Kasper JadeAfter running a pilot program at its retail stores this past holiday shopping season, Apple Computer has deemed its EasyPay checkout systems a "big success" and plans to further integrate the devices into its retail experience, according to an online report.
EasyPay is a paperless process, where customers provide a credit card and an email address to an Apple store Genius or employee when checking out. The customer's card is swiped through a scanner — attached to a Symbol Technologies PPT8800 wireless handheld device (photo) — and an email receipt is dispatched and delivered "within an hour."
Despite an assortment of glitches, EasyPay has worked well for Apple says BuisnessWeek's Peter Burrows, who in a blog posting this week cited an unnamed "source at Apple" who says the company will continue to use the systems in the new year.
"Steve Jobs believes that many people who are comfortable buying on-line — and that's a rapidly growing percentage of the total — will not only accept but will actually prefer getting their receipts electronically," Burrows wrote. "Also, the wireless, paperless checkout gives Apple an opportunity to improve in-store service, as well."
Still, the EasyPay systems are far from perfect and are in need of some tweaks, according to a detailed report recently published at the ifoAppleStore Web site.
"The Symbol portable computers proved to be glitchy, although lots of customers weren’t paying with credit cards. Swiping credit or ATM cards sometimes often took several attempts, and re-booting the devices was not uncommon, further slowing the check-out process," wrote Gary Allen, the Web site's publisher. "Staffers also had to take care when entering the customer’s e-mail address for the receipt– one typo and the e-mail would bounce."
"Perhaps the most serious glitch was procedural–using e-mail to generate a receipt for the ordinary customer when checking them out with a portable device," Allen added. In some cases, customers were reluctant to give out their e-mail addresses or their Internet Service Providers were blocking email from Apple so no receipt could be delivered.
Apple currently operates 135 retail locations worldwide, including international locations in the U.K., Canada and Japan.
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49 Comments
These are wireless card readers, I take it (no, I did not read the link to the article). Is there a risk that a skilled hacker could crack their network and collect card data?
I think this basically says it all about the way Apple thinks. This is why the iPod is a success. And the Mac would be as well if it weren't for corporate I.T. types shaving pennies off budgets for performance bonuses based on hardware acquisitions as opposed to what's best for the whole.
Assuming they work out the bugs, this sounds like a good idea--EXCEPT that the handheld units should also include small receipt printers *in addition to* the email receipt.
Otherwise, what happens if a spam filter (either server-side or client-side) kills the receipt? The customer goes home and viola, they have no proof of purchase less than an hour after they bought the merchandise. (Yes, they could also lose a paper receipt on the way home, but in this case, the fault is with the store, not the customer).
This is the same sort of problem we've started to see with the touch-screen voting machines that don't include paper trails/copies/backups. Reducing paperwork is an admirable goal, but you should ALWAYS have A hard copy backup of these sorts of things.
Assuming they work out the bugs, this sounds like a good idea--EXCEPT that the handheld units should also include small receipt printers *in addition to* the email receipt.
Otherwise, what happens if a spam filter (either server-side or client-side) kills the receipt? The customer goes home and viola, they have no proof of purchase less than an hour after they bought the merchandise. (Yes, they could also lose a paper receipt on the way home, but in this case, the fault is with the store, not the customer).
This is the same sort of problem we've started to see with the touch-screen voting machines that don't include paper trails/copies/backups. Reducing paperwork is an admirable goal, but you should ALWAYS have A hard copy backup of these sorts of things.
I could imagine a highly resourceful (and ballsy) con artist going into the store, posing as an employee, and swiping the credit cards of the unsuspecting...
This has to be the greatest part of shopping at the Apple Store.
Two weeks before Christmas I ran into the Apple Store here in Chicago on Michigan Avenue to pick up a new iPod and the line at the registers was friggin' insanely long. But then a couple employees walked up to all of us and were like, "Anyone paying with a credit card?" They didn't even ask if we were waiting in line for iPods, haha. I asked if they could do EduDiscounts at the EasyPay "zone" and they could so I was sold!
I was out the door with my new iPod in less than a minute. I didn't even have to give them my e-mail address because they already had it on file. Long live EasyPay!