Stores Ask Shoppers to Use the Honor System

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-12-04/stores-ask-shoppers-to-use-the-honor-system-when-it-s-time-to-pay

26 44 7 years ago

jandrese4• 7 years ago

The honor system doesn't work at scale. A small percentage of the population are kleptomaniacs or desperate for their next hit and there isn't an easy way to filter them out. Even with small groups you are playing the odds.

The only thing keeping the stores in the article in business is that they stock only a relatively small amount of cheap merchandise with no secondary market. Their total liability is so low that it's cheaper than hiring staff.

ars• 7 years ago

The only thing keeping the stores in the article in business is that they stock only a relatively small amount of cheap merchandise with no secondary market. Their total liability is so low that it's cheaper than hiring staff.

Giant Eagle, which is a huge grocery store recently started the exact same thing: https://www.beaconjournal.com/news/20190222/zap-giant-eagle-...

They've been doing it for a year, and have added stores, so contrary to what you say, clearly it works.

jandrese4• 7 years ago

Looks like they still have staff manning the store. That is just an alternate form of self-checkout. In fact the article states that they will retain the same level of staff.

briefcomment4• 7 years ago

Also, (I can see it being possible that)* when it is communicated that the only thing stopping you from stealing is your own conscience, a burden is placed on your conscience every time you shop. I think people will be surprised to see how worn down the conscience can get when you keep invoking it for insignificant situations (in other words, when your conscience belies rationality). People may find themselves stealing when they never would've before.

*added as an edit

vorpalhex2• 7 years ago

I hope the act of not murdering or not stealing isn't slowly wearing you down.

_vertigo• 7 years ago

This doesn't jibe with my personal experience at all. Do you have any evidence for this phenomenon existing?

I've heard of willpower being an expendable resource, but not conscience. I don't feel like it places a burden on my conscience to do the right thing, in fact, the opposite is true - doing things against my conscience causes a mental burden or strain, maybe explainable by cognitive dissonance (I am a moral person // I just did something I consider immoral).

gwbas1c• 7 years ago

I think people will be surprised to see how worn down the conscience can get when you keep invoking it for insignificant situations.

At least in the US, there are so many opportunities to steal. In so many stores, it's so easy to just walk out with merchandise. So many private properties have items that aren't bolted down.

(Someone could steal about $1000 of firewood from my backyard, for example, plus the nice racks.)

Somehow, I don't think your prediction will come true.

lopmotr• 7 years ago

I have heard of people regularly stealing from self checkout after first doing it by accident and then realizing how good it felt to get away with.

munificent• 7 years ago

I completely agree, especially having seen what the lack of policing of minor property crime has done to Seattle in the past few years. (In Seattle today, at least in my neighborhood, theft and vandalism are essentially legal. The police will not show up, will not investigate, and will not prosecute. Criminals knows this and act accordingly.)

A social system can rely on the goodwill of its participants for quite some time. But as that system grows and becomes more well known, it inevitably becomes a honeypot for bad actors to exploit. Once those bad actors take advantage of it and experience the lack of consequences, that behavior is reinforced and shared with other bad actors.

The system will either need to change to flush them out, or it will cease to function even for good actors.

boomboomsubban• 7 years ago

Arresting each thief costs taxpayers hundreds of dollars at least, and is unlikely to dissuade people from stealing as they don't have a lot of better options.

monocasa• 7 years ago

That's not Seattle, that's everywhere. I lived in seven states and can't think of a town where the cops would do anything other than write down a report for your insurance. They for sure aren't going to investigate anything, even if you say "it's this guy, at this address, with these car plates. My camera has it all recorded"

gdilla• 7 years ago

Is it supposed to? It's a cost benefit analysis - do they save money by investing in all the tech? Or is it cheaper to use honor system with little to no investment to do so? Given there's always bad actors all the time, there's some minimum of loss from theft that always exists.

ggm• 7 years ago

Since it hasn't been tried at scale, this is an unfounded proposition.

Shops already deal with routine pilfering. My partner's secondhand bookshop had an estimated 5%+ loss rate from petty theft. Large department stores deal with almost continuous shoplifting.

Yes, theft is ubiquitous in a small part of the population. No, this does not mean the honour system cannot work "at scale"

axaxs4• 7 years ago

This only works with low cost items, and/or in nice areas. In low income areas, even many fully manned stores bail due to shrinkage. I'd like to see a middle ground, personally. I like the idea of grabbing and going, using some combination of rf tags and my phone to just charge me automatically. This sounds like the best of both worlds. In an honor system, I'd feel like I'm paying more to cover those who are stealing - which is already a big problem in some areas, like baby products.

nxpnsv• 7 years ago

In Sweden since at least ten years, and Austria in recent years, most big markets support self checkout. Theft costs are apparently less than salaries for manual checkouts...

axaxs4• 7 years ago

We have that too in USA of course, but self checkout is not at all helpful to either issue. In my experience, it takes longer than a cashier for anything more than a few items. Amazon was supposedly working on a grab and go type system, though I haven't followed it.

As for the other issue of theft, most places with self-checkout do have a few staffers, but no real security, and are taught to not bother people who are stealing. This leads to food deserts which is quite sad. I'd rather have automated payments, with real security at the door that makes sure that you pay. And no, not like Costco/Sams digging through your stuff, more an automated system or at most flashing your phone at them.

rootusrootus2• 7 years ago

Practically every decent size market in the US has had self-checkout for many years. That's not a new phenomenon. There's still a staff member monitoring, but they are overseeing a dozen terminals and their job is about helping customers that run into some kind of snag, not catching shoplifters.

This newer idea seems to be small markets with no staff at all on site. Though it's not that new, we've had Avanti Markets at my workplace for a number of years now, and it's an honor system.

logfromblammo• 7 years ago

I was once in a Walgreens in New Orleans, waiting on other members of the party to finish shopping, and someone walked in, filled a backpack from one shelf in under 30 seconds, and walked straight back out again. I looked to the registers, and saw that one of the cashiers had also seen the whole thing, apparently doing nothing.

It felt a little odd to realize that I didn't feel like I owed Walgreens anything in that moment, not even to report what I saw. At the time, I really identified with the scene in the 2002 Spider-Man movie when PP steps aside for the wrestling venue robber. Go on, li'l Robin Hood; stick it to The Man and be well. My relationship with Walgreens has always been purely transactional; they did once have an opportunity to upgrade it, back when I lived in Chicago, but chose not to.

The money that goes into their registers gets sent to Deerfield, and from there on to the shareholders. The merchandise that walks out the door presumably stays local. So why should the cashiers care? They're only hurt if the whole store shuts down.

An entity like that would not do well on the honor system, I think. Walgreens isn't even a person to me. If they won't support my community at even a minimal level, by hiring one local to mind the store, I don't feel particularly motivated to keep their operating costs low out of some sense of goodwill. And I don't have qualms against stealing from robots. If you want me to not steal, on the basis of my own honor, you need to show me the person that would be harmed if I did. If they are all anonymous, and far away, it just doesn't feel as much like stealing. But that real live employee, who may be getting only $10/hour, suffices entirely, even if they just sit there and watch as I check myself out at a kiosk. If I steal, and the store shuts down, that real person loses a part of their livelihood.

Like corporate loyalty, "honor" is a two-edged sword. To benefit from the honor of others, the business must cultivate honor of its own. Walgreens hasn't build up enough for me to care. And they did bribe government customers with kickbacks, and murder that homeless guy in Hollywood, and back Theranos.

vorpalhex2• 7 years ago

I imagine this works well in semi-secured contexts - meaning within a gated apartment complex or in a church. The items are low value (a nice box meal is maybe $20?) and the value of stealing is minimal since you can't resell the goods or hold onto them for any period of time.

The mirrors are an interesting idea. I was recently reading Schneier's book on trust and he makes reference to an experiment where theft rates were reduced when there were portraits of eyes facing shoppers.

I'm sure they still need some token security, and the article mentions some kind of basic camera. I imagine scanning your credit card to enter would also be highly effective (though possibly have other downsides).

proc0• 7 years ago

Is this a poorman's version of Amazon Go stores? lol

rootusrootus2• 7 years ago

In a sense. But that's good, because do we really want Amazon to become as ubiquitous in brick and mortar as they are online? Glad to see other retailers trying to innovate to stay competitive.

axaxs4• 7 years ago

I don't necessarily want that, but if every other company is sitting on their hands, it's their loss. Walmart is the absolute worst. They have the size, money, and a decent tech team, but the checkout experience still sucks. At least the last time I visited, it was all self checkouts. Very small kiosks, so you constantly had to stop and tie your bags and find somewhere to put them while you scan more. All while trying to avoid the family next to you ramming you with their cart or their kids running around you, since the kiosks are less than a cart lengths apart. Assuming you are lucky enough to pay without needing to wait on an assistant for the inevitable machine issues, you'll then be stopped at the door and have your receipt checked if you have anything you decided not to bag. It's literally the worst checkout experience I could dream up.

joemi• 7 years ago

That's mentioned in the article.

efa• 7 years ago

Sub-title of the story: "Stores want to give customers an Amazon Go-like experience..."

throwaway2048• 7 years ago

Stores already ask shoppers to use the honour system, even without self checkout, that's why we don't ask a clerk at a counter to fetch our goods anymore.

tantalor• 7 years ago

without the big expense of cameras, sensors and software
People scan everything themselves
Customers are trusted to use their phones

There certainly are cameras, sensors, and software expenses; it's just some of that burden is paid by the customers.

Sohcahtoa822• 7 years ago

I'm not sure that's true. Traditionally, customers are paying for the wages of the cashier.

Cameras, sensors, and software are likely 1-time purchases. There may be cloud storage costs if your cameras are storing videos off-prem, and maybe the software is a monthly license fee, but I'd wager those costs are cheaper than a cashier.

lotsofpulp• 7 years ago

I would not call using an item which one already owns with zero marginal cost to be an expense for the customer.

Stores Ask Shoppers to Use the Honor System

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