3 Benefits of Scan and Go technology for Data-Driven Retailers

You may have noticed that in-store transactions have sped up lately, thanks to technologies like self-service checkout lines and kiosks. In fact, the self-checkout market is projected to reach $12.01 billion by end of this decade. But as convenience continues to be the winning factor that attracts customers to physical stores, retailers cannot stop to innovate in order to retain a competitive advantage and find ways to service customers even better.

The number of stores offering self-scanning experience (sometimes also called scan & go, or scan pay go) is expected to triple by 2027. While scan & go solutions have become most striking among the US & UK grocery giants, the technology continues to reach other retail sectors as well. The term Scan & Go first came up in 2012, as a result of Walmart’s inhouse produced mobile self-checkout application for iOS devices. Most mobile solutions that have been developed since then are so-called pre-scanning solutions. Customers scan their chosen products, but cannot checkout using mobile payments. Instead, they have to pay at the conventional point of purchase (POP).

In comparison, full mobile self-checkout solutions enable users to complete the full purchase. They can choose, scan, pay, and get a digital receipt – all within one application and without wasting time at the checkout line. Flying Tiger’s arts and crafts stores in the UK and Carrefour Proximité convenience stores in France are just a few of the most recent examples, but the number of retailers following new trend is speedily rising.

Here are main benefits driving the success of scan pay go apps.

1. A faster checkout experience expedites shopping

We’ve all been in a situation where long queues have become intolerable– but have you ever left a store because the line was too long? According to study, 85% of customers will abandon the queue if they have to wait more than five minutes. With access to a mobile self-scanning app, your customers can easily open their smartphones, or a provided retailer device, scan the items they need and pay immediately.Scan and go technology can increase efficiency for the retailer, as stores can be designed and optimised to attract customers and provide better experiences for them, enticing them to continue returning to the store. Requiring fewer tills creates more space in the store, and using scan and go technology gives retailers access to priceless data on the exact shopping habits of their customers, enabling them to tailor experiences for the consumer.

2. Cost savings

By offering scan and go, retailers can reduce (or remove) the tills in their stores. This removes the investment in the tills themselves and their associated ongoing licences, maintenance and running costs. What’s more, the personnel that have previously been required to operate these tills can be re-deployed on to the shopfloor to add value to the shopper experience and provide personal advice, knowledge and maintenance of the environment. The best scan and go solutions can be maintained easily and cost-effectively as they are cloud-based, with troubleshooting conducted remotely.

What’s more, having digital receipts held conveniently within an app also avoids endless paper receipts and eradicates the cost (both monetary and environmental) of printing them. 

3. Promotions & loyalty

Scan and go doesn’t have to just be a passive part of the shopping experience. The technology can be used by shoppers to access enriched product information, reviews, ratings, tutorials, and more. Retailers can also use scan and go to provide and highlight promotions, and they can also integrate the technology with their loyalty scheme to offer a convenient digital loyalty card. Proximity-based in-store advertising can be utilised to push personalised notifications and adverts depending on where the shopper is. These notifications can be used to drive a more personalised exchange with the customer, enabling the retailer to retain existing customers for a better consumer lifetime value.

Scan and go technologies take pressure off of your employees at the checkout – in fact, there are fully autonomous stores that use this technology without any cashiers at all! But whether you use mobile self-scanning as the only checkout option, or just one of the checkout options, you can free up employees that no longer need to stand behind a cash register and allocate them to other areas of your store. In an industry where labor shortages are becoming more frequent, this type of technology can save you time and resources while also enabling you to make full use of the staff you currently have and increase efficiency where you most need it. 

3. Fast & affordable implementation

The good thing about mobile self-scanning apps is that they take little time to implement and require minimal upfront costs with the right software. If you have a software platform in place that already supports this type of technology, you don’t need to spend tons of money and time just to add and integrate yet another separate solution to your tech stack. 

For retailers that have an existing customer app, or which are in the process of creating one, Tenging's scanning solutions are built to work on iOS, Android and Windows, while also offering support for common integration frameworks.