189
No credit card? No smartphone? No parking: Parks Canada ditches cash option at Rideau Canal lots
(ottawacitizen.com)
What's going on Canada?
๐ Meta
๐บ๏ธ Provinces / Territories
๐๏ธ Cities / Local Communities
๐ Sports
Hockey
Football (NFL)
unknown
Football (CFL)
unknown
Baseball
unknown
Basketball
unknown
Soccer
unknown
๐ป Universities
๐ต Finance / Shopping
๐ฃ๏ธ Politics
๐ Social and Culture
Reminder that the rules for lemmy.ca also apply here. See the sidebar on the homepage:
One of the modern mysteries I can't quite get is people caring so much about paying stuff with cash. Are people out there paying for gas using cash as well? How many people have a car and don't have a credit card or smartphone? So many questions...
One: Using a card means all transactions are tied to my financial history. For better or worse, I don't want all my personal habits in a ledger somewhere.
Two: Fees. Merchants have to pay fees on credit transactions.
Three: Consolidating financial institutions between a handful of company's. (Visa, MasterCard, Amex, etc)
Four: Complexity. At least one side of the transaction must setup a system to interact with banks or credit cards. Cash is as simple as counting and handing it over.
Five: Budgets. It's been shown that people spend less when they use cash. When someone can see the money actually leave and what they have dwindles they are more responsible with their spending.
Six: Tax evasion. Sometimes, if the waiter/waitress is struggling tipping in cash means it's easier for them not to report that income.
Seven: It makes it much harder to make financial transactions that aren't "approved." Whether or not you like it, some people want to be able to buy drugs or something else that isn't legal. Or even worse, the whims of whatever payment processor they use. A private company shouldn't get to say who can be a merchant and what they are allowed to sell.
Eight: Gifts. Cash is just a simple, nice gift that Zelle or Venmo can't replace.
Nine: No chance of overdrafting and getting hit with bullshit fees.
I work in fintech, specifically in the payments industry for a company that has a huge vertical spread. And damn let me tell you, we (along with the big ones like MC, Visa, Amex) just skim the delicious foam off the top of everything... right into the pockets of the exec team who keep doing weekly stupid motivational videos from every corner of the world.
I think governments should start thinking about nationalizing the shit out of this instead of everyone paying these stupid nepomonkeys. I don't care if I'd be out of a job, I can find something else.
I used to work for a company that converted coin-based parking meters to contactless card payment. And I completely agree.
Payment by card/app saves the companies a ton of money because they donโt have to handle cash โ the guy going around is now just a fact checker and the automated systems handle the cash.
Previously, some cash was โlostโ at each touch point (human handling the cash) in the chain; now this is replaced by higher fees, and a percentage going to fintech executives directly.
Oh yea. It's ridiculous that governments have let financial transactions be a private company thing.