Adm_Drummer

Why don't carts have a little handheld scanner, then you pay at a scale?

https://lemmy.world/post/26769203

Why don't carts have a little handheld scanner, then you pay at a scale? - Lemmy.World

Pretty much the title. Like, get those handheld scanners and attach them to the carts. I scan items as I put them in, roll up to a “register” where the cart is weighed and verified by a cashier. I just hand over the cash then leave. Or even better, install load sensors in the cart. Usually I like to pack my groceries into my boxes as I get them into the cart. Keeps things orderly and neat and I also don’t buy more than I can carry home. But this means I have to unpack them to place on the belt then pack them all over again after paying. It would be kinda nice to just pay by the cart load.

Mar 13, 2025 at 10:56amWeb
Show threadBestBouclettesMar 13, 2025
That exists and it’s really nifty. At least in France, you have them in most big brand supermarkets. The downside is that it requires a user account.
Show threadAdm_DrummerMar 13, 2025
Very interesting! I haven’t had the chance to do groceries in France yet. I’d love to see it though. It just seems so nice.
Show threadhalcyoncmdrMar 13, 2025

The downside is that it requires a user account.

Most large US supermarkets make you have loyalty accounts to get their real prices anyway as it is, in exchange for your buying habits, otherwise everything is marked up.

Show threadKoboldCoterieMar 13, 2025
I really hate this shit and honestly I feel like it should be illegal. Like, offer discounts for the loyalty program members, sure, whatever, but the price on the shelf when you pick up the item should not be able to have contingencies attached.
Show thread[deleted] in lemmyMar 13, 2025
Discounts for loyalty members is the same thing as higher prices for the general public.
Show threadstormdelayMar 13, 2025
Why is volume a fair discount? Should a single person pay more for their groceries than a family?
Show thread[deleted] in lemmyMar 13, 2025
Selling in volume is cheaper for the business, like 16 roll packs of toilet paper are cheaper per roll than four packs.
Show threadKoboldCoterieMar 13, 2025

Discounts for loyalty members is the same thing as higher prices for the general public.

I generally agree with you, but I think it’d be very difficult to legislate this. (For example, if you ban “discounts” for loyalty program members, they instead offer “rebates” which functionally is the same effect. If you ban “rebates”, they instead send you a coupon for your next visit after you shop.)

If the advertised price is what a non-loyalty-program shopper pays, I have less of a problem with it, but what gets me is when the item is listed as, for example, “2 for $3” on the shelf, and at the register rings up for $3.69 each unless you swipe a loyalty card. Fuck that shit.

Show threadamniotic druidMar 13, 2025

Theft, pretty much. They wanna see you empty that shopping cart before you leave.

You know what would be nice? Check out the Uniqlo checkout booths in Japan Video and imagine that tech connected to a single shopping cart that just charges your card when you walk through the door

Uniqlo Self Checkout in Japan #japan #shorts

YouTube
Show threadAdm_DrummerMar 13, 2025

Well it’s a good thing they hardly ever employ cashiers and make me go through self-checkout. I’d never steal from self-checkout.

I’m guessing those checkouts you linked use some sort of RFID chip in the tag? Pretty interesting!

Show threadLibra00Mar 13, 2025
I heard some grocery chain was experimenting with rfid chips on all their products so you can just load up and leave and sensors at the door detect what you’re carrying and charge you the appropriate amount automatically. Personally I’d rather pull up to a register and have it show me a list of what’s in my cart and the total price rather than automatically charging, but otherwise it’s not a bad idea.
Show threadAdm_DrummerMar 13, 2025
I’m with you. Automatically charging sounds like a nightmare. I still always want a human to verify everything a computer says. I don’t trust a corporate entity to not try and rio me off.
Show threadValmondMar 13, 2025

Well you’d get a ticket or a screen showing it all before paying? Like when you scan yourself.

My concern is the e-waste of a trillion RFID chips.

Show threadAdm_DrummerMar 13, 2025
Yeah, RFID may be a shit way to go tbh. I was definitely thinking just traditional barcode scanners attached to a small computer on the cart.
Show threadCptmurph616Mar 13, 2025
We have this at my local grocery store (Meijer) down in the states. You use the grocery store’s app and scan as you go then pay at a kiosk. There’s a scale at the kiosk to weigh produce or I think there’s an app for that too. No need to weigh the whole thing. It’s called “Shop & Scan”.
Show threadwellbuddyweekMar 13, 2025

I’m going to assume you’re in a country where they have the self checkout things which have a ‘bagging area’ of some sort wit a scale under it?

In the Netherlands we have selfcheckout without this weighing. You walk into the store, grab a handscanner, and as you walk through the store you can pick something up, scan it, put it in your own bag and continue. When you get yo the register, you scan some barcode on the screen of the register woth your scanner, touch your nfc bank card to the terminal, and walk out. No need to take anything out of your bag.

Sometimes they do random checks, then some employee comes over and scans a few items from your bag. But you can just let it be their problem. They’ll usually put the stuff they’ve taken out back in again aswell.

Show threadtimlyoMar 13, 2025
We have something similar in the UK.
Show threadnot_woody_shawMar 13, 2025
Typically, you need to already be a member of the stores loyalty/rewards scheme, so that they know who you are before you start scanning items. And if anything goes wrong, like you try to rip them off, or a technical issue with the scanner, you get locked out from using the scanners until you call their support line and sort it out.
Show threadSuck_on_my_PresenceMar 13, 2025
We had those briefly where I was in the states right before and during COVID. It was so nice being able to pack things in bags neatly and just ring it all up at the end easily.
Show threadother_catMar 13, 2025
Some places in the US have this! My local Stop and Shop does.
Show threadsunbrrnslapperMar 13, 2025

We’ll, there’s Amazon go, which is actually slightly better than having to scan and check out: en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazon_Go#:~:text=Amazon ….

Also Kroger did what you are recommending like 10 years ago, but it looked silly compared to Amazon go, so it didn’t really stick in my area.

Amazon Go - Wikipedia

Show threadBjörnMar 13, 2025

We have that in one shop. It started with just a scanner and at the register you’d get random searches. By now the scale is integrated into the cart.

It sucks a bit because with the first system you could quickly scan ten items and throw them into the cart. But now you have to wait a bit after throwing something into the cart for the scale to give the ok.

They don’t weigh at the end because that way you can have your shopping bags or boxes in the cart. That way the cart’s weight at the beginning is registered as 0 and when you’re done shopping you just have to lift your bags directly from the cart into your car. I guess that could be mitigated by having a scale at the entrance of the shop.

But for all the waiting after scanning one item it’s still much nicer than having to load everything from the cart to the register and then back into the cart again.

Show threadAcamonMar 13, 2025
Yeah, seen something like this in the UK. You take a scanner and scan everything as you shop, then just lay the bill as you exit. To begin with they even offered a discount I think. But they didn’t have a weigh option, just that they’d check some carts ‘at random’. My understanding was, like self checkouts, even if there’s a little more theft it’s more than made up for by less workers.
Show threadsasquashMar 13, 2025
In Switzerland big super markets have this with handscanners. You can also use the Supermarkt App and scan the stuff with your smartphone. When you leave you just checkout and payment is processed automatically if you have set it up or you can pay at a terminal. Sometimes they do random checks.
Show threadfievelMar 13, 2025
Same in Belgium, no scale involved, just a handled scanner you bring in the shop. At checkout you give (or put back depending on the supermarket) the scanner, then an algorithm tell you if you’re elected to a partial control (in which case a cashier scan some of the articles, again there are some rules depending on the brand of supermarket - some ask rescan 5 random products, some 10, some explicitly list most valuable items, some require the cashier to count items,…). I say an algorithm because experience show it’s not just random (for example in the supermarket brand I most often go, if you cancel an item on the scanner, you’re 100% sure to have a control).
Show threadTomtitsMar 13, 2025

There is a trail going on in Gateshead (UK).

www.bbc.com/news/articles/c0rzvrjkklko

Tesco trials giant trolley scales in Gateshead

Trolleys are weighed before checkout to identify any items customers might have missed or scanned twice.

Show threadNoel_SkumMar 13, 2025

There’s at least one UK supermarket that lets you do this.

Info:

Show threadabominable_pandaMar 13, 2025

Tesco in the uk does this.

Coincidentally enough this post a few down from yours (on my feed) shows a trial for the second part of your post

Tesco trials giant trolley scales in Gateshead - Lemmy.World

Lemmy

Show threadcRazi_manMar 13, 2025
I think other large supermarkets do too.
Show threadGrumpyDucklingMar 13, 2025
Sam’s Club in America you can use their app to scan your stuff and pay. They check your receipt on the way out.
Show threadSludgeyyMar 13, 2025

My Sam’s Club has two big arch camera things that scan your items as you walk past. Person at door that normally scans ~3 items and receipt, just waves and says “You’re good to go!”. Been like this for months.

Scan and go is amazing.

The arch is kind of cool but they just had to scan ~3 things manually before so it’s not that game changing. But nice.

Show threadrem26_artMar 13, 2025
Stop & Shop in the US does this (or at least it did? I never used it so I barely pay attention to it lol). There's like a wall of handheld scanners you can pick up when you enter and a little place on the cart for them to go in. You can scan and bag your stuff as you go and then pay at a special register.
Show threadAgrivarMar 13, 2025
They definitely still do it at both locations in my town. I shop for one, so I’ve never felt the need to try it out, but I see other people using them regularly.
Show threadNRBQMar 13, 2025

youtu.be/izjhx17NuSE

If you jump to the 16 minute mark of this video, you can see engineers in the 90s brainstorming the concept of having a scanner built into the cart. The idea has been around for a while.

The whole video is a time capsule in itself.

IDEO: Shopping Cart Design Process

YouTube
Show threadDiddlydeeMar 13, 2025
These exist, albeit not attached to the trolley (which makes sense).
Show threadbluGillMar 13, 2025

Walmart spent millions on rfid trying to do this. Howevera cart full of razor blades would always not read something so they gave up.

as others have said what you ask for evists - but only where most people are honest enough to not cheat. Where stores don't trust everyone the cost of verification is more than any savings.

Show threadSludgeyyMar 13, 2025

Sam’s Club, owned by Walmart, does this basically.

You scan items with your phone, check out, then walk under this arch camera things to leave, I haven’t been stopped to be manually checked in ages.

Show threadbluGillMar 13, 2025
Sams club attracts different customers from WalMart and so they don't have the same crime concerns.
Show threadSludgeyyMar 13, 2025

Walmart spent millions on rfid trying to do this. Howevera cart full of razor blades would always not read something so they gave up.

My point was Walmart, Sam’s parent company, spent millions and carried it out in their other store. I don’t know if it’s rfid, but I’m sure their research in it overlapped with the way they implemented it in Sam’s.

Show threadm-p{3}Mar 13, 2025

The grocery store I often go to had these barcode scanner you vould borrow at the entrance and scan your stuff as you go, along with scale that you could print a barcode sticker for the stuff you pay by weight.

Once you were done, you’d scan a QR card at the self-service checkout to upload all the stuff you scanned, then pay.

It was awesome, you could just pack as you go. Unfortunately they scrapped the project once they found out that the amount of theft was significantly higher with this system. So yeah, we can’t have nice things 😒

Show threadricdehMar 13, 2025
At least in Germany, at a lot of Rewes (supermarket chain), this is absolutely a thing and very common. You can place the handheld barcode scanners in a specialised holder on the cart handle and then scan as you go, and neatly package all your stuff before going to the checkout and paying at a terminal. If even Germany has got this by now, then every other country on the planet surely does too lol.
Show threadParadachshundMar 13, 2025
Do they make it easy to put something back if you change your mind?
Show threadsilly goose meekahMar 13, 2025

Yup, you can just edit the amount of items you scanned. Also makes it easier to “scan” an item in bulk.

They dont check the cart weight, instead they just randomly pick out people where they go through their scanned items and check that nothing else is in the cart. I’m being checked about once every 20 times I go.

Show threadParadachshundMar 13, 2025
That all sounds awesome. We definitely don’t have that in NW US yet. Hope we get it eventually.
Show threadstarlingukMar 13, 2025
Our Edeka has a system like that too.
Show threadChaoticNeutralCzechMar 14, 2025
So does Kaufland and Albert in the Czech Republic
Show threadPissman2020Mar 13, 2025
Ikea does this with their app, but generally, you go to ikea to get one or two items, so it doesn’t really speed up the proccess of checking out
Show threadremonMar 13, 2025

We do.

Not attached to the cart, but you can pick up a scanner at the entrence, scan all your stuff and at the end you scan your scanner. No need for the scale.

Show threadSolidShakeMar 13, 2025
I do this with my phone at meijer. No need for a device when you’re phone can scan already.
Show threadundeffeinedMar 13, 2025
S Chain in Finland offers this, you have of course to have their customer loyalty card.
Show threadtajuntaMar 13, 2025
But if you want to just use the self-service cashier automats, I think the loyalty card is optional. For scanners though it might be required, I’ve never used those. The self-service cashier points are easy enough for me. 😊
Show threadundeffeinedMar 13, 2025
For the scanner you need the card, yes. For the self check out only no
Show threadheavydustMar 13, 2025
We have that in France too.
Show threadkayzeekayzeeMar 13, 2025
They had this at Stop & Shop for a while in the US. Don’t know if that’s still how it works though.
Show threadHubertManneMar 13, 2025
amazon fresh stores do something like this.
Show threadSheenSquelcherMar 13, 2025
Tesco in the UK has had handheld scanners for years, and are trialling scales.
Show threadwewbullMar 13, 2025
Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Waitrose all do the in the UK
Show threadget_the_reference_Mar 13, 2025

If you pack your groceries in boxes in the cart, wouldn’t that throw off the weight at the checkout?

Sam’s Club does it all with a self-checkout app and cart-scanning cameras at the exit. If you only get one or two things and don’t use a cart, then an associate needs to spot-scan on the way out, but otherwise it works great!

Show threadCrashumbcMar 13, 2025
Some giants have had handheld scanners for a decade… You just grab one as you walk in, scan and pack everything and hand it to the cashier on way out.
Show threadChaoticNeutralCzechMar 14, 2025

And you need a membership card because of course you do

Also why involve a cashier when self-checkout is available?