Swedes turn against cashlessness
theguardian.com
Swedes turn against cashlessness
1–10 of 357 posts
Re: Swedes turn against cashlessness
#2As an American, now living in Europe I cannot understand the pushback against cashless systems. In Germany almost every cafe, restaurant, or bar requires you pay with cash. I understand there is a slight charge to the vendor when charging to a credit or bank card, but the amount of time and energy saved by having "exact change" every transaction should increase productivity enough to cover any costs.
Re: Swedes turn against cashlessness
#3As an American, now living in Europe I cannot understand the pushback against cashless systems. In Germany almost every cafe, restaurant, or bar requires you pay with cash. I understand there is a slight charge to the vendor when charging to a credit or bank card, but the amount of time and energy saved by having "exact change" every transaction should increase productivity enough to cover any costs.
> The Riksbank governor, Stefan Ingves, called for new legislation to secure public control over the payments system, arguing that being able to make and receive payments is a “collective good” like defence, the courts, or public statistics.
> “Most citizens would feel uncomfortable to surrender these social functions to private companies,” he said.
> “It should be obvious that Sweden’s preparedness would be weakened if, in a serious crisis or war, we had not decided in advance how households and companies would pay for fuel, supplies and other necessities.”
Re: Swedes turn against cashlessness
#4As an American, now living in Europe I cannot understand the pushback against cashless systems. In Germany almost every cafe, restaurant, or bar requires you pay with cash. I understand there is a slight charge to the vendor when charging to a credit or bank card, but the amount of time and energy saved by having "exact change" every transaction should increase productivity enough to cover any costs.
Maybe you're not used to pay with cash but for people that are used to it, it's not slower than using plastic.
And sometimes it's even faster, when the card or the card reader don't work, the customer is old etc.
Re: Swedes turn against cashlessness
#5As an American, now living in Europe I cannot understand the pushback against cashless systems. In Germany almost every cafe, restaurant, or bar requires you pay with cash. I understand there is a slight charge to the vendor when charging to a credit or bank card, but the amount of time and energy saved by having "exact change" every transaction should increase productivity enough to cover any costs.
Maybe you're not used to pay with cash but for people that are used to it, it's not slower than using plastic. And sometimes it's even faster, when the card or the card reader don't work, the customer is old etc.
With the new addition of Pay Wave where you can simply tap a card on a sensor, I do not see how paying with cash and then waiting for the teller to sort of the bills and provide the right change can be faster.
I understand I need to become more accustomed to the culture that I immigrate too, but that does not mean that there are not more efficient solutions compared to "the way its always been".
As for the card reader not working, this is usually only a problem with older machines or places without a strong internet connection.
Re: Swedes turn against cashlessness
#6As an American, now living in Europe I cannot understand the pushback against cashless systems. In Germany almost every cafe, restaurant, or bar requires you pay with cash. I understand there is a slight charge to the vendor when charging to a credit or bank card, but the amount of time and energy saved by having "exact change" every transaction should increase productivity enough to cover any costs.
> The Riksbank governor, Stefan Ingves, called for new legislation to secure public control over the payments system, arguing that being able to make and receive payments is a “collective good” like defence, the courts, or public statistics. > “Most citizens would feel uncomfortable to surrender these social functions to private companies,” he said. > “It should be obvious that Sweden’s preparedness would be weakened…
The first two points involve the way the citizens "feel" and not is actually most productive.
As for the preparedness of a nation to handle a cashless economy during a time of war, wouldn't a electronic ledger be must safer and reliable than if the government say just started printing more money leading to inflation problems. This has happens numerous times throughout times of history during war and could be avoided with a cashless economy.
Re: Swedes turn against cashlessness
#7Note that apart from privacy issues and technical problems (Puerto Rico blackout, anybody?) numerous studies indicate that people spend less money when using cash instead of credit cards. That's one reason for the big push by the banks, shops, restaurants, and media to "go cashless".
Re: Swedes turn against cashlessness
#8I wonder what effect would cashless society have on saving habits. Would more people buy gold? Stocks? Bitcoin?
Re: Swedes turn against cashlessness
#9Earlier quoted context omitted.
Maybe you're not used to pay with cash but for people that are used to it, it's not slower than using plastic. And sometimes it's even faster, when the card or the card reader don't work, the customer is old etc.
With the new addition of Pay Wave where you can simply tap a card on a sensor, I do not see how paying with cash and then waiting for the teller to sort of the bills and provide the right change can be faster. I understand I need to become more accustomed to the culture that I immigrate too, but that does not mean that there are not more efficient solutions compared to "the way its always been". As for the card reade…
> I do not see how paying with cash and then waiting for the teller to sort of the bills and provide the right change can be faster.
You have to wait for the transaction to verify. That usually takes more than three seconds (at least here), which is roughly the amount of time it takes to get change.
Re: Swedes turn against cashlessness
#10As an American, now living in Europe I cannot understand the pushback against cashless systems. In Germany almost every cafe, restaurant, or bar requires you pay with cash. I understand there is a slight charge to the vendor when charging to a credit or bank card, but the amount of time and energy saved by having "exact change" every transaction should increase productivity enough to cover any costs.
Maybe there are other factors than obsession with the speed and "productivity" effect of the money-transfer part of a transaction.
Your meal and beer entering your mouth probably took 100x as long as the difference between counting change and swiping a card. So why not puree them together? And damn anyone who thinks it was important to keep them separate; incomprehensible.