Is this the future of shopping?
No tills and no queues as UK grocer tries out phone-scan payments
It's late morning in central London and in a tiny Sainsbury's Local near St Paul's Cathedral I am purchasing a cheese sandwich from the future. Sort of, anyway. The sandwich itself is much like any from the present — cheese, bread, packaging. But the way I'm paying for it may just be a glimpse of our destiny. "Hello," a buoyant employee asks as I wander in. "Did you know we are the first till-less grocery store in the country?" This week, the branch unveiled a crucial refurbishment — it has removed the self-service checkout, baskets and tills. In their place are little more than a few oversized barcodes and some explanatory leaflets. It works like this: customers open Sainsbury's SmartShop Scan, Pay & Go app on their phone, scan what they want, pay via Google or Apple Pay, and scan one of the oversized barcodes on their way out. No cards, no queues, no humans. This was the second day of a three-month trial, which builds on Sainsbury's introduction of in-app payments at eight stores ...
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