News

Australian grocer scales back self-serve checkout

June 13, 2012

Woolworths, an Australian grocer, is cutting its self-service checkouts for customers in 400 retail outlets across the country. The kiosks, which launched in 2008 and now number about 2,000, allow customers to scan, bag and pay for their own groceries, according to ZDNet.com.

Although the company reported in 2011 that the kiosks had reduced supervisor intervention by 68 percent, it is now replacing them with single-line queues in the inner-city stores.

"At this stage, we are looking at reducing the number of self-serve checkouts in a very small number of stores in inner-city locations. This is all about increasing customer convenience, and getting them through the checkout in the shortest amount of time," Woolworths said in the story.

Read more about self-checkout.