BRITAIN is in danger of sleepwalking into a cashless society, Parliament will be warned this week.
Concern is mounting that more shops and businesses across the country now refuse to accept cash payments and the days of being able to use notes and coins at all could be coming to an end. Fears were already high that bank branch closures and the removal of free ATMs had made it difficult for people to get hold of cash. Former Scottish Secretary David Mundell said: “The big issue now is we could be sleepwalking into a cashless society because the number of places that people can actually use cash is reducing".
The British Retail Consortium (BRC) reports that more than two million people in the UK are “entirely dependent on cash”. Cash purchases, it adds, accounted for £78billion of research purchases last year.
Last month consumer watchdog Which? warned that the “viability of Britain’s cash system” is under threat.
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Concern is mounting that more shops and businesses across the country now refuse to accept cash payments and the days of being able to use notes and coins at all could be coming to an end. Fears were already high that bank branch closures and the removal of free ATMs had made it difficult for people to get hold of cash. Former Scottish Secretary David Mundell said: “The big issue now is we could be sleepwalking into a cashless society because the number of places that people can actually use cash is reducing".
The British Retail Consortium (BRC) reports that more than two million people in the UK are “entirely dependent on cash”. Cash purchases, it adds, accounted for £78billion of research purchases last year.
Last month consumer watchdog Which? warned that the “viability of Britain’s cash system” is under threat.
Read more
Debating cashless economy in Ireland
