Gizmodo:
Automation is often presented as an inexorably advancing force, whether it’s ushering in a threat to jobs or a promise of increased leisure or larger profits. We’re made to imagine the robots rising, increasingly mechanized systems of production, more streamlined modes of everyday living. But the truth is that automation technology and automated systems very often fail. And even when they do, they nonetheless frequently wind up stranded in our lives.
For every automated appliance or system that actually makes performing a task easier—dishwashers, ATMs, robotic factory arms, say—there seems to be another one—self-checkout kiosks, automated phone menus, mass email marketing—that actively makes our lives worse.
I’ve taken to calling this second category, simply, shitty automation.
While I don’t loathe it as much as the writer, I certainly never look forward to any kind of self-checkout.
The real problem with self-checkout is when anything goes wrong. It’s GREAT for when I have one or two items.. Loews, Home Depot, Target… I find it faster than waiting for a cashier, if one is not immediately available… but for a shopping cart full of groceries with bags of fresh produce? Absolutely not.
This is a great example and reminds me of another, the convenience store Wawa. They have a deli sections that makes great sandwiches and other items and a sub is a great example of an item that using a kiosk actually is a better way to order it. The nature of sandwich customization is such that I find tapping my preferences into a touchscreen so much better than standing there and waiting to tell the person making my sandwich each customization one by one (e.g., Subway or Moe’s).
Having said that, the self checkout registers are horrible. In my youth I worked as a grocery store cashier for years and I was consistently one of the fastest at scanning groceries. However, that skill does not translate to the terrible self checkout machines. The scanners do not work as good. The scale that weighs your items to make sure you put them in the bag is finicky. Dealing with larger items is horrible. And when the machine gets stuck (which happens often) you have to wait for the one person who is monitoring 4+ registers to help you.
I also found another glitch recently. I was in Home Depot and using the self checkout. When I tried to finish it would not accept my Home Depot credit card. I had to go over to the customer service desk to checkout and pay for my items. Turns out that the reason it wouldn’t let me self checkout is that my order was over $1000. There was no indication of this on the register. The person helping did not know (the customer service desk person did). There were not any regular cashiers working. So how does Home Depot consider that good customer service?
I never, ever do self checkout. This is going to sound snooty, but when I go someplace to spend money, I’d rather interact with people and have them do the work. For me that’s part of the experience of going someplace and spending money. Otherwise I’ll just use Amazon.
The ones I rally hate are the restaurants where you have to order on a tablet. The restaurant experience is all about being served, which is probably why chain restaurants are closing and local restaurants are popping up everywhere, at least in my town.
Wait. How does self-checkout work in the States (and Canada)? You grab everything you need, walk to a counter (or wait a bit first if I read the article), take every item again, scan it and put it back? Yes, in that case it sucks.
We have a very good system here in The Netherlands used by most big grocery stores. You grab a handheld scanning device when you walk into the store by scanning a bar code in an app. You scan each item when you pick it of the shelf and put it in your bag or crate or whatever and when you want to check out, you simply put the device in a loading dock (there’s a wall of them) walk up to a register, scan the barcode again, pay and off you go. There is never a line to check out.
Every once in a while someone will check if you scanned everything (usually by scanning 5 to 8 items) but if you never make a mistake they’ll do this less and less.
There is another big chain in which you won’t have to scan a bar code from an app, but where you hand over the device to a person. They might do a check as well (but more regularly since it’s not tied to an account) and when you pass you get a sticker and after 4 stickers you’ll receive a box of cookies (score)!
The handheld scanners are pretty neat as well. They are equipped with a screen and a few buttons. They show the total of what you’ve scanned, if you e any discounts, if ou’re missing out on discounts, etc.
This system is generally favored by customers since it saves a lot of time and you only handle each item once before leaving the store.
Restaurants: Yes, that would be gross. Though I don’t mind paying using a tablet.
I’m starting to like “push for service” buttons, on the other hand. I’ve found service can disappear for twenty minutes when I actually want it.
We have one store in the area where the self checkout machines actually behave the way you’d want. Just one. No problems, no beeping, no fussing… just scan, bag and pay. But I’m sure they’ll “upgrade” eventually.
Paying I’m more open to only because it’s more secure.
Well, it also relieves the server of having to judge whether you want the cheque or not. That’s not really service, that’s more magic.
I’ll be a contrarian here: I *love* self-checkout, be it using an app going up and down the aisles & an associate scaning 5-6 items on my way out; or, if it’s just doing my shopping, then scanning items myself, bagging them myself, paying & going home.
Maybe it’s the part of me that’s an introvert, but I don’t really feel the need to chit-chat with a clerk. I bring my own shopping bags with me, and it is a royal pain in the rear to go through a line with a clerk; they NEVER, EVER bag and arrange my items the way I want them. And I can’t bag my own items when a person checks me out.
I’ll deal with the once-in-awhile quirks of needing assistance or an app that’s not cooperating. Doing all the checking out myself saves me time and relieves the uncomforability factor of dealing with a clerk and possibly a bagger.
To me, it just feels faster to do the entire shopping experience by myself. I put my AirPods in, play a podcast(s), shop, use Apple Pay, bag my own stuff, and go home.
I don’t know about anywhere else, but it works very good in the one market in my town that has it. I make a point of using it whenever possible. The only real downside to me is alcohol sales are prohibited with self checkout. I hear many people grouse about the bane of self checkouts, but if it’s dialed in here in my podunk corner of very N. California, how is it worse in big cities? We never get the latest and greatest up here. It’s not unusual to see upgraded POS terminals that are used/refurbished. Confused.
This sounds *brilliant*. I don’t know of a single retailer here in Canada or the US doing anything like this. 🙁
There are definitely times when kiosks are a net win for everyone. My wife used to work at McDonald’s, and when they added self serve kiosks they got so many more orders they not only didn’t lay anyone off, even after they reassigned most of the counter people elsewhere (they still had counter, just fewer people on it) they still had to hire more people to handle cooking, assembly, running and presenting. I’m not talking just one or two people, either.
It turns out most people liked the idea of ordering six wide from terminals rather than two or three wide from real people. It turned it into “walk up and order” most of the time, and even if the kitchen takes the same amount of time to produce the food people would rather wait for the food than wait to order.
Jeez. Did someone really write “The restaurant experience is all about being served”????? The restaurant experience should be about eating good food in a nice atmosphere. Shouldn’t matter how the selection was made and communicated, and it shouldn’t involve somebody getting his rocks off by the feel of another person’s servitude.
Jeez. Did someone really write “The restaurant experience is all about being served”????? The restaurant experience should be about eating good food in a nice atmosphere. Shouldn’t matter how the selection was made and communicated, and it shouldn’t involve somebody getting his rocks off by the feel of another person’s servitude.
This seems more error prone that what I’ve seen in the US, and it wouldn’t necessarily be any faster. I might seem faster simply because the time spent scanning your way would be distributed, whereas here it’s all in one block. But there’s no need to scan items as you put things in carts, and there’s no complications when I change my mind and take something back out of my cart, or my brother sees something in my cart, and I move it from my cart to his cart, or whatever. Having put all the groceries in a cart, they need to be transferred to bags. It’s during that process that you scan your items one by one as you put them in bags. The nuisance of self-checkout here is that the receiving area is generally keeping track of how much weight should have just been added to a bag based on the barcode scanned, and this limits the speed of checkout. When you go to a human cashier he/she scans much faster because there’s no wait for a weight check. Everywhere I go, there’s usually a choice of self-checkout and cashier checkout. Almost everyone chooses self-checkout… and then bitches about it afterward, because humans like to complain.
US/Canada mostly works the way you describe as “sucks.”
The idea is you keep your groceries in the cart. When you scan them, you transfer them from your cart to the scanner and then to the bagging area. When you’re done, you pay and then pick up the grocery bags and leave.
Since you don’t typically bag things as you shop (here, I mean) it doesn’t really change the number of times you need to handle the items. The drawback is that the bagging area is almost always weight monitored. If you scan a box of spaghetti, the machine expects you to bag the spaghetti and it knows how much the spaghetti weighs. Too much weight or too little weight and the machine pitches a fit.
The first self check-out in our area had the weight monitoring set generously wide. I’ve never have a problem with it unless I actually messed up the sequence. Most others are set much narrower. I especially loathe Walmart’s machines, which are clearly set up because Walmart trusts nobody. Not even the person who’s supposed to fix problems with the machine. Combine that with frequently wrong prices and it’s just a mess, to be only used when they’ve only got one normal checkout open and a huge line for it.
Also, they have a camera and monitor on each self checkout kiosk now that says “YOU ARE BEING RECORDED.” Lovely. Nothing I detest more than trying to do the right thing, being hampered by shitty equipment AND being reminded that the store considers me a thief until I can prove otherwise.
Last time I was there I waited 15 minutes for a $0.80 correction. Why? Because damnit, they’ve pissed me off and yes I’m going to use 15 minutes of their employee’s time on something stupid. I was friendly to the employee, though, and they seemed to get it.
I think writing this down has convinced me to skip Walmart in the future.
Oh geeze, I should have known somebody would blow this into the extreme. Restaurants serve people. That’s what they do. That’s the draw. That’s why it costs WAY more than just buying groceries and cooking at home. It’s not about treating people poorly or “getting my rocks off”, it’s about having a nice experience. Thanks for immediately assuming the worst.
I’m not against self-checkout in general. I used to specifically avoid them because it felt like I was helping put people out of work. But over the years I’ve gotten ok with it for small pickups.
BUT…when I go to Target, I find it really offputting to see people with shopping carts full of stuff there. In my mind, self-check is for a couple of items, not a whole cart. That negates what I feel is the prime benefit of the self-check: speed.
No item count to worry about, just disallow shopping carts in that area. If you can carry it there in a basket or your hands, go for it.
I’m not against self-checkout in general. I used to specifically avoid them because it felt like I was helping put people out of work. But over the years I’ve gotten ok with it for small pickups.
BUT…when I go to Target, I find it really offputting to see people with shopping carts full of stuff there. In my mind, self-check is for a couple of items, not a whole cart. That negates what I feel is the prime benefit of the self-check: speed.
No item count to worry about, just disallow shopping carts in that area. If you can carry it there in a basket or your hands, go for it.
uh no guy, there’s a reason it’s called the “hospitality industry”. guest service is a huge part of the experience. i live in a restaurant town and this is simply a fact. if you don’t enjoy delivering hospitality it’s not the industry for you.
I don’t know about anywhere else, but it works very good in the one market in my town that has it. I make a point of using it whenever possible. The only real downside to me is alcohol sales are prohibited with self checkout. I hear many people grouse about the bane of self checkouts, but if it’s dialed in here in my podunk corner of very N. California, how is it worse in big cities? We never get the latest and greatest up here. It’s not unusual to see upgraded POS terminals that are used/refurbished. Confused.
I get that. When I visited England I liked how they handled payment in some places. Instead of leaving you a bill, they would drop a card reader on your table and you could check out when you wanted. Secure, but also convenient and unobtrusive.
I can’t remember visiting a retailer where kiosks hadn’t replaced checkout people while also making the operation less convenient by requiring me to do the work of checking out my own goods.
I’d rather wait in a long line for a human to do the job, thanks. That choice removed, I might as well order the goods online.
Self-checkout makes me do the work of yet another task that a retailer has chosen to cut corners on. No, thanks.
You’re not being snooty by wanting to enjoy an experience that shouldn’t be made to feel like factory work. I already have far more daily tasks to attend to that my parents or grandparents either had no conception of, or for which they’d have paid someone else to do. If I’m buying $400 worth of groceries from your supermarket, the least you could do at the end of that process is have someone complete it properly while I help bag.
I’ve only ever seen tablet-ordering systems at airport restaurants; there are restaurant-service groups which seem to be doing good business with them. I suppose it’s meant to seem like a step up from a shopping mall cafeteria.
Oddly enough, I get my rocks off by knowing someone has a job and is being treated properly by his or her employer. That’s part of the “nice atmosphere” you’re describing.
It works in the Apple store for accessories. I love just picking something up, scanning/paying and walking out with it. Feels a bit odd the first few times, like security might jump you on the way out.
Stop and Shop in the US does that.