June 2009
PLASTIC NOT FANTASTIC FOR BRITISH TRADITIONS
A new report out today suggests that while some card schemes are trying to force us towards a cashless society, British idiosyncrasies and love of traditions will ultimately save us from a characterless, all-electronic future.
Bye Bye Street Stalls and Bacon Butties?
The report, commissioned by independent ATM operator Bank Machine, looks at the top 10 cash-dependent activities we can’t – and won’t – live without and ranks them accordingly. The following activities are the ones the British public that would miss something if they lived in a cashless society values most:
- Street retailers (farmers markets/car boot sales/fruit and veg stalls)
- Local newsagents
- Local cafes (bacon butties/take-away teas)
- Newspapers
- Community fundraisers (cake sales/local fetes)
- Fun fairs (ice-cream vans/balloon sellers etc)
- Church and charity collection tins
- Office whip rounds (birthdays/leaving presents)
- Children’s pocket money
- Ability to tip (waiters/cab drivers)
The report includes analysis by James Woudhuysen, Professor of Forecasting and Innovation at De Montfort University, Leicester. It argues that a society with exclusively electronic payments would cause activities like these to disappear from our lives, as the electronic payment methods would be too costly to install and not financially viable.
Contactless Consumers
Bank Machine’s report also paints a picture of the impact on human behaviour of electronic payment systems were they to overtake warm, comforting cash. Mobile and ‘wave’ payments, dubbed ‘contactless’, would hit human interaction hard. Many of the best-loved uses for cash involve either thought for other people or social interaction. A plastic-run life would be a solitary, lonely one.
Not Ready To Let Go Of The Readies
And there are other reasons that cash will never die, according to the report. The long-term psychological impact of recent financial scandals will mean that people continue to rely on the tangibility of the green stuff. In addition, there are five key factors that will encourage us all to continue our commitment to cash for years to come.
- A maturing population’s resistance to change for change’s sake.
- British attachment to individualism in general and our currency in particular
- Concerns about a “surveillance society”
- Retailer resistance
- Authenticity of cash over electronic money
Ron Delnevo, Managing Director of Bank Machine, comments: “Cash is here to stay because – despite dubious tactics used by the Card schemes to force us into electronic payment methods – the British public simply won’t be told what to do. It is crucial that we look to the future and realise the real impact of simply accepting systems that we neither want, need or are able to afford.”
Bank Machine commissioned the report to examine whether electronic payment methods could wipe out the use of cash in Britain and what the knock-on effects would be. The company’s initiative is designed to be a wake-up call to consumers nationwide, exploring how the cash-free world card issuers could create would destroy many aspects of our way of life.
Your Money, Your Choice
Top pressures being applied to our use of cash include:
- The introduction of unsecure contactless debit cards and mobile payment technology.
- The rapid decline in the acceptance of cheques, even though over 25 million UK citizens used them last year.
- Aggressive, over-the-top marketing by Card schemes promoting the so-called death of cash.
-ENDS-
Notes to Editors:
• Last year, £186 billion was dispensed from cash machines in the UK, an average of £5903 per second. This figure is forecast by APACS to steadily grow over the next five years.
• Bank Machine created the UK's independent ATM market ten years ago and now has more than 2,500 cash machines in locations including cinemas, garage forecourts and retail outlets - ranging from Selfridges to convenience stores.
• Bank Machine operates both pay-to-use and free-to-use ATMs, with over 600 free-to-use ATMs installed in, for example, NHS hospitals, military bases, Universities and low-income areas.
• Based in Hatfield, Hertfordshire, Bank Machine (a division of Cardtronics Inc.) now has over 100 staff.
• For further information about Bank Machine, please visit its website (www.bankmachine.com) or contact Surinder Kaur Gill at Quintus Communications on 0207 340 6290 / email surinder@quintuscommunications.com
• The Bank Machine report includes:
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