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Current checkout systems seem ancient when we consider how far we have advanced in technology. Isn’t it time to start using these tools to make shopping simpler? No customer likes waiting in line for a cashier to ring up dozens (sometimes hundreds) of items, and this is what Walmart is said to be fixing with Scan and Go.
This app will allow users to simply scan products as they shop. The customer would then be able to come up to the register and simply pay for the products at a self-serving kiosk. Not only would this make it easier and faster for both the customer and the cashier, but it would alleviate part of the $12 million Wal-Mart pays cashiers (all over the country) per second.
There is no mention of having any mobile payment system embedded in the app, but it would be convenient if Wal-Mart offers a way to use credit cards to pay for products within the app. And if they don’t trust customers’ intentions (they likely don’t), they could simply have an employee look over the products and digital receipt at the exit.
Employees are said to be testing the system as we speak, so we should start seeing those lines getting shorter relatively soon. These tests are being done with iPhone apps at the moment, but we have no doubt they will release an Android app once the system is ready to roll out.
For now, let’s wait while we wait (in line). But we are curious to hear what you guys think of this system. How do you see these systems developing as we adopt current technology?
[Via: The Wall Street Journal]
$12,000,000 per second? I think you’ve got a typo there…
That’s what they say…..
That would add up to over $1 trillion dollars of wages paid per day, give or take a few hundred billion. However there are only an estimated $8 trillion US dollars in existence. Yeah, I don’t think they pay $12 million dollars a second. :P Perhaps $12 million a day.
Even $12 million /day – Based on an 8-hour work day, that’s $1.5 million /hour. If cashiers were paid $10-15 per hour, WalMart would be paying 150,000 – 100,000 cashiers. Does any of that make sense?
I thought the same thing.
That equates to Wal-Mart paying its cashiers, in one hour, more than Apple (had to use them, sorry) makes in REVENUE (not profit) in a QUARTER? Bullshit. Something is wrong with those numbers.
what about bagging your products? hows that work?
Well the idea behind the app is that you would still go to a cashier or kiosk to pay (self-serve). When you are there, the cashier could bag it for you (they usually have someone checking them), or you could do it yourself.
With Fast Track in uk sainsburys, you bag as you go. Then you just hand the scanner over at checkout. They have random rescans to discourage thievery.
I was talking a Dairy Manager at Giant once. He told me that was their biggest loss (theft) in the store. He then gave me an example that people scan say half dozen eggs but put a full dozen in their carts. When customers get to the front to scan and “check out”, there’s no human being there to “check” them out. Humans are being weeded out as technology runs in faster than Mr U Bolt.
I love the idea but at what cost in the long run is what I ask. Sounds like a lot of humans out of work like most corporate technology has done.
There’s stores in Japan where everything is rfid tagged you just walk out of the door and it charges your basket to your card
their technology and how they use it are far more advanced than us….
They dont have any FCC regulations, same with S.Korea with an all digital grocery store
That would be such a better experience in Walmart. I hate their lines.
Having the employee check the digital receipt at the exit would defeat the purpose, because they would have a line at the exit now to check merchandise.
They do this with a printed receipt. -_-
You don’t need technology, all you need is more then 2 checkouts open
I don’t know, man. That depends on where you live, I guess. I live right in front of a Wal-Mart (in San Diego), and there are at least about 8 registers open at any given time. Those lines are still a pain.
We get 30 registers open in Austin and it STILL takes forever!
At the Rundberg one, try the new Anderson one…in and out so fast you won’t believe it’s a wal mart!
And queuing.
right? they have like 30 check out lines and only use 2
Tell me about it.. They have 22 registers and only 3 open.
No kidding, I’ve never been to a Walmart with even half of the registers they have installed in the store open, never! Lines backed up into the aisle’s but only 3 or 4 of the twenty or so registers ever open and a bunch of employes wearing 5 year plus badges standing around looking at all the customers with their thumbs stuck up their you know what.
you hit the nail on the head.well almost,they need more lanes open.they are too greedy i guess to pay more cahiers.they make us pay extra in time spent in line.
I used to like going to Walmart, they suck I’d rather shop on Amazon.com
People steal at self checkouts all the time… I think this will make it easier for them.. What i forgot to scan the $50 worth of steak buried at the bottom of my cart…. My bad.
stop and shop in Mass already does this – they’ve android app & I regularly use it
It starts by starting a shopping session
then scan & add items to the cart
the app shows what’s in the cart & what is the total
at the self-check out kiosk, just scan the bar code from the shopping session & pay using credit or debit card, etc
It’s really cool & makes a very good shopping experience
It would be like a sams club… They really only check the expensive stuff… And the vest part is as theft increases so does the cost of the goods we buy.., but they still getting richer because they save 12mil a year from cashiers
IPhone first, then Android? Does this seem backward to anyone else? Not that high end Androids aren’t far superior but there are far more people carrying free low end Androids in Wal-Mart than iPhones.
Not to mention Walmart is a carrier in some areas that sell only Android phones.
Because there are some people who don’t need all that power in a phone. Apple doesn’t allow for that. You have to get an older iPhone for that. Apple should have a low tier iPhone, but they don’t. So that’s their lost.
PROFILING!
No, I’m not a cop….it’s stereotyping thank you very much.
Yah alright! Then lets all go home and complain that the economy suck because there are no jobs and how its the presidents fault…… sweet…..
I see a job opportunity. Who’s going to make and maintain this new software? =.D
Sure as hell isn’t going to be all those cashiers. The companies that these get contracted out to just won’t go hire a shitton of new people for this project, they’ll maybe add a couple of jobs, but by and large, it’l result in the loss of thousands and thousands of jobs.
And be blamed on Obama, naturally.
These are the people of Walmart
Through mark downs, roll backs, and shopping carts
These are the people of Walmart
Where we save money and shop smart only at Walmart
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YvxNgdFeWqM
Wait… Do you guys actually get reception in your local walmarts?
I didn’t until I got my Galaxy S3. Now suddenly I get great 4G, calls, and and txts.
yea, i get full 3G/4G speeds inside walmart.
In a time when jobs are scarce this is the last thing we need.
People steal!!!! I work in grocery retail and self checkout and Scan as u go is a pain in the ass. Why can’t these companies including mine just pay hard working people to do these jobs. If that person doesn’t work out fire them and give someone else a chance. And by the way a Walmart has about 100 checkout stands at each store!!! Use Them
#venting lol
My accounting teacher was talking about this. How a lot of people are losing their job to technology.
Makes me glad that I enjoy CIS. I’m sorry, but I’m going to have to put you out of commission one day. =.(
I hope you don’t think ill of me. LoL!!
My problem with this stuff is that there is someone sitting on 10s if not 100s of billions of dollars. And that money isn’t circulating in the economy. The Money isn’t gone there are just too few people in possession of it.
Them paying people more money would be a great way for them to return that money where it belongs.
Exactly. If the money doesn’t get back out in the system, then the customer base doesn’t have money to spend, and money stops coming into the store! It’s pretty basic. No CEO needs to make 10,000+ times what his average worker makes.
Agreed.
I had this idea two years ago…….
That would be smart! Having an app for that would make life easier… Too bad I don’t shop at Walmart anymore.. lol
This is a great idea except thousands of jobs will be lost :/
walmart doesent care if it were up to them they would cut all jobs
The Home Depot by where I live allows you to use PayPal as a form of payment at a Self-Checkout. I’ve never used it since I have a PayPal Debit Card. LoL!!
But the idea is way cool.
Nothing new with this. They tried it probably 8-9 years ago in the UK in Sainsburys and for whatever reason it was dropped. I thought it was great and saved a bundle of time. Obviously didn’t give the results expected.
”
but it would alleviate part of the $12 million Wal-Mart pays cashiers (all over the country) per second.” Oh yeah, nice, put even more people out of work. I didn’t know employee’s were a sickness that needed “alleviating”.
Wal-Mart pays their employees near minimum wage, and when you’re working with minimum wage help, you get minimum wage service in most cases. Just about every time I’ve been in one of those stores there’s been a long queue at two or three registers and the other twenty registers are closed, and yes this during daylight hours in a major suburban area. There are two sides to this tech. The customer may actually come out with a nice experience for once, but yes jobs would probably be cut. If Wal-Mart invested a little more time and money into recruiting better workersand maybe paying them a decent wage, maybe both parties would win, the customer and the employee. At this juncture, it is clear that will probably never happen.
Pay them a decent wage and the cost of goods goes up. When you demand the lowest price and are willing to compromise service for it which is essentially what everyone’s choice is who shops there there isn’t a way back from that.
Walmart’s average cashier makes $8.62 per hour. http://www.glassdoor.com/Hourly-Pay/Walmart-Stores-Wal-Mart-Cashier-Hourly-Pay-E715_D_KO15,31.htm
It looks like 134 people submitted their salaries and it ranges from $6 an hour to $13 an hour and averages $8.62. The average yearly salary is $17,288. That doesn’t seem like much considering the company makes 15B to 16B dollars in yearly profits on 400B to 450B dollars in revenues.
I haven’t really seen it in any other country, not when ive been in the rest of Europe or New Zealand or even the US, But in all major UK Supermarkets we have self service checkouts, they work quite well, means you dont have to wait behind someone with A FULL TROLLEY when you only have a few items in a basket.
What’s a trolley?
my local stop and shop lets you pick up a hand held scanner and scan items as you shop. then you go through a special checkout later put the scanner in the holster and you pay. makes things slightly easiser but really… its just taking jobs away from people.
How about this for thoughts?
” no one will neither buy or sell unless they have the mark of the beast either in their right hand ( cell phone) or on their forehead ( google project glass)..”
lol…makes you think
They tried this in the UK about 15 years ago with Safeway. It didn’t go well. It became a shoplifters paradise. People would scan 1 item in 2 or 3. Thus costing the company millions of pounds and pushing prices up…
Finally following Europe… Had this in The Netherlands for a few years now.
We already have it in Portugal for some time now. Scan it yourself across the store and pay it at the end, or scan it yourself at the end and pay it yourself as well. Along side with the normal cashiers. To control robbery there is random inspections.
I would think having a weighing system of some sort would cut down on the theft? That’s how the self check out works. You put your bags and whatever in the cart, weigh it before you begin, and then weigh it at the end. If it’s off by too much, then you have to re-check it all. Now, this would only be helpful if it could be effective, if the weight is always off, then it’s just a bigger PITA.
Been shopping like this for nearly two years at my local Waitrose (in the UK). They do a random “stop and recount” on your stuff every now and again to encourage honesty – never commenting on any underscanning but I reckon a “mistake” makes you more likely for another random scan fairly soon :-)
Despite the enormous time saving for me, there are still a huge number of folk who choose to use the normal lines. I can’t imagine why!
Wow another way to get rid of jobs. The CEO’s only care about profits.
I use self checkouts where available, I’m quicker than the cashiers.
I’ve never been to the Walmart here in my town Tn. with more than five of the twenty or so registers they have installed in the store open, never! Lines backed up into the aisle’s and a bunch of employes wearing 5 year plus badges standing around looking at all the customers with their thumbs stuck up their you know what. Even on Black Friday..
Save jobs use a human. Avoid automated systems.
And we watch the USA lose more jobs.
Oh great another way to cut jobs in this country this app is a very bad idea.
i see tons of glitches and alot of people losing there jobs.
you can definitely steal a fews things with this system. its not like you will be controlled everytime.
we got a similar system in France.
I think it would be neat and save a lot of time standing in line especially at chtistmas..