanning gun and legible barcodes is about as friction free as it gets.
- kjkjadksj 3y ago
  Home depot is so overengineered. They are using 24” high res touchscreen pcs with an i7 to just run self checkout. Whoever locked in that contract must be pretty pleased.
  - Dylan16807 3y ago
    A couple hundred dollars is nothing compared to the costs surrounding that PC. Compared to how often systems like that get underbuilt and laggy, using an i7 is a good choice.
    - kjkjadksj 3y ago
      Yeah but its self checkout. Self checkout had no lag when it came out like 15 years ago. What did the engineers do to their codebase to require a modern i7, I wonder?
      - CodeWriter23 3y ago
        Every other checkout I’ve used has lag time after the scan and until the scale settles. Some even have visual feedback that indicates a busy status during this repeating part of the checkout process. Not to mention the human lag time of moving the product to the scale. There is no scale on the Home Depot units. You can scan as fast as the scan gun accepts scans. I’ve scanned 2-3 items per second with these. Using an I7 is a move to future proof. These units will likely be in service 10, maybe 15 years from now.
        kjkjadksj 3y ago
        I am sure they are on a three year replacement cycle like every other piece of enterprise compute. Home depot is also not the only place to do fast scanning. Grocers have always been able to scan instantly as long as I’ve been alive at least.
filoleg 3y ago
Well, have you tried the one at Amazon Go stores? I've been using those once every month or so, since the year the very first one opened in Seattle, and not once have I had any issues at all. It was truly fantastic, especially since the app would notify me afterwards how long I spent at the store, and seeing that number always made me feel good. TLDR on this: my average shopping experience from the moment I entered the store to the moment I left took around 3-4 minutes, with plenty of them being under a minute long.
kaashif 3y ago
I've never experienced any problems with the ones that don't weigh anything. The weighing ones get it wrong often enough to be annoying. If my closest grocery store used weighing self checkouts, I'd be much more annoyed on a regular basis.
- ska 3y ago
  Yes this may be the deciding line.
grumple 3y ago
This surprises me. I regularly get in line and fully complete self-checkout before anyone who was there when I started scanning, even though I'm typically checking out with more items. What's causing the struggle? Every one of these works the same at every store - scan barcode, place item on the weight plate. Repeat. Press pay button, pay with card, whatever, tap/insert.
- ska 3y ago
  > scan barcode, place item on the weight plate. Repeat. Press pay button, pay with card, whatever, tap/insert. scan barcode, place item on plate mostly works except when barcode is crumpled or something. without barcodes it's a more of a crapshoot. Usually more than 1/2 of my basket doesn't have a barcode (fresh produce, etc.) Maybe the ones near me are just too sensitive to weight variations. Oh and one of them really loves to scan a points card 2x, then try an apply the second read as a product and fail. Every time the machine gets confused, you have to wait for an attendant. All things being equal, the cashiers are faster than self scan. If the lineup for cashiers is longer, it can still be faster, but otherwise it's slower in my experience.

lm28469 3y ago

At least where I live it's a nightmare. Instead of having someone work as a cashier and weight my veggies I now have to weight my veggies myself under the supervision of a worker who's only job is to supervise a machine that is buggy enough to need human intervention for every other client. It only serves the shop owner because he can have a single drone operating a few self checkout machines instead of a single line, but is that a net positive for society ? doubt, going to a supermarket is alienating enough, we didn't have to make it worse. And of course they had to add a gate so now you can't even leave the shop without showing the receipt, when you don't find what you want to buy you have to call and wait for an adult to allow you to leave the premise like you're a fucking toddler getting out of the playground area.