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Not paying with cash

rubenerd.com

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Re: Not paying with cash

#3

Post by superkuh »

I'll always remember the time when the tourist town of Ely, Minnesota, USA had it's single fiber internet cable cut. Pretty much all the groups there trying to rent canoes, equipment, hotels, etc with corporate cards weren't able to do it. We were lucky our group brought cash.

A society depending entirely on corporations for currency function is incredibly fragile in addition to corporate payment services being rent seeking, privacy invading, transaction morality deciding monsters. At least in the USA.

Governments should definitely be regulating and requiring those offering paid goods and services to accept cash. And not just for paying debts.

Re: Not paying with cash

#4

Post by Shank »

One thing I really love that Japan got right was the creation of e-money systems that are anonymous (you can get a Suica for 20,000 yen without any registration information), work offline (you don't need network at-payment, nor does the terminal), and are easily accessible (you can get them at any train station, you can charge them at any ATM or convenience store with cash). In contrast, a debit/credit card usually requires a lot more pain to get onboarded with. The closest thing is probably those silly visa prepaid cards you can buy, but they require a little work to use regularly.

Re: Not paying with cash

#7

Post by csinode »

Shank wrote: post #4

One thing I really love that Japan got right was the creation of e-money systems that are anonymous (you can get a Suica for 20,000 yen without any registration information), work offline (you don't need network at-payment, nor does the terminal), and are easily accessible (you can get them at any train station, you can charge them at any ATM or convenience store with cash). In contrast, a debit/credit card usually r…

> work offline (you don't need network at-payment, nor does the terminal)

Surely this is massively vulnerable to double spend attacks?

Re: Not paying with cash

#8

Post by mappu »

Shank wrote: post #4

One thing I really love that Japan got right was the creation of e-money systems that are anonymous (you can get a Suica for 20,000 yen without any registration information), work offline (you don't need network at-payment, nor does the terminal), and are easily accessible (you can get them at any train station, you can charge them at any ATM or convenience store with cash). In contrast, a debit/credit card usually r…

I think a lot of the motivations are AML. Suica has a low maximum balance, that probably restricts the nefarious use cases.

Re: Not paying with cash

#9

Post by cosmotic »

Shank wrote: post #4

One thing I really love that Japan got right was the creation of e-money systems that are anonymous (you can get a Suica for 20,000 yen without any registration information), work offline (you don't need network at-payment, nor does the terminal), and are easily accessible (you can get them at any train station, you can charge them at any ATM or convenience store with cash). In contrast, a debit/credit card usually r…

Meanwhile, there's no apparent way to pay for a train using an American android phone (or at least I couldn't figure it out last year). One of the two apps refused to install on non-japanese phones, the other installed but refused to run. Had to pay with cash and it was a huge pain. Half the time I inexplicably had to do a fare adjustment, a hugely embarrassing moment blocking the turnstile, especially considering the culture there.
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