Or the system which has been used for 1000's of years?
So? How many years have people writing things for before the advent of keyboards?
"We've always done it that way" is a terrible justification for doing anything.
i'm not going to force people to use a different system to the one they choose.
You won't have to. We're well past tipping point as a society. Cash isn't going to wholly disappear but, cheques haven't wholly disappeared either.
So? How many years have people writing things for before the advent of keyboards?
"We've always done it that way" is a terrible justification for doing anything.
On that basis are you saying that people should be forced to give up pens and paper and only record things digitally?
Try again.
No. Be careful what you wish for. And I knew someone would mention covid. FFS.
Going cashless would ensure you can be tracked and controlled by banks and governments. That isn't conspiracy its fact. Another lockdown in a cashless UK? Can you imagine the restrictions then? The last lot of restrictions were way OTT and unjustified at the expense of peoples health jobs and livelihoods etc etc.
What happens when a rogue government gets into power like we have now? Do you trust that lot or any politician? If your answer to that is yes then you need sectioning.
If any local business goes cashless they should be run out of town. There is no good reason for it and there never will be.
Not all of us are as brainwashed as you clearly are though, to be fair.
I can’t see any reason for using cash that couldn’t be solved by using a card payment. There is clearly a lot of paranoia or simply pure lack of understanding.
It feels very similar to those that thinks EVs are a terrible idea for all sorts of bonkers reasons that aren’t really valid.
Its been explained a few times on this thread why cash is a lifeline for some folk. Whats so hard to understand?
I am happy to pay by phone most of the time, but I'm strongly against going completely cashless. Having been poor enough myself, poor enough that I had to withdraw all my wages quickly when I got paid so that I could pay the most pressing bills and still have just enough to live on I would not like people who are in a similar situation now to lose that option.
I can’t see any reason for using cash that couldn’t be solved by using a card payment. There is clearly a lot of paranoia or simply pure lack of understanding.
Yes, your inability to understand that there are many people who wouldn’t be able to use a card-based system, people who don’t have bank accounts, most of which are online only anyway, and don’t have the means to access such accounts, because they don’t have access to a computer or smart device, and probably wouldn’t understand how such things work!
How difficult is it for you to understand, hmmm?
If any local business goes cashless they should be run out of town. There is no good reason for it and there never will be.
It’s easier, cheaper than cash, less risk of loss and quicker.
Yes, your inability to understand that there are many people who wouldn’t be able to use a card-based system, people who don’t have bank accounts, most of which are online only anyway, and don’t have the means to access such accounts, because they don’t have access to a computer or smart device, and probably wouldn’t understand how such things work!
Where are they getting cash from?
For the avoidance of doubt, I'm not saying we should abolish cash (and indeed, is anyone?). There are always going to be edge cases. Rather, it's becoming increasingly irrelevant at a pace. It's going to become largely obsolete simply by dint of the fact that almost no-one uses it any more. As I said above, see cheques - they haven't been scrapped but when did you last see one outwith a refund from a company or HMRC who is probably hoping you never get around to cashing it.
In any case, for all the "won't somebody think of the disabled" arguments I'd bet good money that the majority of people crowing loudest that "cash is king" will be gimmers who think metric is too complicated and want to bring back the shilling, and cash-in-hand tax dodgers.
I can’t see any reason for using cash that couldn’t be solved by using a card payment.
There's a couple of homeless dudes locally that are pretty much the only reason I go to the cash point on a semi regular basis.
It’s a pointless question, as the U.K. never will.
Nothing works better than a briefcase full of money to sweeten that deal.
Yes you could use crypto but everyone’s happier with a good old fashioned bundle of untraceable money 🙂
cash-in-hand tax dodgers
Most definitely,they don’t have the sophisticated tax avoidance that rich people have the luxury of .
I've just been to the petrol station and it struck me, if we get rid of cash then there's a whole generation of kids going to grow up without the fun of trying to hit EXACTLY £20 at the pump.
Thats got to be one of the social mile stones of growing up hasn't it?
It’s a pointless question, as the U.K. never will.
Nothing works better than a briefcase full of money to sweeten that deal.
Yes you could use crypto but everyone’s happier with a good old fashioned bundle of untraceable money 🙂
It only works if you can actually use it. Even now if I somehow "acquired" £100k in cash it'd take me a long while to spend it legitimately unless I actively laundered it.
Incredibly callous view.
No it's not, it's just what's happening. The callous view would be to stick your head in the sand and not supporting the very small number of vulnerable people adapt to the new reality. If we don't they will be excluded from much of daily life, a bit like people without access to the internet, something that has (generally) made life easy for the vast majority of us. Royal mail is doing it's upmost to make written communication a thing of the past and business don't want the cost and hassle of handling bits of paper when communication is so much cheaper (AI) and quicker via electronic means.
I've just been to the petrol station and it struck me, if we get rid of cash then there's a whole generation of kids going to grow up without the fun of trying to hit EXACTLY £20 at the pump.
Thats got to be one of the social mile stones of growing up hasn't it?
Think that ship has sailed; I'm 35 and think I always filled it to the top (and paid by card)
Luckily my first car had a prettly small tank so was never more than about £30ish anyway.
Think that ship has sailed; I'm 35 and think I always filled it to the top (and paid by card)
There's an argument that not filling up makes it cheaper to run because you're not carting fifty kilos of fuel about.
Whether it's a good argument, however... 😁
There's an argument that not filling up makes it cheaper to run because you're not carting fifty kilos of fuel about.
It was a Mini. 34 litre tank. full it would be 25kg - so an average of 12.5kg if I truly ran it to empty.
if I put £20 in thats (at about 1.15/L back then) 13kg. So at best - puting £20 in when its empty rather than at a random point when I was passing a petrol station with a twenty in my pocket - 5kg reduction in average additional weight.
Car was 750kg empty. 0.66% change in average weight. In fact if you add the weight of the driver, that drops to 0.59%.
I can’t see any reason for using cash that couldn’t be solved by using a card payment. There is clearly a lot of paranoia or simply pure lack of understanding.
Yes, your inability to understand that there are many people who wouldn’t be able to use a card-based system, people who don’t have bank accounts, most of which are online only anyway, and don’t have the means to access such accounts, because they don’t have access to a computer or smart device, and probably wouldn’t understand how such things work!
How difficult is it for you to understand, hmmm?
Clearly you didn’t get my point, which was that there is a solution to every issue anyone wants to bring up that cash is better than cards
How difficult is it for you to understand, hmmm?
Maybe the cost of the solutions could be more than paid for by lowering tax evasion.
how does a homeless person with a chaotic lifestyle do it? how does someone in a financially abusive relationship manage? How does a business with zero internet access manage? etc etc
itsclear you arenot understanding the real issues
Clearly you didn’t get my point, which was that there is a solution to every issue anyone wants to bring up that cash is better than cards
How difficult is it for you to understand, hmmm?
Maybe the cost of the solutions could be more than paid for by lowering tax evasion
Yes, in 99% of situations cards are the better solution.
But what do you do for the other 1%?
itsclear you arenot understanding the real issues
The mistake you (and some others) are making here is assuming that if we were to - hypothetically - abolish cash, nothing would appear to replace it. If may well be valid that some people "need" cash because there is nothing equivalent or better today, which stands to reason because why would there be when we have cash? But that doesn't mean that Something Else is unthinkably impossible.
Can't be trusted with money? Here's a card with a £10/day limit on it. Poor with budgeting? We've invented a card with a digital readout showing your balance when it reads your thumbprint. Homeless? As I said earlier, I've seen beggars with card readers, this already exists.
The answer to this whataboutery isn't - excuse me, doesn't have to be - "we absolutely need cash," but rather "how do we address the issue of potential impact to the vulnerable and the stubborn?" Because, like it or not, this is already happening. Plenty of establishments now are card/contactless payment only.
I think you are missing that while electronic transactions might be very useful, at some point you could be shopping for food or other essentials and find at the check out that payment systems from your bank has ceased to function. This leaves you no way to pay other than cash.
Payment systems appear to be reasonably ok but I have been left standing in a supermarket with cards that won’t work.
It should be "relatively easy" to buy an online card payment system from a convenience store - that sidesteps the sort of checks that prevent (for example) homeless people from having a bank account because they don't have an address, and provision it with the same sort of "tap to share" technology that exists already in phones.
I think you are missing that while electronic transactions might be very useful, at some point you could be shopping for food or other essentials and find at the check out that payment systems from your bank has ceased to function. This leaves you no way to pay other than cash.
Payment systems appear to be reasonably ok but I have been left standing in a supermarket with cards that won’t work.
But again, there's currently no reason to fix that (surely increasingly unusual) scenario because we have cash. If we didn't have cash, it would drive systems to be more robust. Aside from anything else, retailers would demand it.
No-one carried shopping bags when supermarkets gave them away. When we banned single use carrier bags we didn't go "no more bags, bring your own, sucks to be you," we put systems in place to provide reusable bags along with a replacement scheme and a cash incentive. The pushback against withdrawing landfill bags was predictably huge; yet today, can anyone honestly say that the new system is not better in every way?
Change is bad we fear change the sky is falling. (And in this case, it also weighs down my pockets.)
I think you are missing that while electronic transactions might be very useful, at some point you could be shopping for food or other essentials and find at the check out that payment systems from your bank has ceased to function. This leaves you no way to pay other than cash.
Payment systems appear to be reasonably ok but I have been left standing in a supermarket with cards that won’t work.
At which point you're still up the creek whether cash exists or not because no one carries enough cash for the weekly shop as the only time banking systems fail is so infrequent it makes headline news when it happens to one bank a decade or so. Who's got £200 in their wallet just in case?
At which point you're still up the creek whether cash exists or not because no one carries enough cash for the weekly shop as the only time banking systems fail is so infrequent it makes headline news when it happens to one bank a decade or so. Who's got £200 in their wallet just in case?
Friend was in a supermarket when a power cut hit, most people were just walking out leaving their full trolleys for the staff to sort out, mate just offered them £xxx in cash for "this lot" which they were happy to take rather than re-stock or dump. But admittedly that was a very long time ago.
Who's got £200 in their wallet just in case?
Err that would be me. I'm often in fairly remote areas with poor access to the Internet. Even in Fort William where I live the largest supermarket has had two power cuts recently which made it cash only shopping.
I think there's a few people on here who've made a really good point which is "it's happening so how can we make sure no-one gets left behind" rather than "it can't happen as people will get left behind".
Businesses will go cashless as it's cheaper to process, more secure and saves them money. The ones that don't are avoiding tax, it's that simple.
So what can we do to make sure the people on the margins aren't left behind when it happens?
Err that would be me. I'm often in fairly remote areas with poor access to the Internet. Even in Fort William where I live the largest supermarket has had two power cuts recently which made it cash only shopping.
How do the electronic scanners and tills work in this scenario?
I think you are missing that while electronic transactions might be very useful, at some point you could be shopping for food or other essentials and find at the check out that payment systems from your bank has ceased to function. This leaves you no way to pay other than cash.
Payment systems appear to be reasonably ok but I have been left standing in a supermarket with cards that won’t work.
But again, there's currently no reason to fix that (surely increasingly unusual) scenario because we have cash. If we didn't have cash, it would drive systems to be more robust. Aside from anything else, retailers would demand it.
No-one carried shopping bags when supermarkets gave them away. When we banned single use carrier bags we didn't go "no more bags, bring your own, sucks to be you," we put systems in place to provide reusable bags along with a replacement scheme and a cash incentive. The pushback against withdrawing landfill bags was predictably huge; yet today, can anyone honestly say that the new system is not better in every way?
Change is bad we fear change the sky is falling. (And in this case, it also weighs down my pockets.)
Its a weird one because having shopping bags was a thing,then it wasn’t ,then it was.
It’s surprising how a lot of the original ways work out more sustainable/eco friendly (when it wasn’t a thing) and we end up going back.
How do the electronic scanners and tills work in this scenario?
It was done more to get disgruntled shoppers put of the building with as few arguments as possible.
The scanners don't work so stock control is messed up.
No booze, wine, spirits, perfumes, cigarettes etc without sending someone to check the price.
The cash drawer doesn't open so you can only take notes that go straight into the safe under the desk.
The freezers all have to be shut.
You cant see much because it's down to the emergency escape lighting.
So you're saying it's like that bit in 28 Days Later, but with Hoodies instead of zombies?
Asking for Binners... Would Greggs need to sell off their stock cheap if they lost power, or could you harness the heat of the melty cheese to keep the rest of the stock warm until the power came back on?
I spent 8 years working for an emergency backup generator company. They can fix all your "what if power cut" objections.
Don't know how it came about but the store I was in manned tills were working, as was back up lighting nothing else was working. The entrance door was jammed open
Every time they overlook the small detail of paying the tax due on the £10 worth of takings.
But that is not relevant to the point they are making. Whether you pay tax on it or not, you make less money from card transactions. The whole expensive business of settlement is bypassed if the customer takes the value to the supplier, rather than relying on the banking system to do so (and charge for it). And their bus or train fare to the shop is the same whether they are carrying cash or not
True you are causing your bank more work by banking the cash. Do banks charge business customers more for this?
Thank goodness for those cash teleporters we all have. Otherwise someone might have to spend an afternoon ****ing about counting it, three times at least, and securely transporting it across town or to who knows where.
There is no way that electronic payments are end-to-end more expensive than cash, it's surely impossible. Card payments might attract a broker's fee, but handling money is a perpetual cost from long before it gets loaded into a cashpoint to after it arrives back at a bank.
Asking for Binners... Would Greggs need to sell off their stock cheap if they lost power, or could you harness the heat of the melty cheese to keep the rest of the stock warm until the power came back on?
For tax reasons, IIRC Greggs food is only incidentally hot because it's come fresh out the oven. It's not "hot food".
True you are causing your bank more work by banking the cash. Do banks charge business customers more for this?
Yes. Banks charge to process cash, that charge is more than they charge for an electronic transaction. You may have card reader fees but you also have other costs associated with cash such as travel to the bank and any extra security. Banks do not want cash, they want a nice clean digital transaction.
Obviously cash is cheaper if you don't bank it, but then why would you not unless you're avoiding tax?
The small Sainsbury’s near me had a couple of power cuts last year, they stopped serving as tills can’t be used, the staff can’t use the barcode readers. However, you could use the Sainsbury’s app to scan as you go and pay. But they still stopped serving.
I won’t reply to the above response questioning my thinking. Suffice to say that solutions will be available for almost everything. As solar & battery storage becomes more widespread, that could solve the power cut issue at checkouts as businesses put in continuity plans. A few weeks ago my parents had a power cut but only realised when a neighbour visited to check if they were off - they were happily running off battery power and would never have noticed.
I can’t imagine a business not having internet access these days. Starlink and future competition for it will be available. Run it through a mobile hotspot. Physical phone lines are being swapped to using internet, so I can’t imagine a business not having internet or phone access - how would they do any business?! But there are solutions available if people open their eyes. You buy a ticket well before turning up for a concert.
Again as above, new payment systems/cards etc will be developed when needs require it. Homeless people with chaotic lives needn’t risk losing cash, if they lose a card or someone nicks it then the money doesn’t go with it and can be replaced. Again, systems will develop. It might allow benefits etc to be paid to them to try and help them out? People with gambling issues can already set cards to not be spent on gambling.
It’s the same as tired old arguments about EVs. The range isn’t enough, I can’t charge it at home, it takes too long to charge, batteries are terrible for the environment, the grid will collapse. All of these are being addressed and things are quickly improving. In 20 years time who knows where we’ll be.
Thank goodness for progress and people who embrace it.
You buy a ticket well before turning up for a concert.
Yeah, so? Your point is, caller? What has that to do with elderly people or people who can’t afford smart devices, or have any access to the internet?
And what has EV’s and range anxiety got to do with the subject? I’m more than aware that the range anxiety thing is rapidly disappearing, BYD have a battery and charger systems now allow a charge from 10% - 80% in 9 minutes, with range of 1000km. But so what, when the vehicle costs £70,000!