The scan scam Jeremy Clark
OPINION Jeremy Clark negotiates the world of self-service machines and discovers real people do it better
They say unemployment is on the up and that’s clearly a problem. Well, I think I have a solution. I went to a DIY superstore the other day to buy something. This is unusual because as you know, for me at least, DIY means Don’t Involve Yourself. Any home improvements I undertake usually involve liberal use of a hammer, large quantities of duct tape and invariably a trip to A&E. In fact before embarking on some light plumbing, Mrs C will call the local medical facilities to reserve a cubicle and have an ambulance with paramedics on standby.
Whereas most men can’t wait for the opportunity to get their tools out, I prefer to reach for the Yellow Pages or start googling. Anyway the point is, when it came to payment time at the DIY store I was faced with either a queue at the till or the new self-scan auto-checkout. These are much like the self-check-ins we now have at the airport and are supposed to reduce manpower saving fortunes for airlines, so spotting someone with a flat-pack shelf queuing at the till and figuring I’d be out much faster, I headed for the automats. The first item I scanned came up with a wrong price. That involved two people to reset the auto checkout and another to go and find the correct price. Then followed problems with unreadable bar codes, credit card reader, scales not registering, and all accompanied by an annoying voice telling me sweetly to “please rescan your item”. It took three members of staff, a lot of tutting and eye swivelling to get me through this debacle. Was I faster? In a word, no.
The shelf guy was back home, had put up his shelves, cooked a
44
WWW.ONBOARDHOSPITALITY.COM
Bolognese for the family, changed the baby’s nappy and mowed the lawn before I had bagged my four items. I left with the stupid machine still calling after me to “please place your item on the scale”. It’s the same story at the
supermarket when using these new scan-as-you-go systems. Again, multiple employees involved in sorting out various issues before I could escape. Had I gone through the till I’d have been a lot faster. Now I read that easyJet is to abolish check-in staff. This is a big mistake. The legacy airlines manage this a little better with their self check-ins at airports but it’s all so impersonal and they still have assistants wandering amongst them to help the hapless and bewildered.
Easyjet and Ryanair’s solution is worse. There will be no one. So what DO you do if your printer packs up just as you were leaving the house? Or your mobile battery runs flat with
Bring on progress AND cut unemployment – just install more machines no one knows how to use!
your electronic boarding pass secreted in its memory banks?
This isn't progress, it has nothing to do with improving the customer experience. It’s solely about selfish cost-cutting. We all know Ryanair couldn't care less, in fact they’d prefer if you didn’t show up at all, but I’m truly surprised at easyJet. It takes me on average no more than 60 – 90 seconds to check-in with bags and that personal contact gives you the confidence you have been processed properly and are really on your way. Recently, I watched a confused family of four at LHR T5 trying to self check-in. There were two kind and helpful staff on hand to help them through it. It took eight minutes to get them sorted, then they had to deposit bags. Meanwhile I checked in normally in exactly 48 seconds, with bag. So yes. . . bring on progress and let's do our bit to reduce unemployment. Here's my advice, achieve both by installing more machines we can't use!
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100