While the health crisis has increased the use of self-checkout registers, some retailers, including Walmart and Costco, are rethinking their approach, according to CBS News.
The implementation of these self-checkout registers was intended to reduce labor costs, but these companies have noticed an increase in theft and "shrinking" bills.
Some customers unintentionally scan items incorrectly while others take advantage of lax surveillance in the self-checkout aisles to avoid paying for certain items.
Customers have developed tactics to reduce their grocery bills. Among them is not scanning an item and/or swapping a cheap item like bananas for a more expensive item like steak.
CBS News indicates that a study conducted among retailers in the United States, Great Britain, and other European countries revealed that companies with self-checkout registers had a loss rate of around 4%, which is more than double the sector average.
To address the situation, stores have attempted to limit losses by enhancing the security of self-checkout registers, such as adding weight sensors. However, these additional measures also lead to more frustrating errors requiring employee intervention.
CBS News notes that Walmart removed self-checkout registers in some of its New Mexico stores earlier this year.
Costco has announced that it is increasing staff in self-checkout payment areas after discovering that non-members were sneaking in to use membership cards that didn't belong to them during self-checkout.
Are we heading towards the end of self-checkout registers? Only time will tell...
