Introducing Self-Billing System: With Smart Trolley and Smart Card for

Supermarket Sector in Sri Lanka

Abstract
A queue control system is developed to control the queue in businesses and in servicing counters.
By using queue control system, the company or service provider will be able to control the queue
of the customers and ensure the provision of a better service. Due to the increase of the demand
from people for a better service, it is more likely that a queue control system is required to be
allocated at all time for all companies. However, looking the queue control systems currently
available in the market, most of them are big in size and unable to be moved here and there. These
portable queue systems are mainly connected to big screen or static panel at the entrance for
customers to obtain their numbers. This will make them feel uncomfortable and wasting the time.
The purpose of this project is to develop a Smart solution for super market (FMCG) sector, which
will be basically focus on smart card and smart cart what will able to fulfill the request discussed
above. Looking alike as the normal Credit card and normal food city carts, this smart solutions
will enables the customers to pay the money by without waiting in the queue or using the money.
This will increase the customer satisfaction by helping the organization to have an competitive
advantages over other supermarkets by create a loyal set of employees

Introduction
Sri Lankan Supermarket
Sri Lankas supermarket trade is anticipated to see an unprecedented growth within the next few
years, backed by increasing per capita income, an increase in the work force and the changing
consumption patterns, technological improvement and etc. As a part of this Sri Lankan
supermarket industry were challenging, both now and in the future. The supermarket industry in
Sri Lanka is set for explosive growth, given the western lifestyles of Sri Lankans, where
convenience is a key benefit sought. The Supermarkets are also at an advantage, as they have a
higher bargaining power over suppliers and are in a better position to offer products at competitive
prices due to economies of scale.

Supermarket chains in Sri Lanka would do well to invest in strategic marketing, as a source of
sustainable competitive advantage. Strategic thinking is important rather than the typical shortterm quick fix. Brand building is essential and must be treated as important.
Sri Lanka had 516 supermarkets being operated in the country which can be categorized as
supermarkets, hypermarkets and convenience stores. According to this Cargills operates 177
supermarkets and the state owned Sathosa which offers a product at a promoted rate operates a
convenience store network of 250 stores. Keells has 48 supermarkets being converted to a hyper
market while Arpico operates 13 hyper markets and LAUGFS supermarkets. According to it
follows Sri Lankan supermarket.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.

Cargills
Sathosa
Keells
LAUGFS
Arpico and etc.

Cargills Supermarket
Cargills Food City has tied up with the leading e-commerce solutions provider in Sri Lanka,
Kapruka to provide online shopping facility to customers to deliver groceries to anywhere in Sri
Lanka at the store price! Now Kapruka customers from Sri Lanka or from around the world can
get Cargills Food City groceries delivered home at a click of a button. All items are priced at
the same price as in the local store making the shopping experience a truly rewarding one.
Cargills says customers have been demanding for an online shopping solution for a long time.
Sathosa Supermarket
The Sathosa chain is also set for growth in the future, with the new management in place. Hence,
what we are witnessing is a dramatic growth in the modern trade, which is taking Centre stage
over the traditional trade. Sathosa is one of Sri Lankan traditional supermarket but now days they
also move to use to technological driver for sales counters. Because technological improvement
trend is effects mostly change costumers preferences.

Keells Supermarket
Keells Super has been always ahead of the technology curve in the retail industry in Sri Lanka and
claims a long list of technological firsts. For instance in 1996 Keells Super was the first to use
Barcodes in Sri Lanka, the first to use business intranets in 2001 and launched e-commerce
enabled Internet shopping in 2002 for the first time.
LAUGFS Supermarket
The SunUp Super has been tagged as the "Super that never sleeps". Justifiably living up to its title,
SunUp was the first to introduce to Sri Lanka the 24 hour retail concept. This was not the only first
for SunUP , it is also the first convenience store to jointly operate with a fuel retail outlet and the
first to introduce a 24 hour pharmacy. All these innovations have taken SunUP super to a step
ahead of the rest. Operating the supermarket chain has a proud status for the most diverse and the
largest product range in terms of SKU's (Stock Keeping Units), housing up to 25,000 per store.
Our main concern is, as it should be, our customer. We target not only the individual retail
customer but also bulk sales as in general trade. With 10 outlets and over 25,000 regular customers
our plans are ambitious.
Arpico Supermarket
Richrd Pieris and Co.PLC is one of the largest and successful diversified business conglomerates
based in Sri Lanka. Being one of the oldest companies with a80 year old history, it is also is one
of the largest employment provider in the private sector in the country. That company is going to
be product diversification, According to that this company is moving to start Arpico Supermarket.

Literature Review
Every day, millions of customers wait in lines, from driving to work to checking out at a retail
store. True reality about waiting lines is unavoidable. Given the dynamism of business and
competition today, a waiting customer is potentially a lost customer. Therefore the main objective
of our report is to give a solution about how to reduce and eliminate the time taken in waiting lines
and billing at point of sales.

According to J. Thangakumar, Hindustan University, Chennai, India, by designing an Intelligent

Shopping Basket which uses Barcode scanners can reduce and eliminate the time taken in billing
counter in super markets. This will allow users to self-checkout and increase productivity time.
U.Gangwal, S.Royand J. Bapat, International Institute of Information Technology - Bangalore,
India, Describe the implementation of a reliable, fair and cost efficient Smart Shopping Cart using
Wireless Sensor Networks (WSN),which is maturing at a very fast pace of its suitability in a wide
range of application areas.
Galande Jayshree1, Rutuja Gholap2, Preeti Yadav, International Journal of Emerging Technology
and Advanced Engineering say that they have designed a SMART TROLLEY USING RFID. By
simply attaching RFID tags to the products and a RFID reader with a LCD display on the shopping
trolley.
U.Gangwal, S.Royand J. Bapat, International Institute of Information Technology - Bangalore,
India have talked about the benefit of automated billing systems where as reducing man power and
in creating a better shopping experience for its customers. As well instead of waiting in a long
queue for billing, these systems help in automating the billing process. Moreover these systems
catch dishonest customers and it will give benefits to both buyers and sellers.
According to G. Jayshree, R.Gholap and P.Yadav., can use RFID readers for automated billing
systems. All the products in the mall will be equipped with RFID tags. When a person puts any
products in the trolley, its code will be detected and the price of those products will be stored in
memory. As we put the products, the costs will get added to total bill. Thus the billing will be done
in the trolley itself.
With all these systems says, which aims to reduce ,and possibly eliminate the total waiting time of
customers, lower the total manpower requirement and expenses for markets and increase efficiency
overall. In a world where technology is replacing the ways we pursue everyday activity, the future
of the retail industry also must lies in more and more automated devices. Customer will need to
have the information about price of every item that are scanned in, total price of the item and also
brief about the product. These systems will save time of customers and manpower required in mall
and cost associated with the product

Major problem in Supermarket Industry

The supermarket sector deals with large number of customers each day. The Point of Sales
customers queues in supermarkets are considered to be one of the critical issues. But the worst
part here is supermarket owners do not pay much attention towards managing these queues.
Longer Waiting is a complex phenomenon to which a consumer often reacts in an emotional way.
We look at how long customers are waiting, the order matters a lot. Wait times not only affect
customer frustration and desertion but also how much customers are willing to spend. Each extra
second of wait time reduces the amount that customers are prepared to pay. This diminished
customer experiences and reduces customers loyalty towards particular supermarket. The
supermarket owners think that once the customer enters into queues, the sale is almost done. But
this is not the way, customers get frustrated and annoyed while waiting in long point of sales
queues.
This critical problem makes several side effects as follows;
Longer Waiting Times
Due to longer queues in point of sales, customers have to keep waiting until come their turn to pay
the bill. Since the busy schedule of Sri Lankan customers, wasting their valuable time for this kind
of non-value adding activities is being a mess.
Reduce Customer Satisfaction & Loyalty
Customers feel unsatisfied due to longer queues, longer waiting times and less attention of
supermarket representatives for this critical queue issue. Therefore this will directly link to
reduction of customers loyalty towards particular supermarket. Therefore customers shift to
competitors supermarket.
Reduction of Competitive Advantage
Since supermarket industry is highly competitive market, there is high elastic demand for
supermarkets in Sri Lanka. Due to queue management issues in the supermarket sector, customers
try to shift to smaller retail shops to finish their purchases quickly. Therefore this will reduce the

customer base of larger supermarkets and finally it runs towards to collapse of competitive
advantage of particular supermarkets.
Sales Reduction
This will be final outcome of effects of ineffective queue management systems of supermarket
sector. Due to customers move to competitors places, particular supermarkets sales will be
reduced. Finally this will reach to minimizing of profit of such supermarkets.
A customer will not consider returning to a supermarket with unmanaged queues and unpleasant
experience. The supermarkets must integrate their existing customer Point of sales longer queues
with a proper queue management system.

Available Solutions for Long Queue in the Super Markets in Sri Lanka
Increasing Number of Branches.
This also a good solution to reduce the traffic of the super market once there are more branches
the customers will be diverted all the branches
Increasing Number of Billing Counters/ Cashiers
Increasing number of billing counter is the best solution to avoid the long waiting queue in super
markets. Specially this can be arrange in the seasonal time and peak time of the day
Promotion of E Commerce Sector and Home Delivery Service
We can see all major super market are having website and can be place order online and super
market can be arrange to make ready to pay for and pick up the order or and the home delivery
Issuing Token send the Customer to the Longue till Recall for Payment
Once a customer is ready to check out, she wheels her cart into an area where she gets a number,
and is directed to a lounge. Staff members scan and generate invoices and once ready, the
numbers are called out into the lounge area so that the customer can pay.

Organizing Some Entertainment Events nearby Queues

We could install monitors that play some kind of well-known family-friendly film that people
associate with happiness. Magic show, Live Music Etc and big screens for watching TV
Keep the Queues Single File
If the queue is well-managed and orderly, then it removes the element of doubt about who is next
in line, as customers know exactly where they are in the queue. Using single file queues limits
uncertainty of who is next, making time go faster

Limitation for Existing Solutions

Increasing number of branches.
This is most expensive existing solution and has invest huge resource as fixed cost and the
maintaining cost also will be very high. Now a days it is very difficult to find a commercial
properties with parking facility.
Increasing number of billing counters/ Cashiers
For the solution of increasing number of billing counters will be most difficult thing because lack
of enough space for billing counters. All ready all the super market has place maximum number
of billing counters . specially billing counter has to be located in way of exit. This solution comes
with fixed cost such as counter preparation cost and cost for other electronics such as computer
credit card machine barcode readers and cash drawers. Maintenance cost comes such as cashiers,
salary EPF , ETF and uniform cost etc
Promotion of E commerce sector and home delivery service
Although this online shopping facility is available in all major super market , the customers are
reluctant to go for online shopping because of customers wants go shopping as the hobby and they
dont have reliability on the quality of the goods offer in on line shaping and still the home delivery
part too not advance yet

Organizing some entertainment Events nearby queues

For live event has to pay hourly rate and it will be expensive and find place also will be limitation.
For Big LCD will be again fixed cost and incur maintaining cost
Keep the queues single file
This also create lengthy queue than multiple shorter queue s and it will create bad image as the
queue will be longer. And the shop will be congested

Proposed Solution
Introducing a Smart Cart and smart card System
Customer long waiting time in supermarket queues are one of a huge problem in the supermarket
industry. Many system analysts are trying to find new solutions to overcome this problem. Higher
waiting time in queues are eventually lead to customer dissatisfaction and loss of customer base.
The proposed solution is contained the ability of minimizing the waiting time of queues in
supermarkets and provide a better service to the customers. As a solution to this issue, a smart
trolley with a barcode system for self-billing and a smart card for self-payment system are being
introduced. The smart trolley is introduced to the supermarkets with the intension of promoting
self-billing system to Sri Lanka. Not only that, it will reduce the waiting time in queues where
satisfied customer will be increased. The customers themselves can take their own time for
selecting products and can generate the bill by their own without wasting time in queues. That
means customers can take the decision of how long they need to spend in the supermarket.
Smart Cart/ Trolley
The smart trolley is equipped with a barcode scanner, smart display screen and a load cell. The bar
code scanner will be useful to identify the each product that is selected and kept inside the cart.
Customer has to swipe the barcode indicated in the product using the barcode scanner in the trolley
before keeping the selected product in the cart. This barcode scanner is a portable device that can
be easily move around the cart. This will allow the customer to scan large weighted products
without holding on hands.

The barcodes which pasted or indicated on the product is unique to each type of product. These
barcodes are consisted with name of the product, price and weight of the product. And these
information are linked with the master database which handles at the supermarket. Once a product
is scanned with the quantity taken to the cart, these information will be updated automatically in
the database. This database will be specially designed using SQL server and the smart display
screen interface will be designed using VB.net which consisted with user friendly commands.
The barcode scanner is required to identify a product therefore can recognize the price and the
weight of the product from the database once the product is scanned through the barcode scanner.
The number of units that is placed in the cart can be input by using the smart display screen. The
quantity of the product has to be mentioned at the time of the product is scanned. This can be easily
done through smart display screen.
And a load cell is fitted at the base of the trolley as a weight sensor which is helpful to measure
the weight of the product basket in the trolley. It will indicate the weight of the trolley once each
of the product placed inside the cart. The load cell is used not to measure the actual weight of the
product but will be helpful in the case of discrepancy. This will be useful to verify the number of
products scanned through the barcode scanner with the number of products inside the trolley. Any
mismatch can be identified by notifications pop up in the smart display screen. If mistakenly an
extra product is placed in the trolley then a message will be pop up immediately in the screen. So
the customer itself can correct the mistake by placing the correct quantity in the cart.

Smart Card
By introducing a smart card system, customers get the privilege to pay the bill generated using the
smart trolley. Thereby customers will not need to bring cash to pay the bill. Instead they can swipe
the smart card in the barcode scanner fixed in the smart trolley. Any extra payment required can
be done as a cash payment.
Operation of the Smart Shopping System
Customer Enter to the Supermarket

Customer picks a Smart Trolley

Select a product from shelf

Scan the product bar code using the bar code scanner

Enter the Number of Quantity taken from that Particular Product

Is the weight indicated in the Load Cell

equal to the Total Weight of the Particular
Product taken?

Yes
Display the Total Current Purchase Amount in the Smart Display

Yes
Is there any other product need to
be select?

No
Swipe the Smart Card

No
Pop Up a
Message

This special card is designed with the main objective of minimizing the time spent by the consumer
at the cashier counter for billing. It will allow a speedy checkout for the customer and reduces the
burden of the cashier in handling cash all the time.
The customer can purchase a smart card using two methods. He can either purchase it through the
special smart card top up center located inside the supermarket or purchase it online through the
supermarket website. For those who apply for a smart card online will receive the card through
register post. Initial top up for the smart card would be Rs.1500/- and the customer can top up any
amount thereafter.
There are two top up options for smart cards.
Option 1: Top up the card for any amount through the Smart card top up center located inside
every supermarket outlet.
Option 2: Log on to the online account and top up money through credit card or debit card.
Special promotions and discounts will be available for the customers who will be using the smart
card for the purchase of products.
When purchasing the goods, if the bill amount exceeds the smart card top up amount, the customer
gets the opportunity to pay the balance amount in cash to the cashier.

SMART
TOP -UP

Prior to the Purchase of Items

Start

Apply for a smart card

Is the consumer
applying online?

No

Apply through the Smart TopUp center at the supermarket

Yes
Create an online account through
the supermarket website

Pay Rs.1500/- as the initial top-up

Is the consumer
regularly top-up
online?

Yes
Automatically update the account
online

End

No

Regularly top-up through Smart

Top-Up Center

During the Purchase of Items

Start

Customer selects the items and put

into the Smart Trolley

Scan the bar codes of each item using

the bar code scanner

Swipe the smart card at the checkout

counter

Is the amount in the

smart card sufficient
to make the
purchase?

Yes
Pay the balance through the cash or
credit/debit card

End

No

Pay the balance through the

cash or credit/debit card

As a result of the Smart Cart and the smart card implementation in the super market, following
benefits can be identifying. The identification of the benefits is going to divide base on two view
points, such as Customers side and Companies side.
Companys Point of View
Time and cost related to employees will be saved
Since the smart cart reduces the work load of the employees, the business organization can decrees
its labor cost. Also workers will be motivated since they have a new task to achieve and more
freedom to interact with the customers in a friendly manner due to less movement with the cash.
Low maintains cost since it is an offline system
When it comes to the trouble shooting and maintaining of the systems, online systems are more
hard to maintain, but since the proposed system runs offline it is easy to do the maintain and trouble
shooting. For the smart card maintaining and hosting business organization can ask the assistance
of the respective banks. It will enable the business to share their responsibilities about the smart
card.
High accuracy in calculating the stock and maintaining the ERP system
Once the business organization implemented the smart cart for the operation, it will helps to create
more accurate daily sale and stock reports with less amount of deviation, also this will support to
the ERP system of the company to run its functions smoothly and accurately by providing the
update informations.
Premises rush will be reduce
With the new system, customer doesnt have to wait in the que in order to bill their goods, they
can see the amount by using the smart cart and pay the amount by using EMT methods or by using
the newly implemented smart card. In order to develop and encourage this business organization
can provide loyalty benefits for the smart card users. This will reduce the premises rush and create
more pleasant environment for the customers to visit.

Helps to increase the customer relationship and loyalty

In the modern business world customers are having more than enough choices to make in the
market, since FMCG market is highly competitive as its nature customers can switch to any
supplier over other, by implementing this new system, business organizations can increase the
customer loyalty towards there retailing shop. Also the organization can use smart card to monitor
the buying behavior pattern and make better understanding about the customer. Having a better
understanding about the customer will create the customer loyalty over the time by allowing them
to create a satisfied customer.
Easy to maintaining the CRM data base and make the prediction on buying pattern
One of the most hardest things in the world is to predict the customer behavior in the market, by
using the systems and data mining methods now a days business analyses use to find this, business
organization can consider this as a arising benefit from the smart card.
Customers point of view
Customers time will be save
Once the smart cart and the smart card has been introduced customer dont want to stay in the
queue in order to pay the money, this will helps them to utilize their time in an effective manner.
All together it will increase the national productivity level indirectly.
Increasing the customer self esteem
Each and every human been likes to live there life with a self-respect and esteem, according to the
psychological view humans are feel more self-esteem when they got a chance to move and work
with the electronic devices, so that customer may got a chance to have a difference experience by
using the new smart cart.

Reference
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Journal of Engineering Science and Innovative Technology (IJESIT) Volume 2, Issue 4, July
2013
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