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Self-checkout has its uses and supporters. Introverts, the socially anxious, people in a hurry, people who'd much prefer to bag (or double/triple bag) their own
by autoexec 2y ago
Self-checkout has its uses and supporters. Introverts, the socially anxious, people in a hurry, people who'd much prefer to bag (or double/triple bag) their own items in ways that work best for them, people who want to get the organic tomato at the price of the non-organic one.
It's absolutely still a scheme by companies to get rid of employees and get customers to do work for them for free, and there are still issues with the systems not working very well, but we at least have the option (in almost all cases) to queue up at the one or two registers with an employee doing the work. When it comes to AI, we're often not being given any choice at all. Even if we can avoid using it, or somehow avoid seeing it, we will still be training it.
- ryandrake 2y ago> people in a hurry Huh, I always thought it was the opposite: If you're in a hurry, you go through traditional check-out. Nothing really matches the speed of an experienced and trained grocery store checkout clerk whizzing boxes past the scanner faster than you can load them into your cart. I think traditional checkout can blaze through 30 grocery items before I can even get three or four out of my cart, fumble around with them in front of the scanners, and then get chastised and stopped by the computer because I didn't place the item properly on the shelf next to the checkout machine.
- zeroonetwothree 2y agoIf I’m buying one thing then it’s much faster to self checkout than have to wait in line. I agree with you for large purchases.
- quantified 2y agoThere are 4-12 self-checkout kiosks and the loads there tend to be smaller. So the line moves. Speed of checkout once you reach the clerk in a traditional lane, hands-down faster than self. Plus traditional is where you buy alcohol.
- autoexec 2y agoI've seen liquor stores that handle alcohol sales through self-checkout without friction. They don't check IDs 99% of the time, which I suspect could get them in some trouble, but instead the monitoring employee basically looks at you and makes a judgement call on your age and if you're clearly not a child they approve it before you're even done scanning.
- quantified 2y agoWhat state or territory does that? Not a challenge, just curious, there are over 50 to track.
- mystifyingpoi 2y agoPolish Lidl works like that. You self-checkout alcohol and some store employee gets notified. They look at you and approve remotely. If you scan alcohol first, they will likely do that before you finish checkout and there is no waiting involved.
- autoexec 2y agoso far I've only seen it in the midwest - WI and IL
- timewizard 2y agoDo you remember "10 items or fewer" lines in grocery stores? I suspect self checkout is the reason they no longer exist. It was a fair trade.
- ghaff 2y agoSome variant of express lanes (may be >10 or <10 items) still exist in most of the grocery stores I frequent.
- bobbiechen 2y agoThis lines up with my experience loitering in the soup aisle and stopwatching the grocery checkouts: https://bobbiechen.com/blog/2022/2/17/let-them-check-you-out https://bobbiechen.com/blog/2022/2/17/let-them-check-you-out
- ghaff 2y agoIt's certainly a way to cut costs. It's also, for a few conveniently handled bar-coded items, generally faster and more convenient than waiting in line behind a person with a shopping cart full of items. (Yes, there are express lanes but they're often not that express.)