Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
Card readers cost peanuts. And are very soon paid for by the increase they generate in extra donations (from people who don’t carry cash).
No they don’t (having looked today at the prices my current client charges for them on a monthly basis).
It adds up quick albeit granted handling cash is not cheap if you can’t pass it to other people
As for not having cash - ideally pay by card but always have £100 or so in cash just in case
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
Card readers cost peanuts. And are very soon paid for by the increase they generate in extra donations (from people who don’t carry cash).
I’m still not convinced they’re going to be practical for small groups where the rule is a few small coins for tea-money.
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
Card readers cost peanuts. And are very soon paid for by the increase they generate in extra donations (from people who don’t carry cash).
And sod the poor, old and stupid. Gotcha
Stop patronising the poor and the old, who use cashless in their millions daily eg on the London bus network.
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
As ever, the move is more to the advantage of the retailer - who has to deal with all that cash - than the customer.
I wish, for once, retailers (and banks!) were honest about this, instead of the 'quicker' excuse.
It is quicker though.
And safer.
And less wasteful.
Cash is a pointless pain.
For you, maybe.
For others, not so much.
But as a selfish right-winger, you only ever think of yourself.
The only people who "need" cash are drug dealers.
Or me, when I want to use the lockers at the swimming pool...
Time for your pool to upgrade to the 21st century then.
Okay. Think for a minute how that works:
At the moment you put a pound coin in the locker and withdraw the key. When you come back, you unlock it with the key and get the pound coin out. It is not a financial transaction; but a little security to ensure some idiots do not lock all the lockers.
There are alternative systems, but from what I've read they all have various issues, not the least cost.
This is what you need.
They're okay, but they're another thing to keep on me in case I need it - and I can't keep it on my keyring without leaving my keys dangling from it. Unless I go to the faff of removing it. Whereas a good old pound coin is useful for so much more.
I'm watching a lecture series on the American Civil War at the moment.
It's astonishing that the Confederates managed to contest Virginia, and defend Richmond, to the very end despite their capital being barely 100 miles from Washington DC.
The South lasted as long as it did - less than Obama’s presidency - due to the incompetence and lack of determination in the Northern commanders.
With competent generals, it would have been game over quite rapidly.
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
Card readers cost peanuts. And are very soon paid for by the increase they generate in extra donations (from people who don’t carry cash).
I’m still not convinced they’re going to be practical for small groups where the rule is a few small coins for tea-money.
And they need bank accounts, which means lots of faff. PLus small clubs are one category that has been aggressively debanked in recent years, so far as I can tell ...
If you're going to do unpopular things do them first. They've five years to manage expectations.
That strategy didn't exactly go well for the Tories, did it?
Yes, but they carried on doing unpopular things. It’s a bit too early to judge whether this lot are doing anything which will pay dividends in three to four years’ time.
I wonder what a 1979/80 version of PB would have been saying about the likely fate of Thatcher's government? (Presumably still in the form of postcards on a noticeboard in a somewhat raffish gentlemens' club.)
And whilst asking for a winnable war might be a step too far for Keir's genie, it's not hard to imagine that Labour will face a perfectly split opposition again in 2028/9.
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
Card readers cost peanuts. And are very soon paid for by the increase they generate in extra donations (from people who don’t carry cash).
I’m still not convinced they’re going to be practical for small groups where the rule is a few small coins for tea-money.
Simple, make cash up to £1 coins, nothing higher value than that.
Cash is one of the prime drivers of the tax gap, and the black and grey economies. Make it just the jingling change end of the spectrum and that disappears.
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
Card readers cost peanuts. And are very soon paid for by the increase they generate in extra donations (from people who don’t carry cash).
No they don’t (having looked today at the prices my current client charges for them on a monthly basis).
It adds up quick albeit granted handling cash is not cheap if you can’t pass it to other people
As for not having cash - ideally pay by card but always have £100 or so in cash just in case
In case of what?
And yes, handling cash is pricier than card charges.
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
Card readers cost peanuts. And are very soon paid for by the increase they generate in extra donations (from people who don’t carry cash).
And sod the poor, old and stupid. Gotcha
Stop patronising the poor and the old, who use cashless in their millions daily eg on the London bus network.
Except those who mainly use cash will be using an oyster card they top up with cash once in a while.
Come back and use that argument when London transport bin oyster and paper tickets
I wonder what a 1979/80 version of PB would have been saying about the likely fate of Thatcher's government? (Presumably still in the form of postcards on a noticeboard in a somewhat raffish gentlemens' club.)
And whilst asking for a winnable war might be a step too far for Keir's genie, it's not hard to imagine that Labour will face a perfectly split opposition again in 2028/9.
At the moment there are (seemingly) rather few ladies on PB regularly. So not much change there alas.
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
Card readers cost peanuts. And are very soon paid for by the increase they generate in extra donations (from people who don’t carry cash).
No they don’t (having looked today at the prices my current client charges for them on a monthly basis).
It adds up quick albeit granted handling cash is not cheap if you can’t pass it to other people
As for not having cash - ideally pay by card but always have £100 or so in cash just in case
In case of what?
And yes, handling cash is pricier than card charges.
In case I’m spending less than £10 in my corner shop or the machines stop working.
And there are a lot of reasons why a card may not work - I pointed out last year that I had to great difficultly finding a Visa card when banks started issuing Mastercard debit cards.
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
I'm watching a lecture series on the American Civil War at the moment.
It's astonishing that the Confederates managed to contest Virginia, and defend Richmond, to the very end despite their capital being barely 100 miles from Washington DC.
The South lasted as long as it did - less than Obama’s presidency - due to the incompetence and lack of determination in the Northern commanders.
With competent generals, it would have been game over quite rapidly.
It is true that the North had some pretty ordinary generals. Who could forget Lincoln’s acid comment to Mclellan: ‘If you don’t want to use the army, I should like to borrow it for a while.’
But it should also be remembered the south had other advantages in the short term. A ready made militia. Control of the Tredegar iron works. And they were fighting essentially a defensive war, which meant they were on their own turf and had limited need to carry the fight forward.
I don’t think the war would have been won in less than three years even if Lee had accepted the proffered command of Federal forces and left Johnson to run the Confederate army. Of course, that’s still a 40% reduction.
My Great-Grandfather worked for National Benzole during the Second World War and was, as a result, one of the few people allowed a petrol ration. During the late autumn 1940 his car was strafed on the road from Felixstowe to Ipswich by one of the small detachment of the Italian Air Force Mussolini sent over to carry out fighter sweeps - doubtless they thought he must have been some big military cheese in a staff car. No real harm done was but he ran off the road and had to put in an insurance claim for the damage. My grandmother delighted in recounting the answers he had to give.
Q: “Who was the owner of the other vehicle involved” A: “The Government of Italy”. Q: “Approximately how fast was the other vehicle travelling” A: “Somewhere in the region of 200-300 miles per hour”
The Italian airforce in WW2 were the best in the world at nearly hitting things.
In a few weeks time I am due to visit a restaurant that is cash only. We have been alerted in advance!
Tax dodgers I suspect
I'm old enough to remember when certain PBers were loudly assuring the rest of us that specific businesses, shown in colour photos on PB with name and location and all, were undoubtedly short-changing HMtQ.
Not an advisable activity from the point of view of OGH's and OGH jr's pockets. Fortunately lawyers accept cash but also cheques, money transfers, etc. etc.
My Great-Grandfather worked for National Benzole during the Second World War and was, as a result, one of the few people allowed a petrol ration. During the late autumn 1940 his car was strafed on the road from Felixstowe to Ipswich by one of the small detachment of the Italian Air Force Mussolini sent over to carry out fighter sweeps - doubtless they thought he must have been some big military cheese in a staff car. No real harm done was but he ran off the road and had to put in an insurance claim for the damage. My grandmother delighted in recounting the answers he had to give.
Q: “Who was the owner of the other vehicle involved” A: “The Government of Italy”. Q: “Approximately how fast was the other vehicle travelling” A: “Somewhere in the region of 200-300 miles per hour”
The Italian airforce in WW2 were the best in the world at nearly hitting things.
Given how they did over Britain, and for how little time, the pinniped in question was remarkably lucky in another sense in not being wounded by them.
The problem is largely the messaging. Everyone knows Labour have tough decisions to make, it’s time for them to talk about what their vision is. Managerial stuff isn’t very inspiring. A government that puts its people through more financial pain absolutely needs to be able to sell the “why” and the hope piece.
I think it's more fundamental than that. Labour weren't upfront about this, and so they didn't win the voters' consent for it at the election, not even from the 34.7% of GB voters they did manage to win.
Consequently I'd expect Labour to get very unpopular, very quickly - but who will benefit?
I can make a case for the Tories, Lib Dems, Reform, Greens or various other nationalists. I don't know which way it will go.
In a few weeks time I am due to visit a restaurant that is cash only. We have been alerted in advance!
Tax dodgers I suspect
There's probably a lot more fraud going on with electronic payments than cash, at least when it comes to the overall amounts involved. There may be more small frauds going on with cash, but it won't add up to as much.
The traditional media have not had a great election so far. Good article, I think.
How the media blew 2024′s election
https://www.inquirer.com/columnists/attytood/media-elections-dnc-kamala-harris-military-20240827.html .. I’ll start with the weekend’s lowlight: a news story that worked up the media food chain from the muck of smaller right-wing outlets, then got boosted on X/Twitter by Alex Thompson, a widely read national political correspondent for Axios, before the New York Post hyped it in your local Wawa and eventually the New York Times felt compelled to address it. You see, an idea that has animated the right for the last couple of weeks is the fantasy that Democratic vice presidential nominee Gov. Tim Walz is a phony. Sunday’s purported news slammed Walz for a 2006 episode when his then-congressional campaign claimed he’d won a youth award from the Nebraska Chamber of Commerce when really it was — get this! — the Nebraska Junior Chamber of Commerce!
Never mind that the 2006 Walz campaign had corrected this tiny mistake (picture Barack Obama doing the hand thing, but even smaller), probably the work of a junior staffer, the second they learned about it…
.. It would require another column — maybe a book — to explain why this is happening. I see it as less the public’s main complaint (corporate control of the media) and more about our profession’s weird value structure, where it’s more important to be savvy, cynical, and not be portrayed as naive shills for liberalism than to care about saving democracy from authoritarian rule, on top of maybe a new and not always healthy brand of careerism from younger journalists.
The Chicago-based media critic Mark Jacob, a retired veteran editor of that city’s Tribune and Sun Times, nailed it Monday with a piece headlined “Mainstream media on a path to irrelevance.” Jacob has harsh words for how reporters have covered the race, writing that “too many political journalists are marinating in the Washington cocktail culture, writing for each other and for their sources — in service to the political industry, not the public.” But he also notes that traditional media can’t figure out how to compete for young eyeballs against sites like edgy and fast-paced TikTok. Jacob pointed out that public faith in mass media has plunged from 72% in 1976, after Watergate, to just 32% today.
You know who gets the new landscape better than anyone else? Kamala Harris…
In a few weeks time I am due to visit a restaurant that is cash only. We have been alerted in advance!
Tax dodgers I suspect
Indeed. HMRC could institute a 'shopping page' where upright citizens can record the existence of cash-only businesses. I hesitate to suggest what HMG might do with the extra revenue in these straitened times.
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
Card readers cost peanuts. And are very soon paid for by the increase they generate in extra donations (from people who don’t carry cash).
And sod the poor, old and stupid. Gotcha
Stop patronising the poor and the old, who use cashless in their millions daily eg on the London bus network.
Do you ever get out of London and into the real world
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
As ever, the move is more to the advantage of the retailer - who has to deal with all that cash - than the customer.
I wish, for once, retailers (and banks!) were honest about this, instead of the 'quicker' excuse.
It is quicker though.
And safer.
And less wasteful.
Cash is a pointless pain.
For you, maybe.
For others, not so much.
But as a selfish right-winger, you only ever think of yourself.
The only people who "need" cash are drug dealers.
Or me, when I want to use the lockers at the swimming pool...
Time for your pool to upgrade to the 21st century then.
Okay. Think for a minute how that works:
At the moment you put a pound coin in the locker and withdraw the key. When you come back, you unlock it with the key and get the pound coin out. It is not a financial transaction; but a little security to ensure some idiots do not lock all the lockers.
There are alternative systems, but from what I've read they all have various issues, not the least cost.
This is what you need.
They're okay, but they're another thing to keep on me in case I need it - and I can't keep it on my keyring without leaving my keys dangling from it. Unless I go to the faff of removing it. Whereas a good old pound coin is useful for so much more.
Such as?
Jesus
Buying stuff when you are not a well heeled middle class guy with a bunch of cards and apps. Which I am, and I still find cash useful because the local sub PO prefers it and because I use the odd carpark in signal free places. If I were poor I would not have three bank accounts and five cards, all duplicated on my phone, and cash would be essential. You are so deep into "let them eat cake" country it's embarrassing.
I wonder what a 1979/80 version of PB would have been saying about the likely fate of Thatcher's government? (Presumably still in the form of postcards on a noticeboard in a somewhat raffish gentlemens' club.)
And whilst asking for a winnable war might be a step too far for Keir's genie, it's not hard to imagine that Labour will face a perfectly split opposition again in 2028/9.
Where would we place our bets on a winnable war?
Hmm. Needs to be against a non-nuclear power. Not one where the US would be interested or in the lead, nor one where Russia or China has a strong interest. Nothing that involves getting mixed up with Islamists and blowback at home. Not a civil war either.
Possibly one where Britain and France, or Britain and Australia, go jointly.
Tricky.
Would the US intervene in a Venezuelan invasion of Guyana? Possibly not. That would be a good one. Hungary making a play for Transcaucasia and Britain sending special forces to help? That would be fun. Otherwise slim pickings, unless Argentina tries it on again.
So...taking their own explanation at face value, they provide a poor service and infrastructure at the moment? Despite the defence for current bills being that it was for investment into service and infrastructure? And they chose to make poor business decisions and now need very high bills to correct for that? On Wednesday, the company announced it wanted to go further, hiking bills by as much as 59%. The proposed changes in bills do not take account of inflation.
Such a move would take the average annual water bill to £638 per customer by 2030. Average bills are currently around £443.
Chris Weston, chief executive of Thames Water, said the money from higher bills would be invested in new infrastructure and improving services.
"They [customers] are not being asked to pay twice, but to make up for years of focus on keeping bills low," he said in a response to the regulator. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cx2lgl9kypno
In a few weeks time I am due to visit a restaurant that is cash only. We have been alerted in advance!
Tax dodgers I suspect
Indeed. HMRC could institute a 'shopping page' where upright citizens can record the existence of cash-only businesses. I hesitate to suggest what HMG might do with the extra revenue in these straitened times.
As I commented only a moment ago, they only need keep an eye on PB when the subject of cash comes up.
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
As ever, the move is more to the advantage of the retailer - who has to deal with all that cash - than the customer.
I wish, for once, retailers (and banks!) were honest about this, instead of the 'quicker' excuse.
It is quicker though.
And safer.
And less wasteful.
Cash is a pointless pain.
For you, maybe.
For others, not so much.
But as a selfish right-winger, you only ever think of yourself.
The only people who "need" cash are drug dealers.
Or me, when I want to use the lockers at the swimming pool...
Time for your pool to upgrade to the 21st century then.
Okay. Think for a minute how that works:
At the moment you put a pound coin in the locker and withdraw the key. When you come back, you unlock it with the key and get the pound coin out. It is not a financial transaction; but a little security to ensure some idiots do not lock all the lockers.
There are alternative systems, but from what I've read they all have various issues, not the least cost.
This is what you need.
They're okay, but they're another thing to keep on me in case I need it - and I can't keep it on my keyring without leaving my keys dangling from it. Unless I go to the faff of removing it. Whereas a good old pound coin is useful for so much more.
I wonder what a 1979/80 version of PB would have been saying about the likely fate of Thatcher's government? (Presumably still in the form of postcards on a noticeboard in a somewhat raffish gentlemens' club.)
And whilst asking for a winnable war might be a step too far for Keir's genie, it's not hard to imagine that Labour will face a perfectly split opposition again in 2028/9.
Where would we place our bets on a winnable war?
Hmm. Needs to be against a non-nuclear power. Not one where the US would be interested or in the lead, nor one where Russia or China has a strong interest. Nothing that involves getting mixed up with Islamists and blowback at home. Not a civil war either.
Possibly one where Britain and France, or Britain and Australia, go jointly.
Tricky.
Would the US intervene in a Venezuelan invasion of Guyana? Possibly not. That would be a good one. Hungary making a play for Transcaucasia and Britain sending special forces to help? That would be fun. Otherwise slim pickings, unless Argentina tries it on again.
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
As ever, the move is more to the advantage of the retailer - who has to deal with all that cash - than the customer.
I wish, for once, retailers (and banks!) were honest about this, instead of the 'quicker' excuse.
It is quicker though.
And safer.
And less wasteful.
Cash is a pointless pain.
For you, maybe.
For others, not so much.
But as a selfish right-winger, you only ever think of yourself.
The only people who "need" cash are drug dealers.
My wife had a severe stroke 7 years ago, wiping out the right side of her brain, short term memory, orientation, logic and a whole heap of other things people like you take for granted.
She cannot do maths any more, not remotely to deal with a card payment system.
I withdraw a certain amount of cash from her account each month and she slowly spends it, seeing the notes disappear makes sense to her so she understands how much more she can buy before I next give her more bank notes.
She needs cash she is not a drug dealer but you probably don't care about people like my wife and there are lots and lots and lots of them.
The cashless advocates never care about anyone but themselves, its more convenient for them the rest of the people can go fuck themselves....you notice most of them also describe themselves as left wing but it is the poorest hit most by cashless
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
Card readers cost peanuts. And are very soon paid for by the increase they generate in extra donations (from people who don’t carry cash).
No they don’t (having looked today at the prices my current client charges for them on a monthly basis).
It adds up quick albeit granted handling cash is not cheap if you can’t pass it to other people
As for not having cash - ideally pay by card but always have £100 or so in cash just in case
In case of what?
And yes, handling cash is pricier than card charges.
Colleagues, you are making me think about this. I belong to the u3a and many …. most …… of our interest groups meet in members homes, where the practice is to collect 25p or so per participant towards tea, coffee etc. I wonder how we replace that; it’s obviously impracticable for hosts such as myself to have a card reader for a couple of quid a month.
So...taking their own explanation at face value, they provide a poor service and infrastructure at the moment? Despite the defence for current bills being that it was for investment into service and infrastructure? And they chose to make poor business decisions and now need very high bills to correct for that? On Wednesday, the company announced it wanted to go further, hiking bills by as much as 59%. The proposed changes in bills do not take account of inflation.
Such a move would take the average annual water bill to £638 per customer by 2030. Average bills are currently around £443.
Chris Weston, chief executive of Thames Water, said the money from higher bills would be invested in new infrastructure and improving services.
"They [customers] are not being asked to pay twice, but to make up for years of focus on keeping bills low," he said in a response to the regulator. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cx2lgl9kypno
He’s kept bills low?
Seriously?
And I thought British Gas and Womble Bond Dickinson were a bunch of stupid and unconvincing whining liars.
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
Card readers cost peanuts. And are very soon paid for by the increase they generate in extra donations (from people who don’t carry cash).
And sod the poor, old and stupid. Gotcha
Stop patronising the poor and the old, who use cashless in their millions daily eg on the London bus network.
At my local Tesco, there is normally a small queue waiting for the checkouts which take cash.
Also, I was in Wigan recently. There was a handwritten note in the window of a takeaway "we accept card payments". Suggesting doing so is not necessarily universal.
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
I'm watching a lecture series on the American Civil War at the moment.
It's astonishing that the Confederates managed to contest Virginia, and defend Richmond, to the very end despite their capital being barely 100 miles from Washington DC.
The South lasted as long as it did - less than Obama’s presidency - due to the incompetence and lack of determination in the Northern commanders.
With competent generals, it would have been game over quite rapidly.
It is true that the North had some pretty ordinary generals. Who could forget Lincoln’s acid comment to Mclellan: ‘If you don’t want to use the army, I should like to borrow it for a while.’
But it should also be remembered the south had other advantages in the short term. A ready made militia. Control of the Tredegar iron works. And they were fighting essentially a defensive war, which meant they were on their own turf and had limited need to carry the fight forward.
I don’t think the war would have been won in less than three years even if Lee had accepted the proffered command of Federal forces and left Johnson to run the Confederate army. Of course, that’s still a 40% reduction.
They had Tredegar - one real iron works. That’s it.
a) Big Issue sellers (and as Divvie notes beggars in general) b) Wong Kei Restaurant for Char Siu Pork and Duck Rice c) Some barbers e) to not be tracked for every minute of your waking life f) er g) that's it.
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
Card readers cost peanuts. And are very soon paid for by the increase they generate in extra donations (from people who don’t carry cash).
And sod the poor, old and stupid. Gotcha
Stop patronising the poor and the old, who use cashless in their millions daily eg on the London bus network.
Do you ever get out of London and into the real world
Do you not consider the near 10 million people living in and around London as “the real world” then?
What are we? Subhuman? Untermenschen? Not as “real” as good honest sons of the soil living on the Lleyn peninsula?
London has as much right to be considered the real world as anywhere else, thanks.
(And I paid for a bus by contactless in Yorkshire recently).
I'm watching a lecture series on the American Civil War at the moment.
It's astonishing that the Confederates managed to contest Virginia, and defend Richmond, to the very end despite their capital being barely 100 miles from Washington DC.
The South lasted as long as it did - less than Obama’s presidency - due to the incompetence and lack of determination in the Northern commanders.
With competent generals, it would have been game over quite rapidly.
It is true that the North had some pretty ordinary generals. Who could forget Lincoln’s acid comment to Mclellan: ‘If you don’t want to use the army, I should like to borrow it for a while.’
But it should also be remembered the south had other advantages in the short term. A ready made militia. Control of the Tredegar iron works. And they were fighting essentially a defensive war, which meant they were on their own turf and had limited need to carry the fight forward.
I don’t think the war would have been won in less than three years even if Lee had accepted the proffered command of Federal forces and left Johnson to run the Confederate army. Of course, that’s still a 40% reduction.
They had Tredegar - one real iron works. That’s it.
The North had scores….
Yes, but it meant rerouting supplies to come from those. Which was hardly difficult, but did take time.
So...taking their own explanation at face value, they provide a poor service and infrastructure at the moment? Despite the defence for current bills being that it was for investment into service and infrastructure? And they chose to make poor business decisions and now need very high bills to correct for that? On Wednesday, the company announced it wanted to go further, hiking bills by as much as 59%. The proposed changes in bills do not take account of inflation.
Such a move would take the average annual water bill to £638 per customer by 2030. Average bills are currently around £443.
Chris Weston, chief executive of Thames Water, said the money from higher bills would be invested in new infrastructure and improving services.
"They [customers] are not being asked to pay twice, but to make up for years of focus on keeping bills low," he said in a response to the regulator. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cx2lgl9kypno
He’s kept bills low?
Seriously?
And I thought British Gas and Womble Bond Dickinson were a bunch of stupid and unconvincing whining liars.
Well, I didn't want to reject their argument instantly so gave him the benefit of the doubt on that, but even if it is true it seems to be an admission of incompetence, and blaming the public for not liking rises earlier forcing the company to keep things low? Even though smaller increases over a number of years are something people do accept, and indeed is a key way people can be made to bear large increases.
Talking of old films, I went to see Pulp Fiction at the cinema last night. At the risk of making many of you feel old it was the 30th anniversary of its release.
It stood up pretty well. The music was excellent and the conversational parts were still hilarious. Rather more casual racism than you would get these days. There was a bit where they were driving in a car and it was incredibly obvious that it was a movie out the back window and they were not actually driving but I suspect that was Tarentino's joke/homage to earlier films.
Well worth a watch if you can catch it.
It's aged interestingly because even when it was new it wasn't entirely clear when it was set. It was ageless from the start.
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
As ever, the move is more to the advantage of the retailer - who has to deal with all that cash - than the customer.
I wish, for once, retailers (and banks!) were honest about this, instead of the 'quicker' excuse.
It is quicker though.
And safer.
And less wasteful.
Cash is a pointless pain.
For you, maybe.
For others, not so much.
But as a selfish right-winger, you only ever think of yourself.
The only people who "need" cash are drug dealers.
And numismatists.
And archaeologists. Think how screwed future archaeologists will be when they dig up Anabob and go through his pockets and try to date him.
iPhones change a lot faster than coins. Would be easy-peasy.
Interesting question, given how fast coins have changed in recent years and how little of an Iphone would survive in terms of information - there isn't even a visible model number on my Android something phone.
Can't see JD Vance being removed by Trump as his running mate. He picked him to be his MAGA heir apparent more than for his electoral appeal
There's no shortage of MAGA wannabes who have changed their entire personas to worship Trump - what does Vance bring besides supposed electoral appeal over those other people?
I don't think he'll be removed, but I don't see what's special about him among the MAGA camp either.
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
I must say I’d prefer it if they did have a reader or similar.
It does feel safer than cash when visiting an otherwise unsupervised building.
The random damage vandals might do almost certainly massively outweighs the tiny amount of cash that might accumulate in the cash box over the course of a week for an average unsupervised church. For instance there's a little one near where I grew up that's in the care of the Churches Conservation Trust. It's got some nice wall paintings of saints that are mediaeval survivals -- but it also has a boarded up east window following some vandalism a while back, and last I heard the cost to fix that was in the five figures. https://www.visitchurches.org.uk/visit/church-listing/all-saints-little-wenham.html
(You can donate by text or online, if you want ;-))
Will do.
I was hoping this was going to be the one with the 19C or 17C total immersion font.
The problem is largely the messaging. Everyone knows Labour have tough decisions to make, it’s time for them to talk about what their vision is. Managerial stuff isn’t very inspiring. A government that puts its people through more financial pain absolutely needs to be able to sell the “why” and the hope piece.
I think it's more fundamental than that. Labour weren't upfront about this, and so they didn't win the voters' consent for it at the election, not even from the 34.7% of GB voters they did manage to win.
Consequently I'd expect Labour to get very unpopular, very quickly - but who will benefit?
I can make a case for the Tories, Lib Dems, Reform, Greens or various other nationalists. I don't know which way it will go.
I think Starmer is actually quite one-dimensional, and the rest is simply dissemblement he learnt as a prosecutor.
He knew he had to cosplay New Labour to win office, but has absolutely no intention of acting that way now he's safely in office - he will act as an old Labour leader with all the prejudices and attitudes of a north London liberal left-winger.
So...taking their own explanation at face value, they provide a poor service and infrastructure at the moment? Despite the defence for current bills being that it was for investment into service and infrastructure? And they chose to make poor business decisions and now need very high bills to correct for that? On Wednesday, the company announced it wanted to go further, hiking bills by as much as 59%. The proposed changes in bills do not take account of inflation.
Such a move would take the average annual water bill to £638 per customer by 2030. Average bills are currently around £443.
Chris Weston, chief executive of Thames Water, said the money from higher bills would be invested in new infrastructure and improving services.
"They [customers] are not being asked to pay twice, but to make up for years of focus on keeping bills low," he said in a response to the regulator. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cx2lgl9kypno
He’s kept bills low?
Seriously?
And I thought British Gas and Womble Bond Dickinson were a bunch of stupid and unconvincing whining liars.
Well, I didn't want to reject their argument instantly so gave him the benefit of the doubt on that, but even if it is true it seems to be an admission of incompetence, and blaming the public for not liking rises earlier forcing the company to keep things low? Even though smaller increases over a number of years are something people do accept, and indeed is a key way people can be made to bear large increases.
If they’ve had low bills and a fuckton of borrowing, then we should be asking where this ‘investment’ has been given the state of water infrastructure is much as it was forty years ago.
I'm not sure in this day and age it will win many votes, but I'd like to see a Tory candidate make the argument for aspiration, markets, low tax to drive investment and a favourable environment for business.
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
As ever, the move is more to the advantage of the retailer - who has to deal with all that cash - than the customer.
I wish, for once, retailers (and banks!) were honest about this, instead of the 'quicker' excuse.
It is quicker though.
And safer.
And less wasteful.
Cash is a pointless pain.
For you, maybe.
For others, not so much.
But as a selfish right-winger, you only ever think of yourself.
The only people who "need" cash are drug dealers.
Or me, when I want to use the lockers at the swimming pool...
Time for your pool to upgrade to the 21st century then.
Okay. Think for a minute how that works:
At the moment you put a pound coin in the locker and withdraw the key. When you come back, you unlock it with the key and get the pound coin out. It is not a financial transaction; but a little security to ensure some idiots do not lock all the lockers.
There are alternative systems, but from what I've read they all have various issues, not the least cost.
This is what you need.
They're okay, but they're another thing to keep on me in case I need it - and I can't keep it on my keyring without leaving my keys dangling from it. Unless I go to the faff of removing it. Whereas a good old pound coin is useful for so much more.
Such as?
Jesus
Buying stuff when you are not a well heeled middle class guy with a bunch of cards and apps. Which I am, and I still find cash useful because the local sub PO prefers it and because I use the odd carpark in signal free places. If I were poor I would not have three bank accounts and five cards, all duplicated on my phone, and cash would be essential. You are so deep into "let them eat cake" country it's embarrassing.
I when I get taxi's down in devon often find I am dropped off in places with little mobile coverage....oh cant use a card to pay
In a few weeks time I am due to visit a restaurant that is cash only. We have been alerted in advance!
Tax dodgers I suspect
You could be impuning a perfectly legitimate business in your zealot pursuit of a cashless society
Here's the thing, though. From a purely practical point of view, a cashless society would be better. Safer, more prosperous, less crime-y, less tax-dodgey.
There are problems, sure. But I'm not aware of any that where solutions don't already exist... If we want them to.
And then the question becomes the fundamental one- are we, as a country, prepared to inconvenience ourselves in any way at all to generate a good and prosperous society for ourselves and our descendants?
I'm watching a lecture series on the American Civil War at the moment.
It's astonishing that the Confederates managed to contest Virginia, and defend Richmond, to the very end despite their capital being barely 100 miles from Washington DC.
The South lasted as long as it did - less than Obama’s presidency - due to the incompetence and lack of determination in the Northern commanders.
With competent generals, it would have been game over quite rapidly.
a) Big Issue sellers (and as Divvie notes beggars in general) b) Wong Kei Restaurant for Char Siu Pork and Duck Rice c) Some barbers e) to not be tracked for every minute of your waking life f) er g) that's it.
Was in the US in February and asked hotel to arrange a cab and they laughed and said nobody uses cabs except to go to drug deals, otherwise it's Uber all the way. I 100% understand that, but I 0% understand the militancy about the issue. Politics is basically about the non privileged. The fact that someone can personally afford a cashless lifestyle is as relevant as that they can afford a Porsche.
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
Card readers cost peanuts. And are very soon paid for by the increase they generate in extra donations (from people who don’t carry cash).
And sod the poor, old and stupid. Gotcha
Stop patronising the poor and the old, who use cashless in their millions daily eg on the London bus network.
Do you ever get out of London and into the real world
Do you not consider the near 10 million people living in and around London as “the real world” then?
What are we? Subhuman? Untermenschen? Not as “real” as good honest sons of the soil living on the Lleyn peninsula?
London has as much right to be considered the real world as anywhere else, thanks.
(And I paid for a bus by contactless in Yorkshire recently).
I think he was probably talking about the 58 million people living elsewhere.
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
Card readers cost peanuts. And are very soon paid for by the increase they generate in extra donations (from people who don’t carry cash).
And sod the poor, old and stupid. Gotcha
I appreciate the sentiment but it is rather odd how cash seems to be the one area where the needs of the old and poor has become absolutely paramount, while in so many other areas of our society those needs are routinely ignored.
But I contest "stupid". You have to be pretty smart to use cash, and I'm interested by the fact the folk with learning disabilities who use my bus still use it, under supervision. It looks very stressful to me, but perhaps being used by their carers to engender some independence/self-worth/mental ability?
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
Card readers cost peanuts. And are very soon paid for by the increase they generate in extra donations (from people who don’t carry cash).
No they don’t (having looked today at the prices my current client charges for them on a monthly basis).
It adds up quick albeit granted handling cash is not cheap if you can’t pass it to other people
As for not having cash - ideally pay by card but always have £100 or so in cash just in case
In case of what?
And yes, handling cash is pricier than card charges.
Colleagues, you are making me think about this. I belong to the u3a and many …. most …… of our interest groups meet in members homes, where the practice is to collect 25p or so per participant towards tea, coffee etc. I wonder how we replace that; it’s obviously impracticable for hosts such as myself to have a card reader for a couple of quid a month.
I guess you could convince everyone to sign up for a Revolut account, and then it's easy to transfer trivial sums of money between people, but someone might think of a better way.
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
Card readers cost peanuts. And are very soon paid for by the increase they generate in extra donations (from people who don’t carry cash).
And sod the poor, old and stupid. Gotcha
Stop patronising the poor and the old, who use cashless in their millions daily eg on the London bus network.
Do you ever get out of London and into the real world
Do you not consider the near 10 million people living in and around London as “the real world” then?
What are we? Subhuman? Untermenschen? Not as “real” as good honest sons of the soil living on the Lleyn peninsula?
London has as much right to be considered the real world as anywhere else, thanks.
(And I paid for a bus by contactless in Yorkshire recently).
Its not they are subhuman it is that their experience is not everyone elses....one room in my home I can get mobile reception in for example....many places I go no mobile reception...my local shop goes cash only several times a year as the machines can't get to the internet etc. It is rare in London for those things to happen....most of the country not so much. So yes when they go works in london so its fine we get irritated at them
My Great-Grandfather worked for National Benzole during the Second World War and was, as a result, one of the few people allowed a petrol ration. During the late autumn 1940 his car was strafed on the road from Felixstowe to Ipswich by one of the small detachment of the Italian Air Force Mussolini sent over to carry out fighter sweeps - doubtless they thought he must have been some big military cheese in a staff car. No real harm done was but he ran off the road and had to put in an insurance claim for the damage. My grandmother delighted in recounting the answers he had to give.
Q: “Who was the owner of the other vehicle involved” A: “The Government of Italy”. Q: “Approximately how fast was the other vehicle travelling” A: “Somewhere in the region of 200-300 miles per hour”
The Italian airforce in WW2 were the best in the world at nearly hitting things.
Which is actually a major contrast to the Regia Marina, who were remarkably good.
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
I must say I’d prefer it if they did have a reader or similar.
It does feel safer than cash when visiting an otherwise unsupervised building.
The random damage vandals might do almost certainly massively outweighs the tiny amount of cash that might accumulate in the cash box over the course of a week for an average unsupervised church. For instance there's a little one near where I grew up that's in the care of the Churches Conservation Trust. It's got some nice wall paintings of saints that are mediaeval survivals -- but it also has a boarded up east window following some vandalism a while back, and last I heard the cost to fix that was in the five figures. https://www.visitchurches.org.uk/visit/church-listing/all-saints-little-wenham.html
(You can donate by text or online, if you want ;-))
Not a problem in our rural churches, on;y visitors outside of services we get are walkers and a few US tourists to see the one where Locke is buried. Plus had a homeless tramp who slept in the porch of another one a few years ago
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
Card readers cost peanuts. And are very soon paid for by the increase they generate in extra donations (from people who don’t carry cash).
And sod the poor, old and stupid. Gotcha
I appreciate the sentiment but it is rather odd how cash seems to be the one area where the needs of the old and poor has become absolutely paramount, while in so many other areas of our society those needs are routinely ignored.
But I contest "stupid". You have to be pretty smart to use cash, and I'm interested by the fact the folk with learning disabilities who use my bus still use it, under supervision. It looks very stressful to me, but perhaps being used by their carers to engender some independence/self-worth/mental ability?
I’m pretty sure my learning disabilities great-niece doesn’t have a card. I don’t think she could cope with it.
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
As ever, the move is more to the advantage of the retailer - who has to deal with all that cash - than the customer.
I wish, for once, retailers (and banks!) were honest about this, instead of the 'quicker' excuse.
It is quicker though.
And safer.
And less wasteful.
Cash is a pointless pain.
For you, maybe.
For others, not so much.
But as a selfish right-winger, you only ever think of yourself.
The only people who "need" cash are drug dealers.
Or me, when I want to use the lockers at the swimming pool...
Time for your pool to upgrade to the 21st century then.
Okay. Think for a minute how that works:
At the moment you put a pound coin in the locker and withdraw the key. When you come back, you unlock it with the key and get the pound coin out. It is not a financial transaction; but a little security to ensure some idiots do not lock all the lockers.
There are alternative systems, but from what I've read they all have various issues, not the least cost.
This is what you need.
They're okay, but they're another thing to keep on me in case I need it - and I can't keep it on my keyring without leaving my keys dangling from it. Unless I go to the faff of removing it. Whereas a good old pound coin is useful for so much more.
Such as?
Jesus
Buying stuff when you are not a well heeled middle class guy with a bunch of cards and apps. Which I am, and I still find cash useful because the local sub PO prefers it and because I use the odd carpark in signal free places. If I were poor I would not have three bank accounts and five cards, all duplicated on my phone, and cash would be essential. You are so deep into "let them eat cake" country it's embarrassing.
I when I get taxi's down in devon often find I am dropped off in places with little mobile coverage....oh cant use a card to pay
Contactless payment works without mobile coverage (including on your phone).
Are you talking about a shop that doesn't have a chip and pin machine? That's rather different, and a choice of that business to forgo lots of custom. Free country.
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
Card readers cost peanuts. And are very soon paid for by the increase they generate in extra donations (from people who don’t carry cash).
And sod the poor, old and stupid. Gotcha
I appreciate the sentiment but it is rather odd how cash seems to be the one area where the needs of the old and poor has become absolutely paramount, while in so many other areas of our society those needs are routinely ignored.
But I contest "stupid". You have to be pretty smart to use cash, and I'm interested by the fact the folk with learning disabilities who use my bus still use it, under supervision. It looks very stressful to me, but perhaps being used by their carers to engender some independence/self-worth/mental ability?
Cash. And the ability to use it, is absolutely vital for those without the cognitive ability to budget on a card.
I'm watching a lecture series on the American Civil War at the moment.
It's astonishing that the Confederates managed to contest Virginia, and defend Richmond, to the very end despite their capital being barely 100 miles from Washington DC.
The South lasted as long as it did - less than Obama’s presidency - due to the incompetence and lack of determination in the Northern commanders.
With competent generals, it would have been game over quite rapidly.
It is true that the North had some pretty ordinary generals. Who could forget Lincoln’s acid comment to Mclellan: ‘If you don’t want to use the army, I should like to borrow it for a while.’
But it should also be remembered the south had other advantages in the short term. A ready made militia. Control of the Tredegar iron works. And they were fighting essentially a defensive war, which meant they were on their own turf and had limited need to carry the fight forward.
I don’t think the war would have been won in less than three years even if Lee had accepted the proffered command of Federal forces and left Johnson to run the Confederate army. Of course, that’s still a 40% reduction.
In principle the South didn't need to win against the North if it could persuade the other side the South wasn't worth holding against its will. The stakes were lower for the North, at least initially.
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
Card readers cost peanuts. And are very soon paid for by the increase they generate in extra donations (from people who don’t carry cash).
And sod the poor, old and stupid. Gotcha
I appreciate the sentiment but it is rather odd how cash seems to be the one area where the needs of the old and poor has become absolutely paramount, while in so many other areas of our society those needs are routinely ignored.
But I contest "stupid". You have to be pretty smart to use cash, and I'm interested by the fact the folk with learning disabilities who use my bus still use it, under supervision. It looks very stressful to me, but perhaps being used by their carers to engender some independence/self-worth/mental ability?
I’m pretty sure my learning disabilities great-niece doesn’t have a card. I don’t think she could cope with it.
Interesting - genuinely. I suppose I find counting cash out quite challenging (certainly much more difficult than a contactless payment) , and have fallen for the trap of assuming everyone else does too.
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
As ever, the move is more to the advantage of the retailer - who has to deal with all that cash - than the customer.
I wish, for once, retailers (and banks!) were honest about this, instead of the 'quicker' excuse.
It is quicker though.
And safer.
And less wasteful.
Cash is a pointless pain.
For you, maybe.
For others, not so much.
But as a selfish right-winger, you only ever think of yourself.
The only people who "need" cash are drug dealers.
Or me, when I want to use the lockers at the swimming pool...
Time for your pool to upgrade to the 21st century then.
Okay. Think for a minute how that works:
At the moment you put a pound coin in the locker and withdraw the key. When you come back, you unlock it with the key and get the pound coin out. It is not a financial transaction; but a little security to ensure some idiots do not lock all the lockers.
There are alternative systems, but from what I've read they all have various issues, not the least cost.
This is what you need.
They're okay, but they're another thing to keep on me in case I need it - and I can't keep it on my keyring without leaving my keys dangling from it. Unless I go to the faff of removing it. Whereas a good old pound coin is useful for so much more.
Such as?
Corned beef tin key.
Force open the slot so you can put it on your car keys. You will never need a quid again.
I have one on each car key set. It’s annoying, having to find a use for corned beef, once you have reminded yourself how dire fritters are.
you can also test how much of a jerk you are. As you don’t have to replace the trolley.
In a few weeks time I am due to visit a restaurant that is cash only. We have been alerted in advance!
Tax dodgers I suspect
You could be impuning a perfectly legitimate business in your zealot pursuit of a cashless society
Here's the thing, though. From a purely practical point of view, a cashless society would be better. Safer, more prosperous, less crime-y, less tax-dodgey.
There are problems, sure. But I'm not aware of any that where solutions don't already exist... If we want them to.
And then the question becomes the fundamental one- are we, as a country, prepared to inconvenience ourselves in any way at all to generate a good and prosperous society for ourselves and our descendants?
Why would it be either safer or more prospersous?....people cant steal cash from a shop so instead just break in and steal or shop lift. I don't see why abolishing cash makes anything safer or more prosperous in fact I suspect less prosperous....instead of breaking in and stealing the money in the till...maybe a couple of hundred quid they break in and steal stock amounting to thousands
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
Card readers cost peanuts. And are very soon paid for by the increase they generate in extra donations (from people who don’t carry cash).
And sod the poor, old and stupid. Gotcha
I appreciate the sentiment but it is rather odd how cash seems to be the one area where the needs of the old and poor has become absolutely paramount, while in so many other areas of our society those needs are routinely ignored.
But I contest "stupid". You have to be pretty smart to use cash, and I'm interested by the fact the folk with learning disabilities who use my bus still use it, under supervision. It looks very stressful to me, but perhaps being used by their carers to engender some independence/self-worth/mental ability?
I’m pretty sure my learning disabilities great-niece doesn’t have a card. I don’t think she could cope with it.
Interesting - genuinely. I suppose I find counting cash out quite challenging (certainly much more difficult than a contactless payment) , and have fallen for the trap of assuming everyone else does too.
Counting cash is difficult but it’s easier than the other option of spending money that you can’t afford to spend
As I said above everyone on this site has the advantage of enough spare cash that a £1/900 of extra spending doesn’t really impact them. For a lot of people £2 spent on x means something else will need to be forgone.
We may talk about the winter fuel allowance but let’s be honest 99% of the people on here won’t need it
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
Card readers cost peanuts. And are very soon paid for by the increase they generate in extra donations (from people who don’t carry cash).
And sod the poor, old and stupid. Gotcha
Stop patronising the poor and the old, who use cashless in their millions daily eg on the London bus network.
Do you ever get out of London and into the real world
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
As ever, the move is more to the advantage of the retailer - who has to deal with all that cash - than the customer.
I wish, for once, retailers (and banks!) were honest about this, instead of the 'quicker' excuse.
It is quicker though.
And safer.
And less wasteful.
Cash is a pointless pain.
For you, maybe.
For others, not so much.
But as a selfish right-winger, you only ever think of yourself.
The only people who "need" cash are drug dealers.
Or me, when I want to use the lockers at the swimming pool...
Time for your pool to upgrade to the 21st century then.
Okay. Think for a minute how that works:
At the moment you put a pound coin in the locker and withdraw the key. When you come back, you unlock it with the key and get the pound coin out. It is not a financial transaction; but a little security to ensure some idiots do not lock all the lockers.
There are alternative systems, but from what I've read they all have various issues, not the least cost.
This is what you need.
They're okay, but they're another thing to keep on me in case I need it - and I can't keep it on my keyring without leaving my keys dangling from it. Unless I go to the faff of removing it. Whereas a good old pound coin is useful for so much more.
Such as?
Jesus
Buying stuff when you are not a well heeled middle class guy with a bunch of cards and apps. Which I am, and I still find cash useful because the local sub PO prefers it and because I use the odd carpark in signal free places. If I were poor I would not have three bank accounts and five cards, all duplicated on my phone, and cash would be essential. You are so deep into "let them eat cake" country it's embarrassing.
I when I get taxi's down in devon often find I am dropped off in places with little mobile coverage....oh cant use a card to pay
Contactless payment works without mobile coverage (including on your phone).
Are you talking about a shop that doesn't have a chip and pin machine? That's rather different, and a choice of that business to forgo lots of custom. Free country.
No my local shop has contactless and chip and pin....just sometimes it doesnt work because no network connection. You need a network connection to approve your purchase
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
2000 devices were put into use, which is a good number.
I quite like that it was run by Ms Emmett, so Cornwall is probably excluded.
If it were me I would probably look at having two options if no extra overhead was caused - for Building/Churchyard and the church funds. Some people like to support the one, and not the other, from both sides - and a lot of places have "friends of" local charities that focus on the building.
The problem is largely the messaging. Everyone knows Labour have tough decisions to make, it’s time for them to talk about what their vision is. Managerial stuff isn’t very inspiring. A government that puts its people through more financial pain absolutely needs to be able to sell the “why” and the hope piece.
I think it's more fundamental than that. Labour weren't upfront about this, and so they didn't win the voters' consent for it at the election, not even from the 34.7% of GB voters they did manage to win.
Consequently I'd expect Labour to get very unpopular, very quickly - but who will benefit?
I can make a case for the Tories, Lib Dems, Reform, Greens or various other nationalists. I don't know which way it will go.
I think Starmer is actually quite one-dimensional, and the rest is simply dissemblement he learnt as a prosecutor.
He knew he had to cosplay New Labour to win office, but has absolutely no intention of acting that way now he's safely in office - he will act as an old Labour leader with all the prejudices and attitudes of a north London liberal left-winger.
I used to deride Sunak as a paint-by-numbers Chancellor, and I think you could apply the same sort of criticism to Starmer as PM.
It's like he's working from the equivalent of a foreign language phrase book for being PM. One of those worst-case scenario handbooks.
On the US Civil War, two thoughts: First, the US Army at the beginning of the war had about 16,000 soldiers -- half of them on duty keeping the peace (mostly) with the Indian tribes.
Second, the Union progress in the West was at least as impressive as the Confederate defense in the East. Some historians think Grant's Vicksburg campaign was the most brilliant of the war: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vicksburg_campaign
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
Card readers cost peanuts. And are very soon paid for by the increase they generate in extra donations (from people who don’t carry cash).
And sod the poor, old and stupid. Gotcha
I appreciate the sentiment but it is rather odd how cash seems to be the one area where the needs of the old and poor has become absolutely paramount, while in so many other areas of our society those needs are routinely ignored.
But I contest "stupid". You have to be pretty smart to use cash, and I'm interested by the fact the folk with learning disabilities who use my bus still use it, under supervision. It looks very stressful to me, but perhaps being used by their carers to engender some independence/self-worth/mental ability?
I’m pretty sure my learning disabilities great-niece doesn’t have a card. I don’t think she could cope with it.
Interesting - genuinely. I suppose I find counting cash out quite challenging (certainly much more difficult than a contactless payment) , and have fallen for the trap of assuming everyone else does too.
Counting cash is difficult but it’s easier than the other option of spending money that you can’t afford to spend
Or when you have incomplete understanding of how much money you have.
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
Card readers cost peanuts. And are very soon paid for by the increase they generate in extra donations (from people who don’t carry cash).
And sod the poor, old and stupid. Gotcha
I appreciate the sentiment but it is rather odd how cash seems to be the one area where the needs of the old and poor has become absolutely paramount, while in so many other areas of our society those needs are routinely ignored.
But I contest "stupid". You have to be pretty smart to use cash, and I'm interested by the fact the folk with learning disabilities who use my bus still use it, under supervision. It looks very stressful to me, but perhaps being used by their carers to engender some independence/self-worth/mental ability?
Cash. And the ability to use it, is absolutely vital for those without the cognitive ability to budget on a card.
The Department for Education?
(Sorry, couldn't resist! I wonder if they'll screw up their budgeting again this year?)
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
Card readers cost peanuts. And are very soon paid for by the increase they generate in extra donations (from people who don’t carry cash).
And sod the poor, old and stupid. Gotcha
I appreciate the sentiment but it is rather odd how cash seems to be the one area where the needs of the old and poor has become absolutely paramount, while in so many other areas of our society those needs are routinely ignored.
But I contest "stupid". You have to be pretty smart to use cash, and I'm interested by the fact the folk with learning disabilities who use my bus still use it, under supervision. It looks very stressful to me, but perhaps being used by their carers to engender some independence/self-worth/mental ability?
I’m pretty sure my learning disabilities great-niece doesn’t have a card. I don’t think she could cope with it.
Interesting - genuinely. I suppose I find counting cash out quite challenging (certainly much more difficult than a contactless payment) , and have fallen for the trap of assuming everyone else does too.
Counting cash is difficult but it’s easier than the other option of spending money that you can’t afford to spend
Or when you have incomplete understanding of how much money you have.
I discovered this week that my student daughter (twin b) regards having less than £1700 in her current account is a risk - she needs that for the next terms rent
a) Big Issue sellers (and as Divvie notes beggars in general) b) Wong Kei Restaurant for Char Siu Pork and Duck Rice c) Some barbers e) to not be tracked for every minute of your waking life f) er g) that's it.
Was in the US in February and asked hotel to arrange a cab and they laughed and said nobody uses cabs except to go to drug deals, otherwise it's Uber all the way. I 100% understand that, but I 0% understand the militancy about the issue. Politics is basically about the non privileged. The fact that someone can personally afford a cashless lifestyle is as relevant as that they can afford a Porsche.
I'm not sure that's right. I'm not militant about it but very few people of any socioeconomic group need cash these days.
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
Card readers cost peanuts. And are very soon paid for by the increase they generate in extra donations (from people who don’t carry cash).
And sod the poor, old and stupid. Gotcha
Stop patronising the poor and the old, who use cashless in their millions daily eg on the London bus network.
Do you ever get out of London and into the real world
I live in Newcastle and never use or carry cash
Yes and newcastle is as I remember a city....not a rural area where you sometimes have to walk around trying to get a signal
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
As ever, the move is more to the advantage of the retailer - who has to deal with all that cash - than the customer.
I wish, for once, retailers (and banks!) were honest about this, instead of the 'quicker' excuse.
It is quicker though.
And safer.
And less wasteful.
Cash is a pointless pain.
For you, maybe.
For others, not so much.
But as a selfish right-winger, you only ever think of yourself.
The only people who "need" cash are drug dealers.
Or me, when I want to use the lockers at the swimming pool...
Time for your pool to upgrade to the 21st century then.
Okay. Think for a minute how that works:
At the moment you put a pound coin in the locker and withdraw the key. When you come back, you unlock it with the key and get the pound coin out. It is not a financial transaction; but a little security to ensure some idiots do not lock all the lockers.
There are alternative systems, but from what I've read they all have various issues, not the least cost.
This is what you need.
They're okay, but they're another thing to keep on me in case I need it - and I can't keep it on my keyring without leaving my keys dangling from it. Unless I go to the faff of removing it. Whereas a good old pound coin is useful for so much more.
Such as?
Jesus
Buying stuff when you are not a well heeled middle class guy with a bunch of cards and apps. Which I am, and I still find cash useful because the local sub PO prefers it and because I use the odd carpark in signal free places. If I were poor I would not have three bank accounts and five cards, all duplicated on my phone, and cash would be essential. You are so deep into "let them eat cake" country it's embarrassing.
I when I get taxi's down in devon often find I am dropped off in places with little mobile coverage....oh cant use a card to pay
Contactless payment works without mobile coverage (including on your phone).
Are you talking about a shop that doesn't have a chip and pin machine? That's rather different, and a choice of that business to forgo lots of custom. Free country.
No my local shop has contactless and chip and pin....just sometimes it doesnt work because no network connection. You need a network connection to approve your purchase
This can be a major issue (very specific example) just after marathons, when you can have 10,000 people trying to buy a beer and a burger and the number of people spamming instagram overwhelms the network. This can now be mitigated by signal boosters (used at Formula 1, for example).
Otherwise, it's only in a vanishingly few places where a network isn't available. I spend my time in the most remote parts of the UK - it really is a niche issue even here. The one thing that hasn't caught up is the parking in some parts of the Highlands, but the estates understand and just leave a note on your car requesting a bank transfer.
A company as badly run as that with so many questions over where the money has gone should not be asking for hiked bills in a monopoly they have mismanaged to survive.
Not, at least, until they have explained how debts ballooned while they were paying dividends claiming large profits - and recovered that money....
Yep let the shareholders lose their arses. If they couldn’t afford to pay dividends, they shouldn’t have paid them.
There needs to be a huge public campaign for the Government to let the company go bust.
Isnt this about the government imposing greater regulatory burden on the water companies but not allowing them to raise the funds to do the work? This is a consequence of denouncing the company that is responsible for the cleanest river going through a capital city in the world as if they were dumping untreated sewage. It's hard to be sympathetic to Thames Water, but they are not at fault here.
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
Card readers cost peanuts. And are very soon paid for by the increase they generate in extra donations (from people who don’t carry cash).
And sod the poor, old and stupid. Gotcha
I appreciate the sentiment but it is rather odd how cash seems to be the one area where the needs of the old and poor has become absolutely paramount, while in so many other areas of our society those needs are routinely ignored.
But I contest "stupid". You have to be pretty smart to use cash, and I'm interested by the fact the folk with learning disabilities who use my bus still use it, under supervision. It looks very stressful to me, but perhaps being used by their carers to engender some independence/self-worth/mental ability?
Cash. And the ability to use it, is absolutely vital for those without the cognitive ability to budget on a card.
The Department for Education?
(Sorry, couldn't resist! I wonder if they'll screw up their budgeting again this year?)
Could be worse they could be the Scottish Government who rumour has it have a choice between students paying for their degrees (including those currently on free courses), charging for prescriptions (or in all likelihood) both
Has PB discussed this excellent decision by Tesco? I may even do a thread on it.
Tesco ditches cash payments at 40 cafes
Retailer says the move has improved the cafe experience by cutting waiting times
Tesco has ditched cash at 40 of its cafes with customers forced to pay by card at self-service machines.
The supermarket giant says the overhaul has boosted the customer experience and the changes have been well-received, but critics said it was “bonkers” and risked alienating elderly customers.
Martin Quinn, of Campaign for Cash, branded the change a “mad decision”.
He said: “Many of the customers will be elderly or retirees who want to order in person, not press a computer screen. This is a mad decision.”
So far, 40 cafes have been redesigned and more are thought to be in the pipeline.
Disgraceful decision which will victimise the mostly pensioner customer base they have.
People have an odd view of what a pensioner is, I think normally based on what one was when the person doing the imagining was much younger.
Someone who is 80 now was born in 1944, was a youth in the swinging 60s, and retired well into this century when offices were packed with computers, mobile phone use was near universal etc.
This idea that there are many pensioners knocking about who are anachronistic figures from some long forgotten age, who can't get their head around chip'n'pin is fanciful.
I was born in 1944 and for me personally I have no issues with a cashless society or using banking apps for shopping
However, I also accept that there remains a good number of pensioners who still rely on cash and I just cannot understand the animosity towards their wish to continue using cash or indeed animosity to pensioners generally
I’m a bit older…..I was at school when Big G was born ….. and I’m normally quite happy with using a card, BUT I went this morning to a Men’s Coffee morning where I was asked to pay £2 towards coffee and a tin was passed round. I’m not yet sure how organizations like that can cope with cards without buying a card reader.
Card readers cost peanuts. And are very soon paid for by the increase they generate in extra donations (from people who don’t carry cash).
And sod the poor, old and stupid. Gotcha
I appreciate the sentiment but it is rather odd how cash seems to be the one area where the needs of the old and poor has become absolutely paramount, while in so many other areas of our society those needs are routinely ignored.
But I contest "stupid". You have to be pretty smart to use cash, and I'm interested by the fact the folk with learning disabilities who use my bus still use it, under supervision. It looks very stressful to me, but perhaps being used by their carers to engender some independence/self-worth/mental ability?
Cash as a physical object is a lot easier to understand than waving a card about, particularly in terms of it being a finite resource. The abstract nature of paying by card would be parsed as equivalent to magic by some.
Who might then not understand why it stops working when they've spent too much money too quickly. Much easier to understand that with cash, even if you find the numbers, etc, difficult.
a) Big Issue sellers (and as Divvie notes beggars in general) b) Wong Kei Restaurant for Char Siu Pork and Duck Rice c) Some barbers e) to not be tracked for every minute of your waking life f) er g) that's it.
Was in the US in February and asked hotel to arrange a cab and they laughed and said nobody uses cabs except to go to drug deals, otherwise it's Uber all the way. I 100% understand that, but I 0% understand the militancy about the issue. Politics is basically about the non privileged. The fact that someone can personally afford a cashless lifestyle is as relevant as that they can afford a Porsche.
I'm not sure that's right. I'm not militant about it but very few people of any socioeconomic group need cash these days.
I mostly don't use cash but sometimes I do because as I said no network connection....I am not anti using a card just too many times its a case of needing the back up cash because something went wrong. What am I meant to do when I get a taxi and they try the card machine and it doesn't work....tell them to drop me off a mile away where there is a signal?
A company as badly run as that with so many questions over where the money has gone should not be asking for hiked bills in a monopoly they have mismanaged to survive.
Not, at least, until they have explained how debts ballooned while they were paying dividends claiming large profits - and recovered that money....
Yep let the shareholders lose their arses. If they couldn’t afford to pay dividends, they shouldn’t have paid them.
There needs to be a huge public campaign for the Government to let the company go bust.
Isnt this about the government imposing greater regulatory burden on the water companies but not allowing them to raise the funds to do the work? This is a consequence of denouncing the company that is responsible for the cleanest river going through a capital city in the world as if they were dumping untreated sewage. It's hard to be sympathetic to Thames Water, but they are not at fault here.
Thames Water are to the extent that they allowed their owners to attach £15bn of debt against the company that wasn’t spent on the improvements that £15bn spent on improvements would have delivered
And I expect if the money had been spent on improvements bills would not need to increase by anything like as much which is why I say the consequence of their request is that the company should be allowed to go bankrupt and the shareholders, bond holders and other people who have lent them money wiped out
Comments
It adds up quick albeit granted handling cash is not cheap if you can’t pass it to other people
As for not having cash - ideally pay by card but always have £100 or so in cash just in case
With competent generals, it would have been game over quite rapidly.
It’s a bit too early to judge whether this lot are doing anything which will pay dividends in three to four years’ time.
50/50, I think ?
And whilst asking for a winnable war might be a step too far for Keir's genie, it's not hard to imagine that Labour will face a perfectly split opposition again in 2028/9.
Cash is one of the prime drivers of the tax gap, and the black and grey economies. Make it just the jingling change end of the spectrum and that disappears.
And yes, handling cash is pricier than card charges.
Come back and use that argument when London transport bin oyster and paper tickets
And there are a lot of reasons why a card may not work - I pointed out last year that I had to great difficultly finding a Visa card when banks started issuing Mastercard debit cards.
But it should also be remembered the south had other advantages in the short term. A ready made militia. Control of the Tredegar iron works. And they were fighting essentially a defensive war, which meant they were on their own turf and had limited need to carry the fight forward.
I don’t think the war would have been won in less than three years even if Lee had accepted the proffered command of Federal forces and left Johnson to run the Confederate army. Of course, that’s still a 40% reduction.
Not an advisable activity from the point of view of OGH's and OGH jr's pockets. Fortunately lawyers accept cash but also cheques, money transfers, etc. etc.
Consequently I'd expect Labour to get very unpopular, very quickly - but who will benefit?
I can make a case for the Tories, Lib Dems, Reform, Greens or various other nationalists. I don't know which way it will go.
Good article, I think.
How the media blew 2024′s election
https://www.inquirer.com/columnists/attytood/media-elections-dnc-kamala-harris-military-20240827.html
.. I’ll start with the weekend’s lowlight: a news story that worked up the media food chain from the muck of smaller right-wing outlets, then got boosted on X/Twitter by Alex Thompson, a widely read national political correspondent for Axios, before the New York Post hyped it in your local Wawa and eventually the New York Times felt compelled to address it. You see, an idea that has animated the right for the last couple of weeks is the fantasy that Democratic vice presidential nominee Gov. Tim Walz is a phony. Sunday’s purported news slammed Walz for a 2006 episode when his then-congressional campaign claimed he’d won a youth award from the Nebraska Chamber of Commerce when really it was — get this! — the Nebraska Junior Chamber of Commerce!
Never mind that the 2006 Walz campaign had corrected this tiny mistake (picture Barack Obama doing the hand thing, but even smaller), probably the work of a junior staffer, the second they learned about it…
.. It would require another column — maybe a book — to explain why this is happening. I see it as less the public’s main complaint (corporate control of the media) and more about our profession’s weird value structure, where it’s more important to be savvy, cynical, and not be portrayed as naive shills for liberalism than to care about saving democracy from authoritarian rule, on top of maybe a new and not always healthy brand of careerism from younger journalists.
The Chicago-based media critic Mark Jacob, a retired veteran editor of that city’s Tribune and Sun Times, nailed it Monday with a piece headlined “Mainstream media on a path to irrelevance.” Jacob has harsh words for how reporters have covered the race, writing that “too many political journalists are marinating in the Washington cocktail culture, writing for each other and for their sources — in service to the political industry, not the public.” But he also notes that traditional media can’t figure out how to compete for young eyeballs against sites like edgy and fast-paced TikTok. Jacob pointed out that public faith in mass media has plunged from 72% in 1976, after Watergate, to just 32% today.
You know who gets the new landscape better than anyone else? Kamala Harris…
Buying stuff when you are not a well heeled middle class guy with a bunch of cards and apps. Which I am, and I still find cash useful because the local sub PO prefers it and because I use the odd carpark in signal free places. If I were poor I would not have three bank accounts and five cards, all duplicated on my phone, and cash would be essential. You are so deep into "let them eat cake" country it's embarrassing.
Hmm. Needs to be against a non-nuclear power. Not one where the US would be interested or in the lead, nor one where Russia or China has a strong interest. Nothing that involves getting mixed up with Islamists and blowback at home. Not a civil war either.
Possibly one where Britain and France, or Britain and Australia, go jointly.
Tricky.
Would the US intervene in a Venezuelan invasion of Guyana? Possibly not. That would
be a good one. Hungary making a play for Transcaucasia and Britain sending special forces to help? That would be fun. Otherwise slim pickings, unless Argentina tries it on again.
On Wednesday, the company announced it wanted to go further, hiking bills by as much as 59%. The proposed changes in bills do not take account of inflation.
Such a move would take the average annual water bill to £638 per customer by 2030. Average bills are currently around £443.
Chris Weston, chief executive of Thames Water, said the money from higher bills would be invested in new infrastructure and improving services.
"They [customers] are not being asked to pay twice, but to make up for years of focus on keeping bills low," he said in a response to the regulator.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cx2lgl9kypno
Joking aside, some of. the Big Issue sellers and some beggars in Manchester now have card readers.
https://www.bigissue.com/life/money/more-big-issue-vendors-are-now-taking-contactless-payments/
BREAKING: Pavel Durov, the chief executive of Telegram, has been charged with allegedly allowing criminal activity on the messaging app.
https://x.com/SkyNews/status/1828886971386867790
Seriously?
And I thought British Gas and Womble Bond Dickinson were a bunch of stupid and unconvincing whining liars.
Also, I was in Wigan recently. There was a handwritten note in the window of a takeaway "we accept card payments". Suggesting doing so is not necessarily universal.
I say well done to the French.
The North had scores….
b) Wong Kei Restaurant for Char Siu Pork and Duck Rice
c) Some barbers
e) to not be tracked for every minute of your waking life
f) er
g) that's it.
What are we? Subhuman? Untermenschen? Not as “real” as good honest sons of the soil living on the Lleyn peninsula?
London has as much right to be considered the real world as anywhere else, thanks.
(And I paid for a bus by contactless in Yorkshire recently).
I don't think he'll be removed, but I don't see what's special about him among the MAGA camp either.
I was hoping this was going to be the one with the 19C or 17C total immersion font.
But that's St Mary, Otley:
http://www.suffolkchurches.co.uk/otley.html
He knew he had to cosplay New Labour to win office, but has absolutely no intention of acting that way now he's safely in office - he will act as an old Labour leader with all the prejudices and attitudes of a north London liberal left-winger.
https://www.activote.net/harris-and-trump-essentially-tied-in-michigan/
SoCal North Carolina Trump 50% Harris 46%
https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/polls/
There are problems, sure. But I'm not aware of any that where solutions don't already exist... If we want them to.
And then the question becomes the fundamental one- are we, as a country, prepared to inconvenience ourselves in any way at all to generate a good and prosperous society for ourselves and our descendants?
I'm finding the lecture series fascinating.
There was a very good (or at least convincing) article in, I think, The Atlantic.
But I contest "stupid". You have to be pretty smart to use cash, and I'm interested by the fact the folk with learning disabilities who use my bus still use it, under supervision. It looks very stressful to me, but perhaps being used by their carers to engender some independence/self-worth/mental ability?
Who are you, and what have you done with Screaming?
https://youtu.be/b8I2HavEEPE?t=651
Are you talking about a shop that doesn't have a chip and pin machine? That's rather different, and a choice of that business to forgo lots of custom. Free country.
Force open the slot so you can put it on your car keys. You will never need a quid again.
I have one on each car key set. It’s annoying, having to find a use for corned beef, once you have reminded yourself how dire fritters are.
you can also test how much of a jerk you are. As you don’t have to replace the trolley.
As I said above everyone on this site has the advantage of enough spare cash that a £1/900 of extra spending doesn’t really impact them. For a lot of people £2 spent on x means something else will need to be forgone.
We may talk about the winter fuel allowance but let’s be honest 99% of the people on here won’t need it
I quite like that it was run by Ms Emmett, so Cornwall is probably excluded.
If it were me I would probably look at having two options if no extra overhead was caused - for Building/Churchyard and the church funds. Some people like to support the one, and not the other, from both sides - and a lot of places have "friends of" local charities that focus on the building.
It's like he's working from the equivalent of a foreign language phrase book for being PM. One of those worst-case scenario handbooks.
Second, the Union progress in the West was at least as impressive as the Confederate defense in the East. Some historians think Grant's Vicksburg campaign was the most brilliant of the war: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vicksburg_campaign
(Sorry, couldn't resist! I wonder if they'll screw up their budgeting again this year?)
https://x.com/TomTugendhat/status/1828332534913986981
If I wanted earliest first I'd be using vf
PB has turned upside down!
Otherwise, it's only in a vanishingly few places where a network isn't available. I spend my time in the most remote parts of the UK - it really is a niche issue even here. The one thing that hasn't caught up is the parking in some parts of the Highlands, but the estates understand and just leave a note on your car requesting a bank transfer.
This is a consequence of denouncing the company that is responsible for the cleanest river going through a capital city in the world as if they were dumping untreated sewage.
It's hard to be sympathetic to Thames Water, but they are not at fault here.
Who might then not understand why it stops working when they've spent too much money too quickly. Much easier to understand that with cash, even if you find the numbers, etc, difficult.
And I expect if the money had been spent on improvements bills would not need to increase by anything like as much which is why I say the consequence of their request is that the company should be allowed to go bankrupt and the shareholders, bond holders and other people who have lent them money wiped out