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Cashier Kristin Vertigan (left) finishes a sale as a customer places her finger on a scanner at a Farm Fresh store in Chesapeake.
Farm Fresh's new payment system scans a customer's finger so it can retrieve stored identification information, including her PIN. |
CHESAPEAKE--Farm Fresh, a regional grocer with 38 locations in Hampton Roads, is testing a new payment system that allows shoppers to buy groceries with their fingertips--eliminating the need to bring wallets, purses or checkbooks into stores.
The Virginia Beach-based supermarket chain is believed to be the first retailer in the state using such a biometric payment system, which stores electronic data based on a shopper's index fingertip, as well as checking account and credit-card information.
In checkout lanes, customers place a fingertip on a small scanner, enter their code numbers and select payment options.
"It's very unobtrusive, and the technology is very solid," said Ron Dennis, president of Farm Fresh, owned by Eden Prairie, Minn.-based Supervalu Inc., one of the nation's largest food wholesalers. "We think this is a real time-saver."
Biometric payment systems represent a small but growing segment of the biometric industry. Today, most of the dollars spent in this market come from airports, government buildings and corporations investing in security technologies.
The International Biometric Group estimates the global market for such technology will exceed $1.5 billion this year, much of it concentrated in criminal identification. Retail, or "point-of-sale," technologies, such as the scanners used at Farm Fresh, are expected to total $30.9 million this year.
Only a few grocers are now using the system. The Piggly Wiggly chain has installed the system in more than 80 stores in South Carolina and Georgia. Cub Foods, owned by Supervalu, and Albertsons have been testing the technology.
So far, Farm Fresh is experimenting with the scanning system at four stores in Chesapeake. But Dennis said he hoped to use the technology in each of the company's stores by the year's end.
"There's nothing to carry; nothing to lose," said Tara Rayder, senior marketing manager for Pay By Touch, the San Francisco company that developed the technology. "It's a more secure, faster, easier way to pay."
Customers who want to use the system must first register at kiosks in participating Farm Fresh stores. Their fingertips will be scanned five times, and then they must swipe a voided check, a Discover card or an EBT (electronic benefit transfer) card, along with a seven-digit password they will need for every purchase.
The system links to customers' financial accounts, eliminating the need to bring a wallet, purse or checkbook to the store.
Currently, the Farm Fresh system does not accept Visa and MasterCard purchases. It does permit payroll and government check cashing.
The Pay By Touch system scans 40 data points on an index finger; it is not actually a "fingerprint." The customer's unique data points are converted into a mathematical equation, encrypted and stored on secure IBM servers, the company said.
The company says it does not share consumer data with third parties. Farm Fresh is not permitted to access the biometric information, but some customer information--such as names and mailing addresses--could be used in the future for a customer loyalty program.
Some privacy advocates say they aren't convinced that the Pay By Touch is foolproof.
"If a biometric system is compromised and someone is able to steal it, you can't replace it," said Lillie Coney, associate director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center in Washington. "You can't get a new fingerprint."
Sherry Burrell, a Farm Fresh shopper, expressed concern.
"Anytime you come up with a new technology, someone's going to figure out how to beat it," said Burrell, who recently lost credit card information in a data heist.
But customer Chuck Moore said he liked the idea of the system.
"I'm all for any kind of technology that will keep people from using my account," he said. "It'll be a lot harder to copy my fingerprints than to copy my PIN number."
