FairPrice, Cold Storage turn to tech to boost productivity
SINGAPORE — Supermarkets are upping their game amid a tight labour market and a need to boost productivity, with NTUC FairPrice introducing iCash, a new closed-loop cash-management system that automates the acceptance and dispensing of cash for customers and cashiers.
Cold Storage is also streamlining its point-of-sales processes and improving backend systems, such as with electronic shelf labels that inform staff of the need for replenishment.
With iCash, customers put their cash into a machine at regular manned checkout counters, instead of handing the money to a cashier.
The machine will then dispense the correct change in both notes and coins.
The system eliminates the need to manually prepare cash floats, the amount of change in the cash drawer, and allows FairPrice’s cashiers to reduce the time spent on performing cash reconciliation tasks — the process of verifying the amount of cash in a cash register — by about 35 per cent.
iCash has been deployed at two FairPrice outlets in Punggol Walk and Bukit Batok West, and at five Cheers outlets. It will be rolled out to all outlets subsequently.
Mr Gerry Lee, deputy chief executive officer (Operations), NTUC FairPrice, said: “The iCash system is a crucial investment in our efforts to increase efficiency and optimise manpower resources so that customers enjoy smoother checkouts with accurate payment-handling and better service.”
Over at the Cold Storage outlet at Sime Darby Centre, its new cash-management system is able to automatically calculate and dispense change when the cashier inserts money into the machines installed at the Point-of-Sales counter.
The cashier can thus focus on other tasks such as scanning and packing grocery items, resulting in each transaction taking up only 10 seconds, or 60 per cent less than the manual process.
The Sime Darby store also boasts Cold Storage’s first integrated self-checkout counters that allow for both cash and card payments.
The terminals allow shoppers to scan, pack and pay their grocery items at the counters.
The store also uses electronic shelf labels, which prompt staff to replenish low-stock items automatically in the recommended quantities — thus sparing them from having to manually update the paper labels.
