[eesmith]

Almost entirely US focused. There's one UK mention: "In the UK, supermarket chain Booths has also cut down on the number of self-service kiosks in its stores, as customers say they're slow and unreliable." linking to https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-lancashire-67373472

That says "Booths is believed to be the first UK supermarket to move away from using self-service tills, which have become increasingly common in recent years." so yeah, hardly an indication of a widespread UK trend.

[bluGill]

Some self checkouts are slow and unreliable. However that is a bug in those particular units. Some of them are just as fast and reliable as what the clerks get - plus I'm never in line behind someone else who is slow. I've had enough waiting for someone who can't figure out which lottery ticket they want to lose their money on. I've had enough waiting on someone else who picks an item that is missing a tag. I have places to be, and lines are not serving me.

[tracerbulletx]

Every time I'm speed running a self checkout I day dream about a world where the price of my groceries is modified significantly lower based on my leader board rank for that day, and that the slow person in front of me is being penalized for being outside the top 100.

[gertrunde]

Booths, which has 27 shops...

[Link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Booths]

[eesmith]

The link I gave to https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-lancashire-67373472 says "All but two of the 28 stores run by the company, which trades in northern England, will have staffed checkouts."

That article is dated 10 November 2023, while the relevant Wikipedia text was changed on 24 February 2021‎.

[gertrunde]

I didn't mean to give the impression that I disagreed with your comment - merely pointing out that they are a particularly small supermarket chain.

[eesmith]

I was more pointing out that the article contained that information already, and was more accurate, so didn't think that the Wikipedia link added anything.

[cassianoleal]

I think it added the information to the thread. I live in the UK and had never heard of Booths despite having travelled around. At first, I thought the article was wrong and meant the Boots drugstore chain instead. Knowing that it's a local, small chain would have helped clarify it.

And yes, reading the article would do that as well but I usually read the comments first before I decide if I want to waste time on the actual thing.

[eesmith]

I can understand that. But from my viewpoint it felt like you were telling me something you thought I wasn't aware of, even though I had read the article before making my comment, or perhaps you thought the number in the article was wrong while the one from Wikipedia was correct.

[nxobject]

Which is interesting, since it’s the BBC…

[eesmith]

... in the "International business" section.

[nxobject]

Touché!