Customers were already steering towards self-service check out and EMV bank card tap and pay well before the pandemic hit and even life on the railways was edging that way with the introduction of ITSO smart cards and the move from Oyster to EMV tap and pay on TfL. But this is just the start and iBlocks is already ahead of the game in moving the rail industry and its customers closer to the leading edge of retailing in the UK.
The supermarket sector is moving on from self-service checkout to a fully automated frictionless shopping experience where the customer just enters the store, picks their products, pops them into their shopping bag and exits the store without entering the lottery of which queue to line up in – they have their accounts debited as soon as they leave the store. This concept is starting to prove popular with "grab and go" type commuter shoppers and is not new. Amazon launched this concept pre pandemic with their "Amazon Fresh Store" and Sainsburys and Tesco are now embracing this too. Before the pandemic Sainsburys stated that their research showed that their customers weren’t ready for this experience yet – but post pandemic things couldn’t be more different. Customers have now positively charged towards digital shopping and this trend has encouraged Amazon, Sainsburys, and Tesco (who’ve branded their store "Get Go") to relaunch the concept and Holborn in London is the place where they are piloting this concept again in their local stores. All the customers have to do is download a QR code and cameras, sensors and software keeps a track of their shopping bag and charges them on the way out.
Yet only 20 minutes on the tube from Holborn at iBlock’s London Bridge HQ they have developed this technology for the public transport industry. They have integrated GPS and Barcode technology to provide frictionless travel for the commuter – the same commuter who is now shopping at the Tesco, Sainsburys and Amazon stores. iBlocks is providing an industry first and is well ahead of the game in terms of providing the passenger with a modern, frictionless, value for money guaranteed travel experience. With the iBlocks smartTIS product the customer just needs to download the App and register their card details and technology does the rest – it even guarantees the passenger the best fare for the journey and if they travel more regularly then the software will cap their fares if the travel pattern means their tickets will be cheaper.
So, the commuter has the benefit of seamless shopping and travelling now... "Get Go" can apply to public transport too with the exception that the passenger just has to walk into the station and out the other end – the software will track the journey and charge accordingly so you don’t even need to "get anything"... just "Go"!