With my job I tend to fly a lot, and I must say one of the coolest things Virgin Blue did is bring in the self service kiosks. Walk into airport, see the HUGE queue but a whole lot of empty kiosks. Since I travel without baggage, I can spend a couple of minutes checking in and done! I think the extra benefit is that those 2 minutes I'm engaged in doing something. Even if waiting in line for a couple of minutes, I'm shuffling along with nothing to do but wait for OTHER people.
People don't like waiting. You see this whenever someone takes a side street to avoid waiting at traffic lights. In my experience, the travel time often ends up longer avoiding the traffic lights, but knowing this I'm still a sucker for taking alternate routes to avoid waiting.
Getting side tracked with analogies on my analogies here :) I didn't actually try the self checkout the other day, but I will next time I'm in. There are friendly staff around there helping people so good time to try it out with the training wheels on. Just think how great this will be when you dash in during quiet times to buy a loaf of bread, and don't have to wait at the only open checking behind the lady doing her weekly shop!
3 comments:
Hi Nate,
I think these have been slowly working their way in. Last Christmas my parents' local big W had ones which even involved credit card signatures on a touch-sensitive screen (DS-style).
I gave the coles one a go last week as a staff member was egging people on. I said "looks good, but i want to use old-style money" (you know, the type with people's faces on it, and numbers written in the corner). But it turns out it does that too.
I had precise money, so i didn't get to test out the poker-machine-style change-giving. The questions seemed a bit odd (like asking whether i was using my own bag or the ones provided) and there was a step where i had to press "Done" for no apparent reason (just an extra step). Perhaps you could give them your business card and offer some reprogramming. :)
I realise society is going all super-serious, but i reckon if they're asking what bags i'm using, an input of "brought my own" could prompt a thumbs up logo with a "good on you" message - or an encouraging little smiley face that winks ;)
Overall, it was a fun game to play (for someone who never was a checkout jockey as a teenager) but with my lack of barcoding skills i don't think i'm saving too much time. I reckon the main winner is coles' staff wage budget.
Wow had no idea they'd been around that long in oz! I'm very keen to try them out.
I won't think for a minute that once at the checkout, I could scan items quicker than the trained staff. I think the real value comes in where you would otherwise wait in line for a trained person (limited resource) to do what you can do yourself. The fact that it's fun only increases its value!
Now I wish they just had self service deli in Coles so I don't get stuck waiting so long to order a few slices of ham.
An update ..... turns out the machines themselves are better than i expected - in terms of giving change. I purchased $2 worth of stuff with a $20 note, and the change consisted of 3x5's a $2 and a $1.
Granted, a real person would give a 10 and a 5 - but it was better than the 9x $2 coins i expected (from experience with train ticket machines).
I guess the difference is that train stations are left unattended for hours/days and so they need to recycle the coins you put in. Conversely, the machines at coles can be regular replenished with notes, because there are always staff members around.
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