Cash will remain a part of our day-to-day lives for decades, Victoria Cleland the Bank of England’s chief cashier has said on the 50th anniversary of the ATM. She pointed out that 94% of UK adults use cash machines. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-40404814
To be honest the only reason I ever use cash machines is for shops that don’t accept card, and it’s becoming more and more easier for merchants to do so.
Used to be tonnes of shops I had to withdraw for, now it’s down to just two.
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94% of adults over which time frame?
If it’s once a month then yeah. I’m probably in that 94%, is it’s once in the last year then definitely.
That stat doesn’t prove much and shows a lack of insight. Just because a lot of people do something doesn’t mean they enjoy it or want to do it. Boo cash boo.
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I feel there had been a strong move towards card usage prior to the global crisis a few years ago and then there was a swing back to cash usage. Particularly with the growth of zero hours contracts and the gig economy.
I’d be interested in seeing where that stat came from tbh…however we do use cash as my OH works in the service industry and tips are commonly left as cash so we spend it when he gets it!
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As the old saying goes “there are lies, damned lies, and statistics”
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I dislike using cash. I try to avoid it as much as possible.
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I hate handling coins as they so dirty. I also prefer having my change put on a small tray for me to take in some countries rather than just dumped in my hand by some cashier at a till.
I know a lot of people who use cash solely so “the government cant track what i’m spending my money on”
I hate holding coins too- they feel gross.
Also maybe it’s because I’m so used to it in this day and age but I never actually give a second thought about what is being monitored/ what I buy, if they want to know I buy a ton of chocolate every week then that’s cool with me 
Corporations spend big money to acquire consumer spending patterns but I haven’t been creeped out by ads predicting what I’d like. Amazon just assumes I’m a huge collector or something, the moment I huge blender or some other product, they send me ads and emails for more models 
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I always used to use cash as I hated entering my pin but since contactless arrived I have moved away from cash and only really use it to pay my cleaner and for random things like newsagents or sandwich lady.
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I can’t see cash being round for too much longer. I find I very rarely carry cash on me any more. Like @awn said, the times I use the ATM are for the few places that only accept cash.
Sweden’s ambition to go cashless I think is really interesting. In fact, I’ve seen a couple of restaurants in London go cashless too.
The difficulty is for those who don’t currently have access to banking services. Hopefully banks like Monzo will make access easier and fairer.
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I’m a fairly frequent user of cash as I make quite a few purchases in the £2-3 range and it seems silly to me to use a card for them and make the shop keeper pay the transaction fees for such a small purchase.
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It’s not as simple as that. They also have to pay cash handling fees to their bank, to pay in at the end of the day, and for getting coins so they can provide you change. I had a conversation last week with the owner of a local sandwich shop I frequent, asking him which was financially better, and whether this changed for small versus large transactions. He said that the card fees are now so low, it doesn’t make a difference whether he pays those or has to pay more cash handling fees. And he’s priced things so that people can just pay however they want and he doesn’t have to worry about it (and his prices are very reasonable). It might not be the same at your local shop, but you can’t assume that paying in cash is financially beneficial for the shopkeeper.
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Using card for £2-3 purchases is actually a good thing as it’ll incentivise the shopkeeper to look at switching to a service that charges less for those transactions in order to reduce his costs, which in turn will lead to demands for card processors to charge less for those transactions which in turn creates pressure on VISA/MasterCard to charge less for them (or risk new rivals emerging). If you artificially make it seem like there’s little-to-no demand for £2-3 transactions then no one will bother to find a cost-effective solution!
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The reason offline retailers adopted cash back at the till is that it reduces the amount of physical cash they have to pay into their business account. It illustrates that processing cash is more expensive, at least for larger retailers, than paying transaction charges and the logistics of getting money to the bank securely.
I am surprised that 6% of people are completely cashless, although not knowing the timeframe that the survey covered doesn’t help in determining the relevance of this stat. When I travel I don’t have any local currency, but in the UK I often need cash for items like parking and the occasional retailer that isn’t able to process electronic payments.
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it is not just processing costs but insurance costs are higher to cover larger sums of money on premises so encouraging use of cards or regularly banking excess cash or giving cash back minimises that cost as well as minimising theft risks
I agree. I have found carrying metal around absurd for the last decade or so.
I’m wondering if the processing fee for a Contactless transaction will actually be less than the costs of handling, processing and depositing your coins at the bank? Plus associated security risks.
Paying Contactless at Co-op for a £0.39 box of ibuprofen caused them no headache and was more convenient for me.
Challenge: someone to use Monzo for a lower cost payment than my £0.39 
£0.27 
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