in the German Matrix/IRC channel, we had a discussion on how to map a “self-service supermarket”, namely a shop which is operated without people around. In Germany, examples of this are shops of the Tegut Teo brand. As they are relatively new to Germany, we would especially like to know from people from other countries where they are more common, how they handle them. (But of course everyone with an opinion on this is welcome to join the discussion)
In the group we basically had people suggesting using self_service=yes and self_checkout=yes, but also people suggesting using a (new) specific tag such as unstaffed=yes (which is at least not documented yet). There was also the suggestion that it might be necessary to add now types of shop=*.
Do you need by any chance some app to use them? I seen app_operated=only used for some POIs with such problem.
payment:app=only may be also applicable
(Poland had some app-only staffless convenience shops, but not sure how this went, some close to me were replaced by other POIs but some seems to exist)
The ones I know you can just enter by scanning your Credit/Debit card and then also pay by that. So I would say app_operated would not really be something I, personally, would be convinced by. For specific stores, sure. But I think app_operated is rather a subcategory, of what I was describing.
Maybe not “more common” with 21 occurrences, but we have unstaffed shop=convenience called Rüedu (named after a wild child), which are added to NSI (by me) with self_service=only.
We have at least two 24/7 supermarkets, 1 advertising they’ve got 400 articles and a second one of the same brand that is fully fledged. Never been there after sundown so could not tell if staff is there but suspect. The feature seen is a handscanner you pick at entering and each article you put in the basket/cart you scan prior to dropping it. As the DIY register you dock the scanner and pay with plastic. They do random checks though to be sure it does not turn into extremely low budget and yes, they have a customer card.
A variation of the DIY registers is where you scan each article and you move it onto a big weighing platform that is able to measure to articles to the gram exact. Each article you move past the scanner and put on the scale computes the differential. The process is interrupted if the cumulative weight does not match the articles scanned and an operator races in. You cannot leave until the receipt for the shopping is put front of a barcode reader at an automatic door.
Recorded in OSM as self service only, opening_hours 24/7 without days of the week since they’re always open. No other particulars.
I doubt supervised=yes requires the “supervisor” to actively look at you in front of you, and intervene. If the staff is hidden in the back and will call emergencies (but not confront any incidents), it may still count?
supervised= has been defined as in-person. Eg surveillance= would be used for cctv.
But how does the analogy work, and what’s the difference here? Lifeguards are specific (certified) staff members. Both unstaffed=yes and supervised=no are quite interchangeable.
To clarify, I do mean supervised=no + self_service=only etc. Unless, unstaffed= is proposed as their shortcut. However, negative form of word isn’t the best. It doesn’t describe other aspects, eg whether it’s gated. It doesn’t explicitly show shops with vending machines only either. Besides, there will inevitably be multiple tags needed, while self_checkout=yes doesn’t cover fully automatic checkouts yet.
That’s fine. It’s the same question. I’m not comparing eg a cashier=no , but supervised=no entirely. So I don’t see how lifeguards is relevant much. unstaffed= seems somewhat self-conflicting if it’s staffed behind. Many “unstaffed” shops indeed have no hidden space for staff entirely, nothing behind racks. Not to mention vending machines, and traditional honor system ones. To borrow rail automation term, at least eg unattended=yes / attendants=no should be considered.
Don’t worry too much about the unstaffed. This was rather a very preliminary idea.
self_service was already discussed in the previous discussion, but there was mentiond the issue that a supermarket in principle is already self-service or in other words, a shop=convinience + self_service=no I would expect to find some shop with a counter where I do an order and then get my things (like a former “Tante Emma Laden” in Germany, use machine translation from German or just have a look at the pictures, the german article does not match to the other language versions).
supervised however, I believe makes much more sense, as long as it is clear that it means that the supervisor has to be there in person such that supervised=yes. Such shops often qualify for surveillance=indoor with live-monitoring from off-site.
To get a bit away from the question “are there humans available” I would suggest also to consider the automated=yes tag (I realized that there should be a tag for unstaffed fuel stations and found it in the wiki). It is also used for locks, which I would also find somewhat comparable. I actually found some shops in germany, but I don’t like that I find a lot of automated fuel station or car washes with shop=yes or shop=convinience where I believe that the automated refers to the fuel pumps (they are filtered away in the overpass query). What is your opinion on that?
In most of these shops there’s nothing automated - the customer even has to do more work than in traditional shops.
I’m in favor of such a set of tags, together with a regular shop tag:
self_service = only
self_checkout = only #independent of if scanning is needed or not
staffed = no #usually no staff present
authentication:app = yes #if an app is needed to get in
authentication:* = yes #for whichever other authentication might be needed
I prefer staffed = no over unstaffed = yes to prevent double negatives if staff is present.
Some shops are open 24/7 with app or membership card, but also have some short regular opening hours, these can be tagged with usual opening_hours and conditional syntax, e.g.
authentication:app:conditional = yes @ 24/7; no @ Mo-Fr 13:00-15:00
opening_hours = Mo-Fr 13:00-15:00 || 24/7 open "members only"
There are questions about what self_service= mean exactly, so similarly for automated=Talk:Key:self service - OpenStreetMap Wiki
Unlike =car_wash , no machine or robots do the shopping for you. It would only be considered for automatic restocking.
Alongside, self_checkout= needs to be clarified for whether it applies to automatic detection by putting items at the machine, and automatic checkout by directly walking out with the items; or only scanning items yourself. There’s further the difference between scanning with a scanner at the self-checkout machine; and scanning with your phone app elsewhere to only print a receipt at the machine, or possibly even walking out directly.
My attendants= idea has a few singular uses, while a dozen seems mistranslated on highway=path for some reason attendant | Keys | OpenStreetMap Taginfo
Half-dozen verb/adjective attended | Keys | OpenStreetMap Taginfo
But supervised= should be discussed for why it’s unsuitable before another new invention. Besides as I mentioned why I don’t like unstaffed= , back-of-house staff is still staff.
Or extend the lifecycle prefix with: unstaffed ?
At least it is more flexible for also future situations & also would prevent that a defective unstaffed shop is being marked as disused.