People who don’t carry their bank cards with them

Should we still walk everywhere or do cars make us lazy

@Bjorkdidit

And yet if you tell them that in my day, we used to add everything up in our heads/on paper and work the change out without any help from an electronic till and they won't believe you

Yes, it's true. My parents bought a corner newsagents in 1974. We didn't have an electric till. Everything was added in our heads, along with working change (which was actually very easy when you use the "count up" method). Not only that, but we had two till drawers, one for zero VAT rated items such as newspapers and another for standard rated items such as chocolates, sweets, greetings cards, cigarettes, soft drinks, etc. So we'd have to add everything up twice, one for a total for the customer to pay, and then we'd have to do a separate tally to transfer the different VAT rated monies from one till to another, where, say the customer had bought a newspaper and packet of Benson & Hedges.

I was only ten, but inevitably I rapidly gained brilliant mental arithmetic skills as I used to serve the counter with my parents.

It was about 20 years later that we bought an electric till, and God, it was slow. Pressing the buttons etc was a hell of a lot slower than just adding up in our heads, but at least we didn't have to fart around with two different till drawers anymore.

I still do the adding up in my head when I go shopping and keep a mental tally of a running total of how much I'm spending. If the till shows a different figure, I'll challenge it, and it's usually something that's been shelf marked wrong or a BOGOF or other offer that hasn't been applied correctly in the till. But usually, it's spot on to the exact amount I added.

Calculators, phones, tills, etc really do make our minds lazy.

There’s only one left now near me that’s cash only. It’s a very good and renowned kebab shop, but very slow and old school. Luckily DP often has cash, but there are times when I wouldn’t be able to go if it was just on me as I wouldn’t have cash in the house or card handy for ATM.

In a pub I remember giving a young barman £21.50 for two drinks that I knew were going to be £6.50 and I didn't want to add to the handful of change I was carrying.

Also, from experience of working in retail/hospitality, before everything was mostly card, I knew that places often struggled for change so I thought I was being helpful.

He looked at the money I gave him, looked at me, looked at the money, looked at me with suspicion, and just as I was about to ask him if I could have my change, he finally typed £21.50 into his till, which of course instructed him to give me exactly £15 in change and his face was a picture. He wouldn't have looked less surprised and amazed if I'd have downed both drinks in one and walked out of the bar using the glasses as stilts.

And yet if you tell them that in my day, we used to add everything up in our heads/on paper and work the change out without any help from an electronic till and they won't believe you

I thought of this thread just now - I'm waiting for our lunch in a fish and chip shop that only takes cash. There are a number of chippies and kebab shops near my that are cash only.

Lots of people on tills are not able to give you the correct money if you want to pay the odd bit after giving them the note. It's not hard as they just have to round the amount up.
I've had the excuse that they've pressed the button now. Tech does make people lazier/more stupid as we lose the ability to do what it does - like remembering phone numbers.

I keep mine in my hand if I’m heading to the shop or nearest supermarket, or takeaway several less than a 10 min walk to get to.

£10 a month is far from excessive for a SIM only deal. People have different requirements, I want unlimited data, plus tethering and roaming, so I pay more than £10 a month SIM only.

But where do these women with no pockets or handbag put their phone?

If it's old, why are you paying anything for the phone? Surely it's paid off now?
And obviously £10/month is excessive for just a calls/texts/data package (Lebara is under £5/month)

But 'everyone' has their phones and a card fits in the back of a phone case. I always have a bank card and a note in the back of mine, same pocket requirement and all bases are covered.

> Why do many people don’t carry their bank cards anymore?

Because for many women, their clothes have no pockets and a handbag is cumbersome?
I've never known a bloke who doesn't carry a wallet or at least a card in their pocket

Regarding contactless payments- sometimes your bank, NOT the retailer etc asks you to do a CnP payment as part of security. “I dunno my PIN”. You can change your PIN to any number you want (not 1234, 1111) at any ATM under PIN services.

The reason I forget my PIN is that I rarely need to use it, changing it wouldn't help as then I'd probably just put the old one in.

You state 'it's a valid choice'. I said it's a valid choice; let's agree to agree, shall we........?!

No one is banning cash universally (yet). It's still a valid choice, but it's a "choice" of the service provider/shop just as much as it's a choice for the consumer/customer. You can't force an organisation to accept cash for a Mars Bar just as that organisation can't force a customer to buy a Mars bar. If an organisation makes the decision that it's too costly to deal in cash, then they have the choice to do that, just as customers have the choice not to buy stuff from that organisation.

But, in reality, it WILL be gone from mainstream organisations within a couple of decades, simply because of the younger generations coming through who are happy not to use cash, the number of customers wanting to use cash will continue to diminish and organisations will continue to make decisions to stop accepting it when the costs of doing so become too high in comparision with the benefits (i.e. higher customers).

Just the same as happened with cheques. There was never a formal "ban" or termination of cheques. It was just that over time, the number of people wanting to use cheques diminished as easier options emerged, and the number of organisations accepting cheques diminished in response. Yes, most banks continue to tolerate their use, but it's important to observe that the new emerging "online" banks which are gaining in popularity tend not to offer cheques as a service/option!

Here's the No Fixed Address bank account.

I was thinking of homeless people, not criminals/fraudsters. I don't include 'lifestyle aspects', whatever they are.
I think a society should be judged on how it treats it's most disadvantaged or vulnerable members, which includes the homeless, by most people's standards.
Why not keep cash, as well as use cards, apple pay, etc?

I think it was HSBC offering bank accounts for homeless people. Not sure if any other bank does.

People will need to get bank accounts. It's a basic requirement of modern society. I appreciate some will genuinely be incapable, i.e. serious mental health issues, but they'd probably struggle to manage cash too, so need support in everyday life in lots of aspects. As the years pass, there'll be fewer and fewer very old people (say 90 plus) who had their working life at a time when people were paid in cash and paid bills etc in cash, so I'll give them the benefit of the doubt. But for anyone younger, they must have been living under a rock, as bank accounts, credit cards, etc., were pretty normal back in the 80s, which is over 40 years ago! There are simple/basic bank accounts for those with poor credit history who are excluded from "normal" bank accounts. I suppose homeless people may struggle to get any form of bank account without a postal address and ID documents, etc. But the number of people who genuinely have reasons for not having a bank account or a dedicated carer to look after their lifestyle aspects, will be a lot lower than the figures for people without an account as most of them will be for less genuine reasons, i.e. can't be bothered, don't trust banks, tin hat brigade, tax/benefit fraudsters, criminals, etc.

No shit. But trying to justify your tinfoil hat attitude by suggesting you’re famous and interesting made me chuckle.

It clearly doesn’t put actual celebs off, and anytime I’ve heard stories of celebs being stalked or harassed it’s by an actual weird human, not as a result of big tech’s standard operating systems.

It's an anonymous forum so you don't know who anyone is.........

It’s funny actually, I just realised - you know what’s worse than turning up to a shop with no bank card? What’s caused me more inconvenience? Forgetting a fucking CARRIER BAG! 😂

That’s how often Apple Pay has failed me - practically never, and only when a card would also have failed.

😂😂😂

Thanks for the attempted insult, but “our” lives are not always routine or low risk, we are just able to differentiate between situations that have low levels of risk and those that have risk of death and plan appropriately. One size does not fit all, and it’s important to have the skill to assess situations case by case.

I have both high and low risk hobbies and have a role in an emergency service where my life is often at risk.

And now Greggs' payment systems are down. Endemic this last week!