The End Of Checkouts! Woohoo! (Amazon Shop)

The End Of Checkouts! Woohoo! (Amazon Shop)

Author
Discussion

LandR

6,249 posts

253 months

Tuesday 6th December 2016
quotequote all
DoubleSix said:
I remember talk of a fully RFID shopping experience whereby no scanning at all was required.

Walk in. Pick up stuff from shelves. Walk out.

All items logged and billed automatically, shame Amazon couldn't manage an experience closer to this.
That's exactly what this is.

You scan the app, enter the shop, take something off shelve, leave shop and you are billed for it when you leave.


Gunk

3,302 posts

158 months

Tuesday 6th December 2016
quotequote all
I can't understand the thinking behind taking humans out of the transactional process. Our local WH Smith has a row of empty self service checkouts and a long queue for the checkout with an assistant serving people.

My local Barclays has replaced cashiers with huge iPads which no one can use properly.

dxg

8,124 posts

259 months

Tuesday 6th December 2016
quotequote all
esxste said:
CrutyRammers said:
Well, there goes everyone's Saturday job. Inevitable, but what are teenagers going to do for a pt job now?
There goes more unskilled jobs from the econonomy. What are those who typically take such jobs going to do?


It's an important question that becomes more relevant as companies use continue to use technology to fulfil the often competing business aims of more profit / lower prices.


Yes, exactly this.

At some point, society has to consider the benefit of using technology to replace jobs without question. People need to be able to earn an income and it could come to be viewed as a societal good - the source of social value, if you will - to keep jobs around that could otherwise be replaced by technology.

Otherwise, the "price" of the goods on sale in these shops will be much higher than we can possibly imagine...

We should ask ourselves if we value the reduced price to us, the increased profit to the retailer, or the welfare of the people relying on the source of employment. If retails goes this way, we will have a further generational wasteland of the unemployable, just as we saw with the death of heavy industry. Not good.

B'stard Child

28,324 posts

245 months

Tuesday 6th December 2016
quotequote all
dxg said:
esxste said:
CrutyRammers said:
Well, there goes everyone's Saturday job. Inevitable, but what are teenagers going to do for a pt job now?
There goes more unskilled jobs from the econonomy. What are those who typically take such jobs going to do?


It's an important question that becomes more relevant as companies use continue to use technology to fulfil the often competing business aims of more profit / lower prices.


Yes, exactly this.

At some point, society has to consider the benefit of using technology to replace jobs without question. People need to be able to earn an income and it could come to be viewed as a societal good - the source of social value, if you will - to keep jobs around that could otherwise be replaced by technology.

Otherwise, the "price" of the goods on sale in these shops will be much higher than we can possibly imagine...

We should ask ourselves if we value the reduced price to us, the increased profit to the retailer, or the welfare of the people relying on the source of employment. If retails goes this way, we will have a further generational wasteland of the unemployable. Not good.
Good post clap

TEKNOPUG

18,844 posts

204 months

Tuesday 6th December 2016
quotequote all
What grinds my gears is that by using a self-service checkout, I'm saving the supermarket money. So why is there no discount to the shopper for using one?

Same with bloody cinemas - charge you a pound to click and collect, for your "convenience". Only it saves them money by having to hire less staff and sells more tickets quicker. Surely it should be a pound discount for using them? And then you get to the cinema and they are out of order and you have to queue anyway. And do they give you your pound back, do they fk...

maffski

1,866 posts

158 months

Tuesday 6th December 2016
quotequote all
dxg said:
esxste said:
There goes more unskilled jobs from the econonomy. What are those who typically take such jobs going to do?


It's an important question that becomes more relevant as companies use continue to use technology to fulfil the often competing business aims of more profit / lower prices.


Yes, exactly this.

At some point, society has to consider the benefit of using technology to replace jobs without question. People need to be able to earn an income and it could come to be viewed as a societal good - the source of social value, if you will - to keep jobs around that could otherwise be replaced by technology.

Otherwise, the "price" of the goods on sale in these shops will be much higher than we can possibly imagine...

We should ask ourselves if we value the reduced price to us, the increased profit to the retailer, or the welfare of the people relying on the source of employment. If retails goes this way, we will have a further generational wasteland of the unemployable, just as we saw with the death of heavy industry. Not good.
Used to be that 90% of us worked in the fields. Once they mechanised that we went to work in factories. Once they mechanised that we went to work in shops and offices. When they mechanise that we'll just go work somewhere else. And we'll keep doing that until there is no work left to mechanise. Then we'll go to the beach.

DoubleSix

11,691 posts

175 months

Tuesday 6th December 2016
quotequote all
LandR said:
DoubleSix said:
I remember talk of a fully RFID shopping experience whereby no scanning at all was required.

Walk in. Pick up stuff from shelves. Walk out.

All items logged and billed automatically, shame Amazon couldn't manage an experience closer to this.
That's exactly what this is.

You scan the app, enter the shop, take something off shelve, leave shop and you are billed for it when you leave.
Yes quite right.

I didn't check the link, just read the first couple of posts which describe something rather different...

DoubleSix

11,691 posts

175 months

Tuesday 6th December 2016
quotequote all
B'stard Child said:
dxg said:
esxste said:
CrutyRammers said:
Well, there goes everyone's Saturday job. Inevitable, but what are teenagers going to do for a pt job now?
There goes more unskilled jobs from the econonomy. What are those who typically take such jobs going to do?


It's an important question that becomes more relevant as companies use continue to use technology to fulfil the often competing business aims of more profit / lower prices.


Yes, exactly this.

At some point, society has to consider the benefit of using technology to replace jobs without question. People need to be able to earn an income and it could come to be viewed as a societal good - the source of social value, if you will - to keep jobs around that could otherwise be replaced by technology.

Otherwise, the "price" of the goods on sale in these shops will be much higher than we can possibly imagine...

We should ask ourselves if we value the reduced price to us, the increased profit to the retailer, or the welfare of the people relying on the source of employment. If retails goes this way, we will have a further generational wasteland of the unemployable. Not good.
Good post clap
Sounds like the sort of protectionist anti-progressive codswollop you find across the channel...

The world and the people within it evolve, looking back is a risible strategy on the world playing field.

menousername

2,107 posts

141 months

Tuesday 6th December 2016
quotequote all
Gunk said:
I can't understand the thinking behind taking humans out of the transactional process. Our local WH Smith has a row of empty self service checkouts and a long queue for the checkout with an assistant serving people.

My local Barclays has replaced cashiers with huge iPads which no one can use properly.
Yep and one person doing the work of three people, manning them all at once. not only do people lose jobs but the ones left have to work harder and harder for less.

When the technology fails you have to wait three times as long for service so its not even any more convenient.

Several times recently I have walked out of the local Morrisons / Tesco empty handed because nothing I wanted, both planned and impulsive, was on the shelves. That i dont mind, but when you cant find a single member of floor staff in a large supermarket then something is wrong. Next time you are in check it out- probably 3 old dears on the tills and one customer service person doing refunds and the fag counter/lotto. Lord knows how much they loose to shoplifting. It cannot be a safe place to work on the late shift with just a half dozen colleagues there in an emergency. It is also incredibly depressing and i genuinely think there is a gap in the market for a friendly supermarket adequately staffed with happy attentive people.

Being quite antisocial i have used the self checkouts a lot. Then i noticed 3 self checkouts became 10 and 10 staff became half a dozen and so on.

I also realised the till staff are often elderly ladies trying to supplement their meagre pensions and perhaps see a few regular faces for a hello. That made me think- senior management are probably collecting data not only to review uptake of the self service vs staffed checkouts, but some useless beancounter probably developed an algo so they can compare average packing times on comparablly difficult to pack items for a more accurate way of seeing how many old dears they can fire

So now i make a point of queing at the staffed check out even for a few small items. we dont get the discount for doing their work so at least hopefully my hard earned goes some way to giving an income to someone who really needs it






B'stard Child

28,324 posts

245 months

Tuesday 6th December 2016
quotequote all
DoubleSix said:
The world and the people within it evolve, looking back is a risible strategy on the world playing field.
It's not looking back and wishing you could go back - it's looking back to see how the fk we got here, what is going to happen if we continue with this direction and if we don't like what we see for the future what the bloody hell are we going to do to change it before it's too late.

Leaving the EU is a step in the right direction

Mr Snrub

24,942 posts

226 months

Tuesday 6th December 2016
quotequote all
UNEXPECTED ITEM IN BAGGING AREA

UNEXPECTED ITEM IN BAGGING AREA

Every single time. If you're by yourself and have more than 10 or so items then a manned till is quicker. Just because something is more advanced doesn't automatically make it better

B'stard Child

28,324 posts

245 months

Tuesday 6th December 2016
quotequote all
Mr Snrub said:
UNEXPECTED ITEM IN BAGGING AREA

UNEXPECTED ITEM IN BAGGING AREA

Every single time. If you're by yourself and have more than 10 or so items then a manned till is quicker. Just because something is more advanced doesn't automatically make it better
Never ever used one - If the day ever comes that it's the only choice I'll find a store that does have staff, if the day ever comes that it's the only choice anywhere then I'll be a bit sad and have to start using them but until then I see no advantage to me only to the store.

menousername

2,107 posts

141 months

Tuesday 6th December 2016
quotequote all
Mr Snrub said:
If you're by yourself and have more than 10 or so items then a manned till is quicker
That reminded me - what about the ones that now have conveyor belts- meaning you load, scan and pack - who are they for? A family of five ex supermarket cashiers who each take a particular role in the process with military precision

Anything less and its a catastrophe

Eric Mc

121,785 posts

264 months

Tuesday 6th December 2016
quotequote all
20 years ago some supermarkets introduced "scan as you go" technology.

Sparkyhd

1,792 posts

94 months

Tuesday 6th December 2016
quotequote all
Problem is eventually there will only be one retailer, Amazon.

Once Amazon control all sales channels they'll start jacking up prices and we'll all be slaves to US corporates.

Gunk

3,302 posts

158 months

Tuesday 6th December 2016
quotequote all
B'stard Child said:
DoubleSix said:
The world and the people within it evolve, looking back is a risible strategy on the world playing field.
Leaving the EU is a step in the right direction
I don't think we can really blame the EU for the demise of the shop assistant!

confused

Edited by Gunk on Tuesday 6th December 20:56

DoubleSix

11,691 posts

175 months

Tuesday 6th December 2016
quotequote all
Gunk said:
B'stard Child said:
DoubleSix said:
The world and the people within it evolve, looking back is a risible strategy on the world playing field.
Leaving the EU is a step in the right direction
I don't think we can really blame the EU for the demise of the shop assistant!

confused

Edited by Gunk on Tuesday 6th December 20:56
Wasn't sure what that had to do with the rise and rise of mega corps either tbh

SKP555

1,114 posts

125 months

Tuesday 6th December 2016
quotequote all
Sparkyhd said:
Problem is eventually there will only be one retailer, Amazon.

Once Amazon control all sales channels they'll start jacking up prices and we'll all be slaves to US corporates.
People were saying that about Walmart a few years ago. Now they have more competition.

B'stard Child

28,324 posts

245 months

Tuesday 6th December 2016
quotequote all
Gunk said:
B'stard Child said:
DoubleSix said:
The world and the people within it evolve, looking back is a risible strategy on the world playing field.
Leaving the EU is a step in the right direction
I don't think we can really blame the EU for the demise of the shop assistant!

confused

Edited by Gunk on Tuesday 6th December 20:56
Deletes reason to leave number 272

B'stard Child

28,324 posts

245 months

Tuesday 6th December 2016
quotequote all
DoubleSix said:
Gunk said:
B'stard Child said:
DoubleSix said:
The world and the people within it evolve, looking back is a risible strategy on the world playing field.
Leaving the EU is a step in the right direction
I don't think we can really blame the EU for the demise of the shop assistant!

confused

Edited by Gunk on Tuesday 6th December 20:56
Wasn't sure what that had to do with the rise and rise of mega corps either tbh
Well if you going to pick and choose what you quote I'll have to call you ///ajd wink

Nothing in there to indicate you've snipped my reply - Gunk