Walmart is trying out a new Scan & Go system, called Fast Lane, in in Toronto. It is an improved version of an earlier, and failed, attempt in the United States.
Fast Lane
The checkout system was appropriately named ‘Fast Lane’: customers can scan their products themselves using the My Walmart app, after which payment is handled automatically. The supermarket chain has tried out the Scan & Go system earlier in 125 stores in the United States, but the technology was soon dropped due to low customer participation.
Still, Walmart never stopped looking for ways to speed up the checkout procedure. In some outlets, employees can process payments using a mobile device, eliminating the need for customers to spend time in a queue. At Sam’s Club, a chain owned by Walmart, the system is still in use and in the Dallas outlet a faster version of the tech is being tried out.
Customers are expecting ever faster payment methods: American research indicates that 49 % of consumers uses some form of self-scanning every week. Now that self-service options are becoming more prevalent, customers are expecting technology that is better, faster and easier. Scan & Go-technology and registerless shopping are in a testing phase at several major retailers: Amazon Go is the prime example, but in Europe the technology is also slowly being adopted in such chains as Auchan, Albert Heijn, Delhaize and Decathlon.
