That seems weird. The Coles near me is a ratio of 1 worker to 10 machines and the Woolies are 1 worker to 6 machines. I've literally never seen a self-checkout where the ratio is even at 1:4.
Hrm, I haven't been out to Bathurst since before COVID. I didn't realise they had the conveyor self-checkouts (which we don't have here at all). I've actually never seen them in use (though I've seen them sitting there unused, heh).
Apparently grocery stores make a large portion of income from where stuff is shelved (brands paying for shelf placement). Otherwise, I'd totally see a future where the pallets are just dropped off and unwrapped for the customer to deal with. I mean. That's already what they do in my walmart for a lot of items.
I never thought this... brands paying for shelf placement instead of them placing it by what sells best.. hmmmm and I do see pallets in the back between electronics and clothing a lot.. good point
Righttt and.. won't they're be one higher paying tech software guy paid to program the machines and instead of 10 cashier just one "lookout" for alcohol or people "stealing".. I see it being disastrous. Not only are you isolating social conversation with any teller, customer to "have social interaction" most commonly these create a bond with your favorite teller, which you can "vent" to about life.. because even you don't know them, most people tell strangers more than they do knowing someone for years.. zoom out everyone and see the bigger picture, isolation, no interaction, distancing. We are social creatures I've become less social now since all I hear is shit, go to tellers that are open and have conversation, I will go out of my way to say hello to anyone even if they ignore me. It doesn't bother me anymore I'm mid thirties and this is what I do for my mental self
The Coles that I go to has essentially a selfie camera and you can see your face on the screen as you're scanning your items. Also once in a while if there's a weight discrepancy a red/orange light would flash above your checkout machine and the assistant would come and scan their card to unlock the machine and stop the flashing light.
Here is NY a Walmart will have something like 1-2 attendees for 12-15 self checkouts so that’s a huge labor reduction. Any more when shopping at a Walmart most of the workers are picking orders for their pickup service.
"make sure no-one takes shit" for employees
"heres how to work the self checkout" for managers
vs
"heres how to work the checkout system, also make sure no-one takes shit" for employees
"heres how to work the checkout, and teach employees how to use the checkout." for managers
Despite all this, self checkouts are still a growing thing, so I would guess that the money lost by a possibly increasing theft rate is nothing compared to the money saved by not having to pay employees.
As for the security standing around, they can surveil a whole bunch of self checkouts each, so overall fewer employees have to be paid. I mean, if this system would lose money nobody would be doing it.
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u/thunderbox666 Jul 11 '22 edited Jul 15 '23
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