自助结账是个失败的实验吗？

Few aspects of the retail experience get shoppers as riled as self-checkout.

在零售店的体验中很少有哪个环节能像自助结账一样让购物者感到愤怒。

Some people love the speed, convenience, and social distancing. Others complain about finicky machines that don’t scan correctly and a lack of staff to help them. Last fall, Booths became the first U.K. supermarket chain to get rid of self-checkout, citing overwhelming complaints from frustrated shoppers.

有些人喜欢它的快速、便利性和社交距离。但有些人则抱怨那些机器经常不能正确扫描，而且旁边也没有工作人员来帮助他们。去年秋天，Booths成为英国第一家宣布摆脱自助结账功能的连锁超市，理由是他们收到了顾客对自助结账潮水般的抱怨。

“We’re really proud that we’re moving largely to a place where our customers are served by people, by human beings, so rather than artificial intelligence, we’re going for actual intelligence,” the company said.

该公司表示：“我们非常自豪地宣布，我们正在转向一个由人类为客户服务的方向，我们追求的不是人工智能，而是真正的智能。”

Booths’ decision made headlines stateside, adding fuel to the burning debate over self-checkout. But Wharton operations, information and decisions professor Santiago Gallino thinks it’s unlikely that many American stores will follow suit. Love it or hate it, he said, self-checkout is here to stay.

Booths的决定也成为了美国媒体的头条新闻，为自助结账的激烈争论火上浇油。但沃顿商学院运营、信息和决策学教授圣地亚哥·加利诺认为，许多美国商店不太可能步其后尘。他认为，不管你喜欢还是讨厌，自助结账都会一直存在。

“For retailers, it’s a combination of cutting labor and adding flexibility,” he said. “It’s not to make checkout more efficient. They are basically transferring the labor to the customer.”

“对于零售店来说，这是一种削减劳动力和增加灵活性的结合。这并不是为了提高结账效率。实际上店家是在把这部分劳动转移给顾客。”

Gallino said retailers are constantly uating where and how to trim expenses, and the biggest categories are inventory and staff. That’s especially true for grocery stores, which generally have razor-thin profit margins and significant inventory risk. Gallino said it makes sense for supermarkets to install self-checkout lanes to handle busy times and augment a smaller staff. Even Booths said it was keeping self-checkout machines in two of their busiest stores.

加利诺表示，零售商在不断评估在从哪里以及如何削减开支，而最大的成本类别是库存和员工。对于超市来说尤其如此，它们的利润率通常非常低，库存风险很大。“超市安装自助结账通道以应对繁忙时间是有意义的。”就连Booths也表示，他们在最繁忙的两家商店里都继续保留了自助结账机。

“I don’t mind doing it myself,” the professor said. “If I see long lines in the regular checkout, it’s a way for me to get out faster. But I confess sometimes I regret it because they don’t usually work that well. It’s definitely not a flawless system.”

“我不介意自己结账，”教授表示，“如果在结账时看到排长队，自助结账能让我更快离开。但我承认，这个体验有时的确很不爽，因为它们通常不那么好用。这绝对不是一个完美的系统。”

Gallino said retailers must figure out how to tread the line between convenience and annoyance. They also need to know their customer. A department store shopper expects some level of personal service when making a purchase, while someone running into the supermarket for eggs probably doesn’t care.

加利诺说，零售商必须想办法在给人方便和增加烦恼之间划一道界限。他们还需要了解自己客户的特点。百货公司的购物者希望得到一定程度的个性化服务，而冲进超市买鸡蛋的人可能并不在乎用自助结账。

“If you are understaffing and forcing customers to use self-checkout, then you start to annoy your customers, and this is going to backfire,” he said. “Your customers will stop going, especially if it doesn’t have a connection to lower prices.”

他说：“如果你人手不足，强迫顾客使用自助结账，那么你就会开始惹恼顾客，效果适得其反。你的客户以后会更少去你的店里购买，尤其是如果自助结账和更低价格无关的话。”

Some form of self-checkout has been around for decades, but recent improvements in technology have sped up adoption. One study found it was the dominant form of checkout at grocery stores, accounting for 55% of transactions in 2022.

某种形式的自助结账已经存在了几十年，但最近技术的进步加快了采用速度。一项研究发现，自助结账目前是食品超市结账的主要形式，占2022年交易的55%。

The ubiquity has come with a new problem: shrink. Defined as inventory loss due to theft and other factors, shrink at self-checkout is rising because automation makes it easier for shoplifters to help themselves. A survey last year by LendingTree found that 15% of self-checkout users admitted to stealing, and 44% planned to do it again. Even a majority of the 21% who admitted to taking an item accidentally didn’t correct the mistake.

这种普遍性带来了一个新问题：被定义为由于盗窃和其他因素造成的库存损失（Shrink）激增。因为自动化使商店扒手更容易浑水摸鱼。LendingTree去年的一项调查发现，15%的自助结账用户承认有偷窃，其中44%的人计划再次偷窃。即使在21%承认自己是无意中拿走物品的人中，大多数人也没有纠正自己的错误。

Sophisticated monitoring systems aren’t stopping thieves, who have learned to get around both the cameras, the sensitive scales, and the overworked attendant. One self-described “self-checkout swiper” wrote a blog on techniques to steal from supermarkets, including keying in product numbers for cheaper items, scanning products with the barcode facing up or covered, scanning fake barcodes, and using bulky items to obscure the view of smaller, expensive items.

复杂的监控系统并不能阻止小偷，他们已经学会了绕过摄像头、灵敏的磅秤和过度劳累的服务员。一位自称“自助结账刷单者”的人写了一篇博客，介绍从超市偷窃的技巧，包括输入较便宜商品的产品编号，扫描条形码朝上或覆盖的产品，扫描假条形码，以及使用笨重的商品遮挡较小、昂贵商品的视线。

The shrink rate from self-checkout is estimated between 3.5% and 4%, compared with a rate of less than 1% for cashiers. It’s so significant that supermarket chain Wegmans announced in 2022 that it would stop self-checkout because of unspecified losses from shoplifting.

自助结账的货品丢失率估计在3.5%至4%之间，而收银员通道的丢失率不到1%。这种损失非常巨大，导致连锁超市Wegmans在2022年宣布将停止自助结账，原因是商店行窃损失加大。

“It’s facilitating errors and, in some cases, the steal,” Gallino said. “In some cases, it’s an unintended steal, but you’re now creating an inventory information problem. Now there is additional noise in the system. It’s hard to replenish and to know what is in the store.”

加利诺说：“自助结账增加了流程失误，也增加了偷窃行为。在某些情况下，可能是意外，但现在造成了库存信息问题。系统中出现了额外的噪音。很难补货，也很难知道店里到底还有多少库存。”

For grocers, such information is critical. Gallino said the grocery executives he talks to understand shrink and inventory inaccuracy, and they take these factors into consideration. What’s harder for them to quantify, he said, is customer loyalty. Are shoppers leaving because of a lack of staff or a clunky machine, or is there some other reason?

对于超市来说，这些信息至关重要。加利诺表示，他交流过的超市高管了解这些货品丢失率和库存不准确的问题，他们在决策时会考虑到这些因素。但是让他们更难量化了解的是客户忠诚度：顾客离开我们是因为人手不足或自动化流程笨重，还是有其他更重要的原因？

“There are situations where self-checkout is definitely a plus,” he said, citing a train station ticket kiosk as an example. “In other cases, you start to ask how much pain the customer is willing to take, and I think that’s where many retailers aren’t careful about quantifying.”

他以火车站售票亭为例说：“在某些情况下，自助结账绝对是一种优势。比如火车站售票。但是在其他情况下，如果你开始问顾客愿意承受多大的痛苦（或麻烦），我认为这就是许多零售商在衡量客户忠诚度时不够小心的地方。”

Gallino pointed out another important consideration for retailers using self-checkout: They are missing perhaps the only chance to gather valuable feedback from the customer in real time. When a sales associate asks, “Did you find everything you needed today?” the answer helps store managers know what they are doing right and wrong.

加利诺指出了另一个重要考虑因素：自助结账将会使他们错过实时收集客户宝贵反馈的唯一机会。
当服务员在收银时问顾客：“你找到了所需要的一切了吗？”顾客的回答将有助于商店知道他们有什么地方出错或需要改进。

“It’s an opportunity to get quick and accurate information,” Gallino said. “That contact point can be critical, and you’re losing that completely.”

“这是一个从顾客那里获取快速准确信息的宝贵机会，”加利诺说。“这个接触点可能很关键，而如果你使用自助结账系统，你就完全失去了这个机会。”

Despite its flaws, Gallino thinks self-checkout isn’t going anywhere. But he is hopeful that retailers will give more consideration to how they deploy it.

尽管有很多缺陷，但加利诺认为自助结账不会消失。他希望零售商能更多地考虑如何部署它。

“I think we’re going to see these in the future, for sure,” he said. “At the same time, I think some retailers are going to be smarter about when and how they use it.”

“我认为自助结账将继续存在。与此同时，零售商会更明智地决定何时使用，以及如何使用它。”