Are notes, coins out of fashion?

But if they are to go, we need another anonymous form of payment

Without a cent in our pockets or a banknote in our wallets we can already buy petrol, pay for parking and shop for everything from shoes to wine and vegetables. However, this mad rush to pay only electronically has its downsides.

It is not a major financial sacrifice to tip the chap who fills the tank of your car, or who might still assist in future when you plug your vehicle into the charger. After all, “green” cars also get dirty windscreens and underinflated tyres, and some of the engines of the future will still need oil and water.

Yet few of us carry cash these days, so tipping can get complicated. The implications of the cashless society also hit you at the traffic lights, particularly in the context of a hugely unequal society such as SA. There is clearly still a role for notes and coins, even if there are places where they are needed less.

Our bankers are making us mean as they drive us towards plastic and digital payments with an explosion of technology that allows the flow of funds through your phone and even your watch. ATMs are still ubiquitous in SA, and you can still pay cash for almost everything — for now. But there is no joy in popping into any SA bank to get notes and coins as the queues can be awful and there are extra charges for cash withdrawals over a certain limit.

Those relying on tips and handouts are clearly suffering from this relentless move to ecash, but there are more subtle, but dangerous consequences for us all. On a recent visit to London the future was evident. Many restaurants and delis refuse to take cash payments at all, a trend that exploded during the Covid hysteria.

Yet pay by card, tap your watch or phone, and you are leaving a footprint. This may be fine if all you are doing is buying a carton of milk or a newspaper (Business Day comes highly recommended). However, electronic surveillance is becoming ever more sophisticated. Do you really want your health or life insurer to know how often you pop into the bottle store, or how much you spend on fast food and cigarettes?

Your e-spending is recorded, and no-one should be silly enough to believe that data can’t be accessed by people and organisations with their own agendas, often ones that might cost you dearly.

There is also the civil liberties argument. Sex work may soon be totally legal, but even so, do you really want to leave a record of your visits to dens of ill repute? Or of that candlelight dinner (not the sort Eskom imposes) or weekend away with your receptionist, or the Friday night site visit to Hooters?

If people like Bill Gates are right, all humans may eventually have chips implanted in them that not only identify them but can also receive and make payments. Pay with cash and you still risk being tracked by the security cameras, but you can lower the risk of exposure that arises from all your spending being electronically monitored.

The information that is collected on you could be used for blackmail, and if your employer seeks or is given details of what you have been up to it could lead to the sort of discipline you did not purchase from Madame Whiplash.

Not all discretion is naughty. Whistleblowers and journalists often require discreet meetings so the identities of those who spill information about corruption, scoops and scandals are protected. Set up an electronic trail and you magnify the risk of exposure; pay cash

YOUR E-SPENDING IS RECORDED AND INFORMATION THAT IS COLLECTED ON YOU COULD BE USED FOR BLACKMAIL

THOSE RELYING ON TIPS AND HANDOUTS ARE CLEARLY SUFFERING FROM THIS RELENTLESS MOVE TO E-CASH

for those beers you had with on offer in transport systems in your source and it becomes London, Hong Kong and many more difficult to detect who is other places. However, if you your deep throat. operate through a card or phone

Of course, every problem — this carries security risks. A except, it seems, the security of card should be loaded, or preloaded, the power supply in SA — has a sold and then used solution. Card readers are used anonymously. by almost every small business, We might have suggested a and this use is spreading. What different solution based on we need is a dirt-cheap device postage stamps, which are, in that can be obtained by every their way, a store of value. But car guard, service station have you tried to battle the attendant and — dare we say it — queues in your local post office sex worker. recently? Take a week off work

If notes and coins are sometime, and give it a try. heading into the vaults of Develop and distribute an history there should be — and anonymous cash replacement almost certainly already is —a and you can shop, tip, and even plastic card solution. A card that get up to all sorts of discreet can be loaded anonymously, naughtiness without the 24/7 like the digital wallets you can surveillance threat that hangs store in your phone. This loadand-pay over today’s cashless consumer. technology is already Greater minds than ours, with a far better understanding of how to tap into financial systems such as bitcoin, would be able to get things up and running in less than a weekend. However, it really is high time we got things moving.