The Consumerist – by Laura Northrup
Credit card network Visa has an interesting proposal for small food businesses across the country. It will give as many as 50 of them $10,000 each to upgrade their systems, especially to accept contactless mobile payments. The catch is that they have to agree not to accept cash anymore.
Visa’s War on Cash is a thing
You may not have known this, but Visa has declared war on cash. That makes sense, since cash is its main competition as a network for credit and debit card payments. The $500,000 set aside to help merchants quit cash is just one front in this war.
The Wall Street Journal reports that the company’s new CEO, Al Kelly, has a particular interest in eradicating cash.
“We’re focused on putting cash out of business,” he told the company’s investors in June. Globally, payments by cash and check are actually increasing. Americans still use physical dollar bills in 32% of transactions, and Visa wants to change that.
The Pros & Cons Of Going Cashless
One small restaurant in New York City told the WSJ that its manager saves 23 hours each week worth of work by going all-cards. The main downside: having to pay transaction fees on all of the money that it takes in.
The National Retail Federation takes a pro-cash stance, noting that fees take an average 2% bite off the top of business, and the percentage goes up for merchants that are smaller. The trade group has also pointed out in the pastthat expenses related to taking cash — even the risk of robbery and theft — are still lower than credit card fees.
Ultimately, it’s customers who will decide which method of payment we prefer, and the percentage of payments made in cash is falling. 40% of consumer transactions were in cash in 2012, and that fell to 32% in 2015.
Notably, while Visa says that the $10,000 payments will help food vendors and restaurants with their payment systems and marketing costs, you don’t really hear anything about a discount on those interchange fees.
One way that these cashless restaurants could avoid both interchange fees anddealing with crumpled bills would be to accept blockchain currencies like bitcoin, assuming that interested customers have devices with bitcoin wallets in their pockets. Visa, however, is not going to help them set up for this. As far as we know, the payment network doesn’t have any cryptocurrency payment acceptance products in the works.
What a bunch of Bull S*(T
I won’t go to any restaurant that doesn’t take cash….there….did you get that A.I.? haha
Agreed. Any business that refuses payment in cash or that otherwise fails to respect my privacy is not getting my money.
Agreed, cash is king and we need to have it available to us. The only reason these traitors want to ban cash is because it is another link in the total control chain.
True, but I think it will be hard for them to ban cash entirely. And even if they do so, there are other mediums of exchange that could be used in its place when making private sales (e.g., ammo or other basic commodities with intrinsic value).
They’rr going to have world currency soon. Wrench in gear box time.
If they do not take cash, and if they use robots, I do NO shop there. I do NOT believe in doing away with cash; but I do believe in that it MUST Lawfully be backed by gold, silver, etc. I do not believe in taking away jobs from those who need them because robots are cheaper.
How cheap are the robots/robot kiosks when NO ONE WILL BUY FROM YOU?
Don’t like the unLAWFUL and unConstitutional TSA, don’t fly, take a train, etc as it would NOT take long before they would be gone.
Do not like our children, spouses, friends, etc being killed, injured in UNLAWFUL, undeclared wars? Then teach them the meaning of the Oath to the US Constitution. That there is NOT ONE person who serves within our government, or any governmental office that allegiance is owed to. Our allegiance here in the USA is to the Constitution of the United States of America, nothing else. THAT is the basics of our freedom, our sovereignty.
J. Reuben Clark: “God provided that in this land of liberty, our political allegiance shall run NOT TO INDIVIDUALS, that is, to government officials, no matter how great or how small they may be. Under His plan OUR ALLEGIANCE AND THE ONLY ALLEGIANCE WE OWE AS CITIZENS OR DENIZENS OF THE UNITED STATES, RUNS TO OUR INSPIRED CONSTITUTION which God himself set up. SO RUNS THE OATH OF OFFICE OF THOSE WHO PARTICIPATE GOVERNMENT. A certain loyalty we do owe to the office which a man holds, but even here we owe just by reason of our citizenship, no loyalty to the man himself. In other countries it is to the individual that allegiance runs. This principle of allegiance to the Constitution is basic to our freedom. It is one of the great principles that distinguishes this “land of liberty” from other countries”.
But if you (generic “you”) “just follow orders” and “just do your job” you may end up like those who did so and were found to not be excused from what they implemented. Because if you do NOT follow those orders, those bad things cannot be done here.
And the ban on cash agenda continues…..
Cybermammon is SO much more controllable.
And removable.
Here, Exide batteries does not take cash.
Went there last year to buy a factory second.
The guy asked if I was gonna use a credit card.
Told him I don’t use that crap.
He said we don’t except cash, only credit cards.
Told him to stuff credit card, and Exide up his back side.
He seemed like a proud commie arse lick.