Until you run out of friends… 
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At first I thought lots of people must have just got cash in a card for Christmas, then I read the article 
False alarm 
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Age UK warned the elderly face being excluded from society if they are cut off from cash in the shift to online banking and retail.
Their own research shows around 59 per cent of over-65s use a smartphone compared with more than 90 per cent of 16- to 54-year-olds.
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Dunno how I feel about this… if you can drive a car, you can probably manage a cashless payment system. The cost of installing and servicing pay and display machines is, relative to newer payment systems, enormous. Most people who can drive ought to be able to pay by phone or use an app. And if they genuinely can’t get to grips with either of those technologies, I’m not sure they should be driving.
I appreciate, however, the problems with online payments quietly taking over from pay and display machines… I can see how that might catch some people out, if not implemented with some consideration for their needs, so the article isn’t completely with merit. But, equally, we can’t keep paying people to count coins in pay and display machines forever - its far too expensive and there’s no real need.
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My mum is 82. She is almost completely deaf and would not be able to pay by phone. She has a basic mobile phone which she struggles to use (she can’t even use the phone book function on it because she can’t remember what button to press, so she has a notebook with it with the numbers written down). She wouldn’t be able to use a parking app.
She is however perfectly capable of driving a manual car with traditional instrumentation and controls.
She is capable of using a ticket machine which takes cards or cash.
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Completly agree, same with my parents.
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Why must you have to use a phone?
Whilst I’m not a supporter of the argument to abolish cash completely (I’m certain it’s impossible) cash parking is ridiculous, costly, and insecure, and I’m certain elderly drivers could use a contactless card.
Surely it’s not beyond human ability to invent a contactless machine, with a few options for various lengths of stay, and pay by tapping a card?
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Some of them are contactless too, but always seems hit and miss for my local ones.
There are contactless payment machines around here but many councils are removing even those.
My Mrs is on her phone all day long. But she just messages me the location code and gets me to pay for her parking 
.
Genuine question, would it just be cheaper / easier to just give over 65s free parking and keep it app only for everyone else, rather than keep cash going.
My god no. Baby Boomers are already the wealthiest generation in history and their hoarded wealth is screwing over everyone else. Make them pay.
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my mum is in her 80s and still manages to drive a car , she can use her mobile to make calls when she remembers to turn it on and can use whats app but for the life of me she will not use her mobile for banking , shes perfectly capable of on line banking so definately should be driving thanks 
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Pensioners who can use cards and drive aren’t the point in the article (as they can pay, even if card isn’t usually their preferred option).
The article specifically claimed that elderly drivers who couldn’t pay with cash were struggling, and as has been said by others what is the overlap really because most people wouldn’t be competent enough to drive a car but vulnerable enough to only be able to conduct transactions in cash? It can’t be every large at all.
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Why? Fundamentally, cars are the same to drive as they have been since boomers would’ve learned to drive.* You turn the key you press the pedals, shift the stick and move the wheel. The paradigm is the same.
Paying by app instead of cash, or even using contactless, that’s a different paradigm from ‘put coins in, press button, get ticket’, so it should be a surprise that there are people out there who struggle (or refuse to) adjust.
*assuming that these boomers who have trouble with apps are still driving a manual fuel car and not a fancy Tesla
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Because driving is a relatively dangerous and actually quite complex process involving constant slit-second decisions. It requires a person to be “firing on all cylinders” mentally in order to be done safely.
To then claim that same person “can’t get their head around using a card”, which is fundamentally quite easy in comparison in terms of the process involved, isn’t logical. They may prefer cash generally, but if they actually can’t cope without using it that’s a problem. It arguably indicates that they’ve lost the mental agility needed to drive safely.
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Are you talking about app based parking or using a contactless card to pay for parking?
I’m not sure if you meant this in jest or not, but may I just say that I find it a little bit offensive?
Blaming everyone of a certain age for being wealthy ignores and demeans the experience of the large number of people of that age who struggle from week to week to pay the bills.
I’m reminded of an acquaintance who said, (many years ago) that they wouldn’t choose to watch a film which was directed by a woman. He couldn’t see the problem with the statement as it was just a personal choice and he wasn’t imposing it on anyone else. It was only when someone suggested replacing the word ‘woman’ with ‘black person’ that the penny dropped.
I’m aware that there are many problems in society, and that hoarded wealth is one of them, and that people of a certain age have most of the hoarded wealth, but I find it problematic when people lump all of those people together for blame.
Anyway, if it was said in jest, then the joke fell flat for me, and if it wasn’t, then I’ve said my piece, and I’ll leave it there. Also, I don’t want to derail the thread.
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I think this could be seen as approaching “not all men” territory. That is, we know there are exceptions to the description of the group, but it’s not necessarily helpful to say “not all boomers” every time the issue of boomers having a tremendous amount of accumulated wealth and privilege is broached. Rather, the criticism can be read and it can be understood that if you’re not a boomer loaded with money and cheaply-acquired property, the criticism doesn’t apply to you.
tl;dr, we do understand that there are haves and have nots at all levels, and not all boomers are the same.
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I think that conclusion is a bit of a reach. I’ve no interest in TikTok, if this community was sure down tomorrow and we were all told to use a Monzo TikTok instead, I wouldn’t use it. Because I don’t get TikTok at all. But that doesn’t mean I lack mental agility and that I would be incompetent or unsafe in other areas of my life, like driving.
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