The Rise and Fall of Self-Service Checkouts: How Retail Chains are Adapting to Theft and Customer Experience Concerns

Some companies are eliminating them entirely, while others, such as Target, Dollar General and regional chain Schnucks, are limiting the number of items customers can bring to self-checkout. They want to reduce losses from theft, improve customer experience and relieve employees, the newspaper said.

A Walmart spokesperson said that in recent months, the company has drawn self-examination from several sources based on feedback from employees and customers.

“When self-service centers were first introduced, they were designed for smaller orders,” said Schnuck spokesman Paul Simon. When the practice has expanded to a larger number of objects, everything has to be re-evaluated, he said. Schnuck now limits self-service checkout use to a maximum of ten items. Although the main goal is to improve customer service and payment efficiency, the company also expects a slight reduction in theft, said Sím.

Customers want the shops to be completed quickly, but labor is often the shop’s biggest cost. Self-service registers were introduced to reduce payment operation costs. Thanks to self-service centers, one employee can monitor several customers at the same time and help them if necessary.

Companies like CVS Health introduced self-monitoring 20 years ago. The practice was accelerated by the covid-19 pandemic, when communication between people decreased. However, self-service checkouts have also contributed to the rise of churn, a term used in the retail industry to describe losses caused by theft, inventory loss or product damage. This is because customers make mistakes or steal. Traders reluctant to spend more money on staff are deciding whether to cut labor costs or fight theft losses.

In a LendingTree survey of 2,000 customers last year, about a fifth said they had mistakenly taken an item without paying for it when using self-financing. study. About 15 percent of self-checkout users admitted to stealing an item on purpose. Some people are posting videos on social media of customers scanning a lower priced item instead of the more expensive item that should be scanned.

“In the past, store construction was largely invisible,” said David Johnston, vice president of asset protection and retail operations for the National Retail Federation (NRF). “Today we see practices that are very clear and shameless. “

Most Target stores have limited the number of items to be purchased at self-checkout to ten. During tests in some stores, the company found that this reduced customer registration time in half compared to places where this restriction was not introduced. After the rollout in all stores, employees also saw a reduction in lost products, a company representative said.

America’s largest retail chain, Walmart, has completely eliminated self-service checkouts in some locations and replaced them with manned checkouts. In some locations, customers with optional memberships can use self-service locations, for which they pay an annual fee.

Walmart has added more self-service locations to stores in the past. But he quickly discovered that this led to problems, such as higher theft rates and customer mistreatment of the technology. In response, it quietly turned off pressure sensors at self-checkout counters because they too often triggered “wait for help” messages, which annoyed customers and staff alike.

In 2022, Dollar General said self-checkouts are so successful and popular that they will try to equip some stores only with self-checkouts. But a year later, CEO Todd Vasos backed off those plans. In March, the company said it would eliminate self-service fees in stores with the highest product losses. At the remaining stores, customers will be able to use self-service checkouts when purchasing up to five items.