Advocates call for cash preservation

The novel coronavirus pandemic has catapulted the United Kingdom into the electronic payments age by forcing shoppers and retailers to embrace money transfers and other non-physical forms of remittance that most Britons shunned a matter of months ago, but the death of cash is worrying some advocates.

They say the shift to electronic payments triggered by people needing alternatives to physically handling cash is negatively impacting some sectors of society and threatening jobs.

According to the consumer magazine Which?, a survey of 2,000 people shows 34 percent of Britons who have been asked to pay electronically for something since March were unable to do so.

The magazine said a growing refusal to accept cash, which began in businesses such as coffee shops, where large numbers of transactions coupled with consumables made it unattractive, is "creeping into the wider UK economy", potentially excluding people who do not have computers or smartphones and those without bank accounts.

Natalie Ceeney, the author of a study associated with the Access to Cash Review, said she wants the government to guarantee the survival of cash.

"The figures show that it's not simply the odd coffee shop going cashless," the BBC quoted her as saying. "We can't just blame individual businesses; many are going cashless because they can't easily bank cash takings because their local (bank) branch is closed or some distance away. The government needs to urgently legislate to protect the viability of cash, as it promised to do last year. Time is running out."

Jenny Ross, Which? magazine's money editor, said: "We have repeatedly warned about the consequences that novel coronavirus will have on what was an already fragile cash system, but nowhere near enough action has been taken by the government or the regulator to understand the scale of this issue."

The British government's Treasury department, which is responsible for developing and executing the nation's public finance policy, has said it is considering giving the Financial Conduct Authority, which is the regulator of the nation's financial system, the power to specifically oversee the future of cash as a payment tool.

The Independent newspaper said the survey found worrying examples of why cash payments must be preserved, such as an incident involving a diabetic man in urgent need of food, and a respondent who was refused access to a bus, despite having cash and a broken ankle.

The Independent said the survey found that, despite the dramatic shift toward a cashless society, one person in seven would struggle without a cash option.

The shift to cashless payments has affected the banking sector, with less demand for high-street banking services leading to closures. HSBC became the latest bank to announce changes this week, with plans to close 82 branches in 2021, reducing its UK sites to 511.