Review: Tesco Scan as you Shop

So, some of you may have been into your local Tesco recently and seen these strange new additions to your trolleys, a holder of sorts.  When I saw these at my local Tesco last week I thought they might be introducing the scan as you go technology I have previously seen at Sainsbury's.  

I was right, this week when I went to do my weekly shop I was accosted by a member of staff and asked if I wanted to give it a go and was given a leaflet of the terms and conditions of use.  These are common sense really basically informing you that you will be spot checked occasionally to ensure you have scanned everything and if you do knowingly steal (not accidentally forget to scan) then you won't be able to use the service anymore.  You also have to register for the service which involves scanning your clubcard and entering your post code.  Then your ready to go!

To begin you scan your clubcard and a scanner will be highlighted for you to pick up and use.  It really is simple there are a few buttons on the scanner itself.  One is to scan items, one is to remove items and there is one which has promotional information on about products you scan.  You simply go along do your weekly shop and scan everything as you put it in your trolley.  At the end you go to a special designated area which closely resembles a cattle cage and park your trolley in a bay alongside a touch screen (same as self-serve) till.  You then simply scan a bar code on that till to confirm you have finished your shop and it will upload the data to the till.  At this point I had to have a spot check as it was my first shop and these will be random in future.  A member of staff just scanned approximately 10 random items to confirm I had scanned them and then I went ahead and paid.  

So the benefits of this service:

1. It is convenient, you scan as you go along and then put items straight into bags rather than have a face off with an evil cashier who scans at the speed of light whilst you try to pack everything in a structured way.
2. You beat the queues!  When I went to the tills today the queues were horrific, however, I rather smugly walked on by to the special area for scan as you shop customers where there was no queue and was out within 5 minutes
3. If you have a weekly budget as I do then this is really useful as your total is shown on the screen as you go along including any discounts from promotions.  
4. Its easy!  It really is a user-friendly system.  

Negatives:

There aren't many negatives to the customer except:

1. As with the self serve tills you have to record yourself if you use your own bags for your green points.  I nearly forgot but luckily the staff member reminded me
2. If there are any promotional coupons such as the current ones for knives you have to ask for them or you won't get them, so again you have to have your thinking cap on
3. If you like talking to your cashier at the end of your shop than your not going to have that experience.

To be honest the Negatives for Tesco are way worse than the customer.  Yes they do random spot checks but you will have times when people whether accidentally or not do not scan items and then finish their shop without a spot check meaning a loss on Tesco's side.  They do have clubcard details for each shop but I imagine it would be difficult to attribute a no scanned tin of beans to one customer.  I also think it is gonna make the job of Stock Control very difficult since customers have to remember to scan different flavours separately.  So for example, if I was to buy 2 packs of cous cous that were different flavours I have to scan each one separately but I can imagine there will be people who will double scan one.  

Anyway, I really liked this service and will definitely be using it again for all future shops.  Next time your in Tesco....Give it a go!