Cash?

[Flutterbybudget]

To think that companies and shops should really be accepting cash again now?
I know that during the last few years, people were being encouraged to use contactless payments “where possible” officially to reduce germ carrying on cash, but NOW with no Covid restrictions and the cost of living soaring, I think that more and more people will WANT to return to paying cash for various purchases (makes budgeting simpler) and it seems bizarre to me that some places are still refusing to accept cash payments.
I, for one, don’t want to live in a cashless society, where every penny that I have can be tracked, traced and taxed. I want to be able to sell an old piece of furniture, without that being questioned and taken as “income”. I want to be able to give my children/ grandchildren coins to put in their money box.

Cash in hand jobs can be a difference between surviving or struggling for some people.

Too many bottles of wine this week? Card disabled

I highly doubt that.

Our bus service decided not to take cash however if their card machine isn't working your walking so they decided taking cash and card was better than running a bus with zero passengers it was weird got on bus card machine malfunction tried to pay cash NO! NO CASH! erm?? Called main office they said the next driver would take cash "as a courtesy" I pointed out it was them who malfunctioned not me cue long pause and the question.....did he really refuse your cash as his machine broke? The oh fuck penny dropped and they got him a working bus fast

Seriously not joined up thinking

There are ALWAYS discussions about people on benefits having a card not money to pay for things you won't be able to buy alcohol or cigarettes with this card and of course you will be forced into paying shops for everything this doesnt seem like a "bad" idea but it really is can you imagine having a your choices removed like that? The inability to buy a cheap toy from Facebook marketplace because they want cash and your on benefits so all you have is the stupid card?

I agree OP. Of course the taxman would love to see every bit of money we earn and spend. I'm sure along with it would come new ways to tax us more. Its why I'm so against it. Money in the bank isn't 100% "safe" accounts can be scrutinised and frozen. And not always because you actually did anything wrong.

The council-run cafe in the large park in the city centre doesn't accept cash. There have been a lot of unhappy older children/young teens unable to have a drink or ice cream this Summer.

We have noticed Burger King, Pizza Hut, Prezzo, pizza express and dominos are still cashless we have been choosing to spend our money elsewhere. It has also helped our diet as well😉

I'm a big fan of cashless.

It really works for me to be able to track back what I have spent. I just don't keep track transaction by transaction. It's been great to make even small transactions cashless.

The costs associated with processing cash payments are so.much.higher than cashless, if we had neither and had to choose, who would pick issuing and circulating tokens against having a list of transactions.

Anyone who thinks budgeting is easier with cash is very welcome to PM me to talk through how to budget when using cashless.

"The costs associated with processing cash payments are so.much.higher than cashless"

How much higher, @FinallyHere? Are we talking a flat rate per transaction or a percentage? Looking for some actual numbers.

The costs will include collecting cash, having a float to provide change, counting cash, delivering cash to a bank where it needs to be counted again. These will take time which could otherwise be used more productively or not be required, less time required. Plus the cash tied up in the float.

Plus the risk of robbery

I don't think there will be universally applicable costs, these will vary compare the wages paid. And turnover.

Compared to each transaction of exactly the right amount, no float, no change, no counting, no visit to the bank.

Complexly different remote kind of security required.

Gor a traditional account, like Natwest. the fee is 70 p per £100 deposited

For a challenger bank it's £3 per transaction or 0.7% of the amount deposited, whichever is higher .

So depositing £2000 would cost £14.

So both cost £ as oppose to no fees (which is most accounts) for electronic transactions (not including whatever fees you might have for administering credit card etc).

Thus doesn't include the staff cost of going to the bank, petrol etc and the risk..

*excuse typos

YABU

It's up to the shops so I can't get too worked up about this

Cash will die out soon enough - thank the lord

I am currently paying cash because I sold some items on FB Marketplace so I had the cash handy, plus I'm actually up to my overdraft limit at the moment so can't use my card even if I didn't have the cash. I am so, so glad I do have the actual money in my hands - it meant I could do a small shop for bread for my DS's lunchbox for the next couple of days until pay day.

We were on a camping holiday in Yorkshire last week and I was surprised at the number of businesses who only accepted cash.

Small businesses do not have to bank the cash they take, they can use it themselves. A business I worked for always paid the cleaner in cash at her request, and yes it went through the books and HMRC.

Starbucks are card only which has really annoyed me. I didn’t have my card on me but had cash to buy a cold drink and used their drive through (which had no sign up to warn me it was card only prior to joining the queue). On paying they refused my cash citing covid but the irony was they had started making the drink so it went to waste because they refused the cash (correct change).
I think a lot of businesses have found ways in the pandemic to cut costs and I imagine that having a cashless till means that it is safer if that there is no physical reconciliation of monies at the end of the day. I imagine it would save time, reduce human error etc
But citing covid as a reason for declining cash isn’t ok

I understand where you're coming from and YANBU but.... I recently left a job in retail and cash is fucking filthy.

The amount of people who think it's fine to give you a £10 note that they've been holding IN THEIR MOUTH while they fuck around with their phone is disgusting.
Even before a pandemic it was gross but now it's even worse.
I won't start on women who keep their cash in their bra and hand it over all sweaty....

I think you have no understanding at all of budgeting on a tiny budget. When you have £40 for the week for food, it is far easier to have that set aside in cash to use in various shops, than to have to add up each cashless transaction for a pint of milk, some veg at the market, some bread at corner shop, etc.

Tracking your overall spend is easy if cashless. Tracking an individual budget where you have £10 for the meter, £40 for food, £6 for bus fares, etc etc is much much easier by cash.

Different banks charge different fees for handling cash. There's also higher insurance costs - usually hundreds of pounds more if a business wants to insure their cash holdings. Then there's the time of counting it, taking it to the bank, etc. And of course, the risk of theft (business insurance for cash usually has a hefty excess), and the risk of forged notes that has to be borne by the retailer.

You don't have to "add up" anything if you use one of the modern banks such as Monzo where the app does all that for you and you can set budgets etc.

That's fine for petty cash like a few hours for a cleaner, but not much good to pay their suppliers, all their other staff who want BACS payments, their direct debits (insurance, power, subscriptions, security, waste, professional fees, etc). They can hardly pay the wholesaler's lorry driver a few thousand pounds for the half van load of groceries/tobacco/booze being delivered can they?

The majority of small businesses who take cash are retail. They wouldn't want that much cash hanging around.
A business that doesn't put this kind of cash through a bank is much more likely to be audited by hmrc. Putting cash or making £ electronic makes it much much easier to run your accounts and use specific software like xero and do all your returns like VAT to hmrc. This saves an unbelievable amount of time, makes your accounts much easier (and cash flow) and makes your returns to companies house easier too.

Cash makes your business much riskier in all sorts of ways.

A lot if businesses find it a pain to keep banking cash so card only .
for me me always card as I’m lazy it’s a effort to go to cash machine , I don’t pass any so either have to remember to ask for cash back or go cash machine at supermarket .