AIBU to refuse to pay cash in hand?

[Dontasksillyquestions]

This recently came up in conversation with a friend and she disagreed with me.

I generally avoid hiring anyone who asks to be paid cash in hand. I don’t see how cash is more convenient these days unless it’s to avoid tax, benefits rules, etc., and I don’t want to be involved. I also rarely carry cash and getting to a cash machine is inconvenient.

Last year I stopped using a regular gardener when he suddenly asked for cash only, despite there being no payment issues (I always transferred the money on the day he’d done the work). My friend thinks I’m being ridiculous and that it’s none of my concern how people run their business. AIBU?

I get an invoice from the window cleaner.

I can pay by cash or BT.

I pay anyone cash who wants it. Hairdresser, builders, plumbers, dog kennels, nail salon, beautician, cleaner, dog walker Happy for anyone to avoid paying as much tax as possible.

Great deal for both sides.

My nearest cash machine now is a half hour walk since all the local banks shut. I would not pay cash to anyone regular. Going way out of my way to go to the atm for a one off is fine but not every week.

To stop chancers doing things like chargebacks with the bank I’d imagine. Cash means the person paying can’t get their money back unless the tradesperson pays it back - there’s no third party involved. Accepting card payments often means you have to pay for a service to be able to do that, all of which eats into profit.

Quite honestly, I’m not sure why it matters if you pay in cash or not, if you’re given an invoice and a receipt. It’s up to the person working to declare the earnings and pay their tax etc, so it’s no hardship on the person paying.

It didn't have to be mentioned. I was talking about MY concerns about those things.

From my side I wouldn't pay for anything big in cash, but I think a lot of self employed people work really bloody hard and tend to do a few little jobs at the weekend for cash, personally I think this is fine as they are paying tax on all the bigger jobs through the books they do on weekdays 🤷
Years ago I used to have a second job waitressing events when I was younger, on top of a full time office job. I only did cash work for the waitressing, as I already paid tax on my main job and I don't think hard working eg working on top of full time should be taxed/it wasn't worth the hassle if I got taxed on that. This is actually a change I would make if I was PM... Have people's hours linked to their payslips and anything over 37.5hrs a week should be tax free.

Or my old cleaner wanted cash, she was a single parent and pretty hard up, she wasn't charging much and it doesn't bother me either way.

But everyone's morals around these kind of things are different, so I think you just need to be happy with your own decisions!

I'm self employed, when I started a few years back many customers paid cash which meant I had the money in hand. Now, most pay by bank transfer. Some of them are excellent at remembering to do so in a timely fashion every week, some of them not so much, so I have to keep checking, chasing, reminding which is annoying.

I think as long as you get an invoice and a receipt, then cash is fine.

Well no, because taking cash and not declaring it as income is tax evasion and not tax avoidance.

Which only benefits the person not declaring taxable income.

I never pay cash in hand. I've had quotes for work done on my home where they've given me two prices. One for cash and one not.

I'm not a fool, I know cash in hand means they are avoiding tax, or similar.

I don't approve of tax avoidance, let alone tax fraud.

If I want to live in a civilised society ( and I do) where we have NHS, free education ( albeit only up to age 18 these days) a functioning police force ect. Then we have to pay for it. The way we pay is through taxation.

And of course, there is always the reprobate who wants cash in hand so he doesn't have to declare it to CMS. So another child goes without thanks to the colusion of the people who paid the father cash in hand.

Some may think I'm a gullible fool. I don't care what they think of me. I care what I think of me. And cheating is in effect a lie.

I don't approve, or want to be associated with liars.

YABU and also judgemental to assume someone is a tax fraud criminal for asking for cash (which they don’t have to pay charges for when banking).

Plenty of money that is paid by card is laundered and plenty that is paid cash in hand is correctly declared and taxed according.

You know “the government” is the rest of us, right? Why should the self employed get to pick & choose which laws they obey?

Ultimately tax evasion hurts us all.

I don't mind paying small amounts in cash because if you pay by card the trader loses up to 2.5 percent. I pay cash for a coffee and a bacon roll from a van, eggs at the market, and the ice cream man too.

I can understand someone charging £25-30/h when they justify having to cover tax, NI or lack of sick and holiday pay. If they dodge tax, it is a crazy rate. It’s the hourly equivalent of earning £80k.

My local garage is happy with cash or card but charges less if we pay cash so that's fine by me!

I can sort of see why someone might ask for cash for a one-off job (ie., they do not trust you). But if someone's a regular, then I think it's fair to say no, you'd rather not.

FWIW I'm a gardener; I find it mildly irritating when people pay me cash in hand. A lot of people seem to think it's preferable, but it's not.

As long as he gave me a receipt I probably would just pay cash for light gardening. But as others say, it could be to dodge cms or tax so don't feel bad for saying it's bank transfer or we part ways.

Benefits me if we go with the cash quote…

Wow!! I don't live in the UK but I can't imagine any builder here wanting to be paid that much in cash, nor have I encountered anyone who asked to be paid in cash in many decades. Builders here generally send an invoice at the end of the month, as do most other trades. Even my late DM's lawnmowing man sent a monthly bill, and that was for a tiny amount.

Must be a PTA because you have to physically bank it and account for it.

It’s likely they just want to save money and that’s why they are cheaper in the first place.

A small business using a card machine will typically have to pay 2% in fees (sometimes more) which means £20 for every £1000. Lots of banks don’t charge to deposit £1000 and if they do it’s likely to be a nominal fixed sum that doesn’t exceed £10. Therefore, a job charged at £5000 costs the trader (and effectively you, because it’s passed on) £100 in charges. Pay in cash and it costs between £0 and £10. It’s not tax fraud, just sensible finances. The fact so many people are ignorant to this is astonishing.

Of course shops should continue to be able to accept cash and people to pay in cash. I think the bank charges for small businesses to use card machines is immoral. My issue is with bigger payments to tradespeople.

Sure. As long as you know you’re not actively colluding with tax evasion, which isn’t legal for either of you.

Why is it astonishing? Are you one of those people who expects everyone to know the same stuff you know?

I'm a childminder and I ask for payment in cash, too many people over the years have said I've sent the bank transfer or I'll do it later, it all goes through the books correctly. It's hard for a self employed person to chase a payment if its not forthcoming.