In selected stores around the world, the payment experience is slowly changing. Now, shoppers can skip the queues, and buy products straight from the shelves on devices in the palms of their hands. But will the rise of these mobile points of sale (POS) lead to the death of the checkout as we know it?

Thanks to several large-scale adopters in the USA it looks like mobile POS is set to take off in a huge way, but some still have their reservations, and many believe it will not lead to the death of the traditional checkout, even if it does shake things up.

What is mobile POS?

Point of sale is retail speak for the place a transaction occurs. In a traditional clothes store or supermarket, the points of sale are at the tills at one end of the shop. In a department store, the POS could be at one of many tills allocated to each area or brand throughout the store. Now, thanks to wireless technology, many retail stores have POS that are not fixed in one place.

Mobile POS has been common in many areas for a long time. In public transport, for example, travellers have been able to buy train tickets straight from conductors for years. Portable card machines brought over to tables in restaurants are another example of mobile POS that has been a part of our lives for a while.

The idea behind mobile POS has always been to make the shopping experience as simple and hassle-free as possible for both the customer and the retailer, but the introduction of POS on the shop floor could potentially change the way we shop.

Who are the early adopters of mobile POS in retail?

Apple stores have always been known for their high employee-to-customer ratio, and for generally being extremely busy, so it is not surprising that they were one of the first high profile adopters of mobile POS. For years now, the ‘Genius’ staff of Apple stores have gone from talking to a customer about an iPod to taking their payment on a mobile POS device in the space of a few minutes.

Following Apple’s lead, several large chain stores in America brought mobile POS to their stores. The biggest of these is department store JC Penney. Since 2012, JC Penney have embarked on a mission to incorporate mobile POS into every one of its 1100 stores around the United States. Now, several of its departments don’t have conventional checkouts at all, with shoppers being served only via iPads.

Though mobile POS is perhaps more prominent in the USA, the technology is being adopted by many businesses on both sides of the Atlantic. In the UK, thousands of independent businesses rely on mobile POS to give customers express service. Ash Meads of Flavour Vapour says thanks to mobile POS he is “able to take the till to the customers and serve them quicker and more professionally without them having to wait around.”

Many other small businesses have adopted mobile POS. Particularly restaurants and market stalls.

Is mobile POS the future of retail?

The question is, are these early adopters ahead of the curve, or out on a wild tangent? UK website Startups says mobile POS is definitely the future because it is cheaper and more portable. But in 2013, after JC Penney had embraced mobile POS in many of its stores, shoppers became confused as to where they should go to make purchases. This was likely due to the store’s change of policy that allowed staff to dress in casual clothing, making it difficult to distinguish staff from customers.

Aside from customer confusion, there are a few other drawbacks that mean mobile POS is unlikely to replace traditional checkouts altogether. The foremost of these is the inability of current mobile POS to process cash payments, and the potential unreliability of mobile POS devices. A POS iPad will need to be charged regularly, but a traditional till can work non-stop.

Some retail stores are instead focusing on other technological innovations to the shopping experience. Virtual reality shopping and real-time tracking of customers is becoming increasingly popular in stores around the UK. Using technology to gain customer insights might be a more effective way of increasing turnover, so it may well be that these technologies are more important to major retailers.

In light of all this, a report from Business Insider found that mobile POS is not being adopted by large retailers as quickly as some might think. This low adoption rate shows that even though mobile POS is already disrupting the traditional retail model, we are unlikely to wave goodbye to queuing at checkouts any time soon.