The unique contactless technology will be available to customers at eight Whole Foods Market stores in Seattle.
The Amazon One service, which allows customers to pay in a physical store by simply putting their palm on a reader, was introduced in September 2020. It has been piloted in several Amazon Go, Amazon Go Grocery, Amazon Books, Amazon 4-star, and Amazon Pop Up stores in Seattle, where the company is headquartered.
The company has now announced that new contactless payment technology will also appear in stores at Amazon-owned Whole Foods. Such a step means that the first experiments were successful, and customers were satisfied with the possibility of paying with the touch of their palm, without the need to take out a card or gadget and exchange cash with the cashier.
The first Whole Foods store to be covered by Amazon One technology was Whole Foods Market on Madison Broadway in Seattle. There, palm payments are available starting April 21. And in the next few months, seven more chain outlets in the same area will have access to the innovation.
According to Amazon itself in an official statement, the feedback from customers has been excellent, with thousands of users signing up for the service. It is underlined that during the pandemic, customers exclusively appreciated the possibility of convenient contactless payments.
It has also been reported that customers appreciated the speed of registration, which involves creating a unique palm print, which is done using computer vision technology. Customers spend a few minutes at a particular device in the store, scanning one or both palms to associate their "image" with their credit card. Then, they can immediately use the new option to pay for purchases.
22 APRIL 2021, USA