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Walmart just announced plans to remove all human cashiers from stores and go fully self-checkout by the end of this year, Positively Osceala reports.
According to the country’s largest employer, the chain’s 10,000 stores will feature exclusively self-checkout and/or “Scan & Go” by the end of 2021. Wow–we wonder how this will impact its employees!
As we know, many retail and fast food chains accelerated their contactless payment technologies amid the coronavirus pandemic last year.
The retail juggernaut announced on its website that it was currently testing a store with 34 registers lining the edges of a wide-open store. The registers are equipped with a green light that alerts store associates to available checkout lines. The lanes will be open all the time. Wow–it does sound like it will move people through the checkout process faster!
The company asserts that the process will be manned by humans.
“At first glance, the new area may look like it’s just a bunch of self-checkout registers. But ask any associate, and they’ll tell you it’s a full-service checkout experience,” Matt Smith with corporate affairs said in a June 30th statement.
“It’s not just a self-checkout experience. It’s a manned checkout experience if you want. We’re able to move customers through a lot faster,” frontend team lead Matt Downing seconded.
Yes, the company asserts that all employees will transition to being “hosts” with the new checkout model, but we can’t help but wonder how not having an employee at each and every checkout could possibly NOT result in fewer jobs? For every guest that can checkout without the help of a host, aren’t they making a case for removing that position?
The Osceola paper visited 4 local Walmart store locations, and associates in 3 of the 4 stores confirmed that they were going cashier-less this year. This is wild!