Random question for those aged 50+

[ShopTattsyrup]

Random question that stemmed from a meandering conversation with my mother this evening.

For those of you aged 50+, and therefore doing jobs pre 1985, at what point did getting paid in cash stop being the norm?

My mother remembers getting paid cash in the early 80's for her saturday job in a cafe, but cannot remember if that was still the case five years later when she was working as a waitress and bar staff and no memory of when she started getting pay cheques and when she started getting paid directly into her bank account.

Anyone out there with better memories than her?

I was paid in cash until 1992

I knew someone once who was quite young and paid cash in 2004. She thought it was something dodgy and had to be explained that it was above board and she would still have deductions etc

Paid cash for first job ( not counting babysitting) in 1977.

Paid cash seasonally, part time until 1987. I also looked after a holiday home and that was paid into a bank account by solicitor.

With our business we still paid ourselves and employees in cash, weekly, untill 2015 (the year before we got a computer system!)!

All properly through the books, taxed, PAYEd etc before anyone starts. It just saved a trip to the bank to pay it in, and saved business bank charges.

Then we changed to 4 weekly pay to save money on the outsourced payroll. And I think we then swapped to bank transfers for the employees. We still took our wages in cash (again completely legitimately), which I'd then have to go to the bank and pay in. Yes, it was a pain. But it was progress!

DH had worked in the business from a young teen in the early 80s and thus it had ever been. The computer system was at my insistence, stock control was literally kept inside DH's brain, great for him, nightmare for me!

I'm not even in my 40s yet OP, so I struggled with the backwardness of it all, but DH accepted change was needed in the end, and even came to love the computer system 😂.

I started work in 1974, and was paid by bank transfer. I think as a general rule, salaried staff and management were paid by bank transfer, and full time factory/ hourly paid workers at least had the option of payment in cash well into the 1980s. Larger companies pushed hard to get their employees to switch to payment by bank transfer as personal bank account usage became more widespread. It saved on payroll staff and and meant that the security risk of having temptingly large amounts of cash on site on pay day could be avoided.

I was paid in cash for temporary jobs when I was at school or a student (until 1983) I was also paid in cash for a temporary factory job I did at the beginning of 1984.

I moved to a permanent job later in 1984 and had no choice but to be paid direct in to my bank. If I remember rightly there were some older staff who were still paid in cash because they preferred that, but new recruits weren't given the option.

Civil servant starting in 1981. Around 82/3 I was given a 50 pound bonus, a lot then, to open a bank account for them to pay me. Previously I got notes in brown packet.

I was paid cash for a Saturday job, while at school, 1977. Never since.

My first job in 1987 was paid monthly and went directly into my bank account.

Starting from 1979, all my salaied work was paid by direct bank transfer. I was self-employed for a couple of years and paid mainly by cheque with some bank transfers. I was never paid in cash.

1986 for me. Moved jobs in 1987 and was paid by cheque then.

Only ever got cash pay from a couple of Saturday jobs before I left school, everything after that (1982 onwards) into the bank.

My memory isn't so good now, but there was something called The Truck Act, and under that, until it was repealed (in the 80s I think) you could demand (and had the right) to be paid in cash, even if that was not your company policy. I worked somewhere where nearly everyone was paid directly into their bank, but there were a few old school men who insisted on cash, so that they could give out some to their wives for housekeeping, and then the rest would be divided up and put aside for bills (possibly in tins on the mantelpiece!) Of course, it was chiefly used as a means of keeping your earnings amount secret from your wife. It all sounds unthinkable now.
I was mostly paid in cash until 1980. A lot of older people resisted having bank accounts, preferring to keep their cash hidden at home, so hence cash pay.
Mind you, I also remember buying my national insurance stamps at the post office and sticking them in a little book. Things were very simple in those days!

I started work in 1979, a salaried job at a University, my wages were paid into my bank account. Saturday job earlier in 1979, in a restaurant, wages were paid in cash.

Late 1970s I had a Saturday job in a library. I think they sent me a monthly cheque, as I recall getting asking my Dad how to set up a bank account so that I could pay it in.

Used to do casual work in holidays for my Dad (also 1970s). He's the only person who's ever paid me cash, come to think of it.

Cash for Saturday job until the mid eighties, then in salaried work at a national charity was paid by compyter [rinted cheque, after that always stright into bank and just printed payslip given. I agree that it depends on job, casual work in cafes, small shops and bars doesn't always "go through the books"

Brown wage envelope with pay slip (handwritten then typed then some kind of rollostat) with notes and coins in. Think the last I had was in 87ish. In fact I had a job where I had to do wages and all the envelopes went into a shoe box and everyone lined up to collect. We all then ripped them open and went out eating and drinking. Good god - memories !
Since roughly 89 onwards wages straight to bank account but still had old style wage slips in envelopes with waxy windows.
Do you think I can shred my filing cabinet drawer full of these relics? I keep think I’m might need them ‘just in case’ !

my first pay was for Saturday in a doc's surgery, got paid 5/= in a little brown envelope with my name and the amount on it. i was very pleased, as i was still in junior school. there were no appts then, people walked in and gave their names, and i had to retrieve their medical notes, which were put in a tray and they took into the doc's room when called.
seemed to work well. guess that;s why they changed the system.
later when i got my first regular job, i had to open a bank a/c in order to be paid by direct transfer. it was public service type, in a polytechnic.
that's because it was a salaried role, ie paid monthly into bank.
other types of workers, esp manual/technical were paid cash wages weekly.
in one of my later jobs. although it was salaried, we could get extra subsistence allowance for working far away from base, and that was paid in cash, monthly from the chief's petty cash box.

this thread has made me think.
maybe we could have a series of these, like AMA, on life in the olden days ! how little everyday things have changed. could be interesting.

It stopped being the norm in the mid to late 1980s. The government ended the law from the 19th century where you could insist on being paid in cash, and then banks stopped insisting on a minimum balance on current accounts (£100?).

I was a student and worked part time in a supermarket in 1990-1. We were paid cash.

My first full time job in 1984 was a trainee audit clerk. I got a cheque for £130 in a little brown envelope each month...yes, month! The boss used to deliver the envelopes to each staff member's desk personally. I used to have to wait for the cheque to clear before I could spend it.

I was paid weekly in cash for a part-time job until 1990.

My first job (1986) was cash but every other one after that was paid into my bank.

Had a weekend job in the local pub in the 80s, always paid in cash at the end of the shift. Started salaried work in 1988, money paid straight into bank account. I am trying to remember now whether my university grant (those were the days) was paid by cheque or into my bank account...

I'm 53 btw and did A levels in 1985. So someone aged 50 would have done A levels in 1988 and/or O levels in 1986. Even if they left school at 16 they wouldn't have been working full time in 1985. So you are more likely looking for people aged 55+

That was salary for managing a zoo

Mid 80s. I work in the offices at a factory and I remember, when they changed from being paid in cash to being paid into the bank, that quite a few women who worked on the shop floor did not have bank accounts. I also remember that right up into the 90s some people would draw out their entire monthly wage on the day they got paid because they wanted it in cash.