Walmart is rolling out a new technology in its stores that enables shoppers to scan and pay for their items without checkout lanes, registers, or cashiers.
Here's how it works: shoppers download Walmart's "Scan & Go" app, then scan the barcodes of the items they wish to purchase.
Once they are finished shopping, they click a button to pay for their goods and show their digital receipt to a store greeter on their way out the door.
Amazon revealed plans in December to introduce a similar technology to its own brick-and-mortar grocery concept, called Amazon Go, which is still in the planning phases.
But Walmart is leaping ahead of Amazon and already rolling it out to more than a dozen stores in Texas, Florida, South Dakota, Arkansas, Georgia, and Kentucky.
For shoppers without smartphones, the retailer provides hand-held scanners. The stores also have options for customers who don't want to link up a credit card to their Scan & Go accounts.
Those customers can simply click "finish" on the app, then report to a self-checkout register where they will scan a barcode for their total purchase and pay for their goods.
