Should stores have to have cash option?

At first I was like a business should be able to set whatever policy they want, if they refuse cash they may risk losing some customers. But some people don't have credit cards or bank accounts and probably can't get them due to bad credit or other reasons. Some people prefer to pay for things in cash. And like Peachy said, cash is legal tender, so maybe it should be a law.

The rest of the world is moving towards a cashless society. People on welfare or receiving food benefits have debit cards. Yes, there are a small percentage of "unbanked", so a business will risk losing some customers. A solution is that larger retail businesses can install machines that take cash; a small retailer should have the option.

Also, part of the motivation is to have stores that have minimal or no staff, like the ones Amazon is experimenting with.



JT, this is a red herring. Yes, many stores put in non-bank ATMs that charge outrageous fees. No one is required to use them to make a purchase. Those who put them in a store do it as a "convenience" and make money from it. The fees banks charge when withdrawing money from an ATM that is not your bank's are also ridiculous, though not as bad as these private ATM companies. But, those people have debit cards! The law is to protect those who don't have them.

As for this senior, I want to force all stores to use Apple Pay so I don't need to carry my card everywhere.

Bottom line, Asian countries have figured this out...

Yet another unrelated issue. If bankless folks are getting their paycheck on a debit card and get charged fees for withdrawing cash, then that should be rectified. It's a similar issue if they're given a check and are forced to one of those "check cashing" places.

But, that person with a payroll card who uses it for purchases, won't be charged fees.

The topic is about people who don't have debit cards in a cashless store.

Not accepting cash is getting to be a problem in Israel, but not for shopping. More for bill paying.

Our bank machine doesn't use envelops anymore .  Makes dh stabby because he's always depositing cheques of all different sizes and the machine can't always figure it out so he always has to put them in in small clumps instead of in one envelope.  The cool thing though is that it prints copies of the cheques onto the receipt so it's easy to track things.

I'm not super interested in banking from a mobile device. I know lots of people do it - but I'm not there yet .

Speaking of which that's another reason that cash should be an option - cash purchases are private purchases. Gifts don't show up on credit card bills, no one else needs to know how much you're spending on [insert item here]. Some times being incognito is nice.

The campground I stay at hosts a libertarian festival every year. Acceptable forms of currency are everything from cash, apple pay, bitcoin, and some guy he melts his own silver into coin. It's all legal tender that week! I quite enjoy that!

Most airlines no longer accept cash for food/beverages. That's been in place for a few years now.

I call those Zero World problems... they are even less important than first world problems. (Like my complaint about stores that don't take Apple Pay.)




First, you need to have interest in a mobile device.