Published on 12, July, 2020
I love self service tills in shops. They are much more hygienic than manned tills. The only unhygienic part is pressing the button asking how I'm making the payment and if I want a receipt.
On manned tills the operator touches every item of food I buy and on a recent visit I saw an operator sneeze all over herself and her hands and food items.
Now some shops are going into reverse, Booths are ripping out their self service tills, and my local branch of Iceland has gone back to manned tills only.
All opinions are welcome.
There are pros and cons.
One advantage is when paying cash, the machine is more honest and reliable when giving change. At a manned till I have been short changed by an operator several times in the past.
Problems with the self service tills often depend on the particular model, most weigh the items you buy but in certain shops such as my local Aldi they don't detect very light items at all and staff have to override the machine.
With self service tills, staff have to be on their feet all day. On manned tills they can sit all day.
Self service tills need staff to ok restricted or age restricted items. Even when they video the customer, can't they use AI to estimate the customers age.
Cash? What’s that lol - since Covid, I use contactless with my card on my phone and I very rarely have to use my actual card with my PIN
I seldom carry cash, so tend to pay with my contactless debit card and was doing it long before Covid. The drawback is if the cost of my shopping requires me to enter my card's PIN, resulting in me frantically trying to remember what it is.