[smackfu]

I guess it depends on the quality of the self-checkout system. At my Stop & Shop, there are four or six self-checkout lanes staffed by a single person (Go go union job elimination!) If you get through a purchase without running into "wait for attendant", sure it's fast. But if you do have to wait, because their fundamental distrust of the customers makes the system get many false positives for stealing, now you are in a secondary line of people waiting for the attendant, and the time for checkout is terrible.

[jff]

Wow, that sucks. My local store only ever does "wait for assistance" when you buy booze... and half the time the attendant will just gleefully press "ok" on his terminal without even checking my ID, so it goes even faster :)

Implementation details matter, I guess. (Pretend I made some interesting reference to Steve Jobs' managing style here)

[finnw]

In some stores if you scan alcohol the machine will freeze until the attendant turns the key.

In others, it flashes a light to alert the attendant. It allows you to carry on scanning, but the attendant must turn the key before you pay.

I just hope that isn't patented.

[tomkarlo]

Yup.. the system tends to bump into that mode any time it notices a disparity between the weight of the bag you're filling and the items you've scanned. I had that trigger last night because I brushed the top of my paper bag while scanning the next item.

The short term problem is that there's only one attendant and many customers run into problems with the process - I was stuck behind an elderly couple that couldn't figure out the card payment terminal. All I needed was for the attendant to press one button on her screen so I could keep scanning. If they're going to switch to these new systems they should at least use 2-3 attendants for a while until customers get used to them.