Unexpected human in the bagging area: Morrisons bring back staffed express checkouts

The express lanes will serve customers who wish to buy ten items or less. They will mean customers with a small shop who want personal service will not have to queue behind those with a trolley full of groceries and have an alternative to self-scanning.

The average basket size for a UK supermarket customer is now 11 items costing £15, with shoppers visiting stores approximately five times a week, according to figures from Kantar WorldPanel.

David Potts, CEO of Morrisons, said: “We’re listening hard to our customers and responding quickly wherever possible. If customers from time to time do smaller shops, they want to get in and out of our stores quickly.

“We are responding by introducing express checkouts which shoppers with ten items or less can use. These checkouts - and our very helpful staff - will offer a quick and personal service, helping to keep queues low and improving thousands of shopping trips.”

Two express lanes will be introduced at each of Morrisons 504 supermarkets nationwide. They will be run from existing checkout units within each store. One will be operational from 8am to 8pm and both during daily peak shopping periods of 12-2pm and 4-6pm.

Their addition means Morrisons will offer customers three payment options in store. Standard checkouts will cater for larger trolley shops, whilst self checkouts and manned express checkouts will give customers more choice for smaller shops.

The development comes after Morrisons retail team and CEO David Potts asked colleagues and customers how to make the shopping at Morrisons better.

Another recent change has been the removal of Morrisons Intelligent Queue Management system in March 2015. Staff now use their own judgement to decide how many checkouts to open rather than being guided by a computer system.