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Cashing in on the cashless society

While the world’s media was trying to get a handle on Russia and Ukraine, my counter-cyclical approach was to investigate the move towards a cashless society.

Retailers and banks have been (stealthily), moving away from having their shop assistants and tellers handle cash. Maybe it was already happening, but the Covid-19 pandemic accelerated the push by retailers in particular, to insist on people using a debit card to pay for goods and services. The rational was to slow the spread of germs, although one might be aghast at the results of swabbing an ATM keypad or EFTPOS machine.

A majority of Australians (55%) now has become used to internet banking, electronic bill paying and using debit or credit cards to buy goods and services.

In 2022, the Reserve Bank issued a technical bulletin about the use of and distribution of cash in Australia. The Bank’s Consumer Payments Survey (CPS) showed that the share of total retail payments made in cash fell from 69% in 2007 to 27% in 2019. The results from the 2022 study will be published later this year.

The RBA used multiple surveys to explain the rapidly declining use of cash in Australian society. The Online Banknotes Survey (OBS), commissioned by the RBA, asked individuals about their cash use behaviour. In 2022, cash was used by 25% of respondents in their most recent transaction. Debit and credit cards remain the most popular payment method, although electronic options such as tapping with smartphones or watches are becoming more prevalent.

“The survey points to a permanent shift in payment behaviour for a significant proportion of the population; 39% of respondents said they have been using cash less often since the pandemic began. Those on lower incomes were more likely to have used cash for transactions and consider themselves high cash users.

On Sunday the host of Australia all Over, Ian McNamara, read out a letter from a listener who had taken a cache of cash to a bank branch. She was told the coins (in bags) could not be accepted as ‘we are a cashless bank’”.

“The world’s going to hell in a hand basket,” Macca opined, citing a phrase originating in mediaeval times.

The cashless bank issue was also canvassed by talkback radio 3AW, after a listener emailed to describe his run-in at a bank branch.

ANZ Victoria and Tasmania general manager Cameron Home confirmed in a statement to the radio station that “a small number” of branches “no longer handle cash at the counter”.

“At these branches cash and cheque deposits and cash withdrawals continue to be possible through a smart ATM and coin deposit machines.”

The ANZ spokesman did not quantity the number of branches refusing to take cash at the counter.

This trend poses a quandary for those of us who traditionally save coins. My pink piggy bank had reached the stage where there was no more room for the coins that accumulate like used tissues in the pockets of jeans and jackets. Many people have a piggy bank, an old cigar tin or biscuit barrel in which they throw their loose change. Nobody wants to keep $20 of loose change in their wallets, purses, handbags or pockets.

So, many of us have this habit, particularly if we are children of depression-era parents, of savings coins then banking them once the amount makes it worth the effort.

She Who Also Hoards Cash routinely throws $1 and $2 coins in a tin. Come Christmas she will count said cash, bank it, then use the $200 or so to buy ‘Christmas plonk’.

This week I laboriously counted and separated the cash into the correct denominations (in plastic bank bags).

All banks have scales and machines which can quickly and accurately confirm that a bag indeed contains $50 in $2 coins (or $7.80 in 20c pieces). Some branches can tip a mixed bag of cash into a machine which will automatically sort and count the cash in a matter of seconds.

I decided to spend an hour or so with a practical demonstration of how one fares trying to deposit $160 in coins at a bank branch. Our family bank (Suncorp) was closed – 9.30 – 2.00pm Monday to Friday). Did you know Suncorp had sold its banking business to ANZ Ltd? (No. Ed)

I then went to the Warwick Credit Union and the teller deposited the coins with no fuss at all. As part of the exercise, I learned that many banks now expect small business customers to deposit cash via a “Smart ATM”. I can only wonder how this will go with people who operate cash-only businesses (markets, busking, CD sales and so on).

The deep flaw in the concept of a cashless society is what happens when the technology (which relies on electricity and technology that works 24/7) fails. Almost on cue, we had an Australian banking example when some Commonwealth Bank customers were unable to log in to their accounts online.

The bank apologised to its customers after a major glitch left them unable to make purchases with their bank cards or access their accounts.

Customers received error messages when trying to use the NetBank online banking service and the CommBank mobile app.

It’s not the first example (for any bank or business for that matter) finding that their ‘smart’ apps can and do fail.

As dedicated readers may recall, we spent a week marooned in a regional town in New Zealand without mobile phones, internet or ATMs. Good thing the hire car had a full tank, eh! The town was cut off from the world in the aftermath of a catastrophic cyclone. A small supermarket near where we were staying had fired up its generator and served customers on the basis of ‘cash is king.’ EFTPOS payments were possible, but only after a long wait in a queue.Despite these occasional ‘hiccups,’ the banking industry seems determined to introduce labour-saving technology, even if it sends their customers to hell in a hand basket.

A survey by RFI global asked merchants what their future intentions were towards accepting cash. The data suggest that half of merchants that accepted cash in April 2022 planned on actively discouraging cash payments or displaying signage to that effect at some point in the future. Those merchants that plan to move away from accepting cash were more likely to have higher turnover and be in metropolitan areas. The pandemic appears to have influenced some merchants’ plans to dissuade cash use, with hygiene concerns around cash handling as the most prominent reason. The risk of theft and the cost of sourcing cash are other reasons.

Meanwhile, the traditional source of cash for so many Australians (automatic teller machines or ATMS), is in decline. Since 2016, when ATM numbers peaked at 8,000, 25% have closed. Most of these closures have been ATMs owned by authorised deposit-taking institutions. Some of these ADIs, as they are known, will charge you a fee of up to $3.00 to make a withdrawal.

The latter is yet another argument I have against the banking system in general. Banks charge fees for almost every aspect of banking, be it in person or via internet banking. Virtually all merchants charge a fee when you use a credit card to make purchases (e.g, $5.90 added to a return ticket to NZ). Many banks charge a monthly fee for maintaining business and even personal accounts. Moreover, these fees increase over time.

It could be a mistake to ascribe the tap and go trend on Millennials or Generation Z.

I was at a choir reunion last month when an elegant 70-something woman, having ordered a pizza, leaned over towards the EFTPOS machine and waved her smart watch at it. Ka-ching!

More reading: what can go wrong will go wrong

Friday on My Mind – Technology And Our Private Lives

technology-privacy — “Hacker’ image by www.pixabay.com

“Och*, technology – it’s the Deil’s work,” my Scottish Dad said in 1964, when I bought one of the early transistor radios.

Dad died in 1991, so he missed the Internet (and Windows 98, the best version). He also missed WIFI, smart phones, internet banking, Facebook, Twitter, Skype, Bluetooth, video and music streaming and that nemesis of 21^st century parents − Facetime. I’m not sure what he’d make of hackers, spammers, viruses, malware, or dealing with glitch-prone software and untimely computer crashes.

As we all should know privacy risks for internet and mobile phone users include data harvesting, web tracking and government spying. Many internet security companies are now advocating the use of a virtual private network (VPN) which encrypts your data and hides your internet address. And, as this article reveals, the Internet of Things poses new cyber threats, as security is often lax or absent in domestic items like smart TVs, fridges and microwaves and other connected devices.

This week I conducted an IT security review after a sudden flood of spam emails jammed up one of our addresses (not this one). She Who Goes By Various Acronyms was extremely pinged off with the 200 dodgy emails that came several nights in succession. They were dressed up to look like emails we’d sent but had been ‘rejected by sender’.

I can’t say our Internet Service Provider (iinet) was overly helpful. They insisted that the email address had not been hacked or compromised. The support team advised me to change my password (duh) and later referred me to a service where you can report ‘new’ spam. That didn’t really help much, so I spent a good few hours doing my own troubleshooting.

As part of a usor emptor security review, I reset my WIFI router to its default settings, and then re-installed it with a complex admin password and a new WIFI password. Tedious, yes, and the tediousness extended to relaying the new WIFI password to every device that shares the same router. As a result, we slowed the spam to a trickle and now it has stopped altogether. (Yay, techy Bob-Ed)

In the early days of starting a WordPress website, my weekly posts were inundated by what is known in blogger world as ‘comment spam’ – most of it from Russia. We slowed the onslaught by installing an effective anti-spam plugin (Akismet) and stopped it by limiting post comments to 14 days.

I began to wonder about spam; who distributes it and why. Do they want to sell you stuff or are they just creating mischief? What they want more than anything is for you to click on the inevitable malware-ridden attachments. Do so at your peril.

I discovered that a sudden flood of spam can (a) bury messages you did need to find and (b) sometimes they are phishing emails. These are emails that purport to be from one of your legitimate service providers. You can usually detect them by the stilted use of English and also by the fake email address

Later, I forwarded the bogus email to iinet support and complained. Since then, I have had other attempts by swindlers to milk credit card details by forging emails. It is beyond me why a large ISP (iinet, now owned by TPG), can’t put a stop to this. I’m told scams like this are commonplace, no matter which ISP you use.

There’s a lot of it about. As you may have read recently, cyber crooks impudently set up a facsimile of the MyGov website, which holds an enormous database of tax, medical and social security detail.

Many of my Facebook friends are currently complaining about nuisance calls, phishing emails, spam or hacking of their ‘Messenger’ app. These scams are becoming so prevalent it behoves us all to put another layer of security in place. Many banks and institutions (including MyGov), use a ‘dongle’ or some form of two-step verification (a time-sensitive pin sent to your mobile).

There is a certain amount of sales-driven hysteria promulgated about the ability of ‘Russian hackers’ to covertly take control of your computer and start delving into your private details. Some swear by online password managers, but I favour an in-house, two-step method. It is tedious but safe, provided you don’t fall into the trap of allowing your web browser to save logins and passwords. Surely you don’t do that?

The anti-virus programme I uninstalled this week was quite good at doing what it is supposed to do, but it kept alerting me to potential threats and PC performance issues. Solving these supposed threats and issues meant upgrading to one or more ‘premium’ programmes.

Hassles aside, when technology works, it can be a joy to all. Last week I compiled a short video to send to my Auntie in the UK who was turning 100. My sister and her daughter sent me a video on Messenger as did my nephew. We recorded our own video greeting on the veranda at home, complete with kookaburras in the background. I called my other sister in New Zealand and recorded her audio message and then edited the clips into a 10-minute video and slideshow. I then uploaded it to YouTube with a privacy setting. My cousin in the UK said it came up great when cast to the big screen TV.

That milestone occasion got me musing about my teenage years (Auntie outlived her sister (my Mum) by 52 years. Technology sure has changed from those days as a rugby-mad teenager in New Zealand. I bought the transistor radio for one purpose; I’d set the alarm (a clock with two bells on top), and get up in the middle of the night to listen to (e.g.) the All Blacks play England at Twickenham.

Dad (left) had no interest in sport, but as a volunteer member of the St John’s Ambulance, he spent many a cold Saturday afternoon on the rugby sidelines, first-aid kit at the ready.

He’d have probably credited the ‘Deil’ with this 2019 example of electronic surveillance of professional athletes. When professional rugby players run out onto the field, a small digital gadget is tucked into a padded pouch on the back of their jumpers. The GPS tracker relays performance information to the coaching team (and, apparently, to rugby commentators). From this wafer-thin tracker they can upload data and analyse the player’s on-field movements. This is how Storm winger Josh Addo-Carr was proclaimed the fastest man in the NRL. He set a top speed of 38.5 kmh chasing a scrum kick down the left touchline in the round five match against the North Queensland Cowboys in April. He’d still get run down by a panther or a tiger, but it’s pretty darned fast.

While the top 10 stats look thoroughly impressive, I doubt the general public will get to hear about the half-fit players slacking off in the 63^rd minute.

Fair go, as we say in Australia, as if it isn’t intrusive enough going into the dressing sheds and interviewing sweaty blokes in their underwear.

*general interjection of confirmation, affirmation, and often disapproval (Scots)

King decrees universal basic income

king-basic-income — King decrees universal basic income Image by Jason Train, Flickr https://flic.kr/p/f1BBQu

The question for the week is, what, apart from introducing a universal basic income, would you do if you were King, President or Prime Minister for a day? The term ‘King for a Day,’ which has inspired more than a dozen pop songs and an obscure opera by Verdi, implies that for 24 hours you get to be loved by the masses. You can loll about in a high-backed chair, gold orb and sceptre in hand, and be fawned over – mint juleps and the like.

In the Silly Season, media outlets tend to ask people questions like this, for a news slot or an inconveniently empty news hole next to a couple of ads. The ABC North Queensland asked a bunch of 11-year-old kids and some senior citizens what they’d do if they were Prime Minister for the day. Some of the answers were predictable enough. Sophie, 11 said, “Give everyone a day off so adults can take their kids out (and make theme parks free).” James (10) said he’d employ more scientists so Australia can get its research skills up (reserve that kid a cabinet post, circa 2030). Keira (11) wanted more national parks; Charlotte (11) wanted a program for kids to do work experience and be taught something they want to do.

If I could be King for a Day, I’d single out the dysfunctional tax and welfare systems and propose the following reforms:

Introduction of a universal basic income for all adults: $25k a year, indexed, no strings attached. Adults are free to earn money over and above the $25k, but it will be taxed on a sliding scale to the maximum rate for anyone earning more than, say, $150k.

Hypothetically, a previously unemployed or under-employed couple could, with a tax-free household income of $50,000, find jobs, start a business, renovate the spare bedroom, and join Airbnb and ramp up their annual income in a myriad of ways. Their only duty would be to the Tax Office.

Treasury boffins would be responsible for reforming the tax system to ensure the universal basic income could be funded and that as few people as possible are disadvantaged. Treasury could find ways to encourage business to work with this new system, for example offering generous tax rebates for research and development.

In my Kingdom, all forms of social welfare would be replaced by a new regime, overseen by the Office of Financial and Social Opportunity and Incentivisation (NOOFASOI). The office would oversee payment of the UBI and iron out the inevitable wrinkles in a new and untested system.

This is not just a FOMM flight of fancy

Countries as diverse as Finland, France, Ireland, Norway, the US, Canada, New Zealand, Holland, Iceland, India and Brazil are either talking about universal basic income or trialling it in one form or another. Switzerland had a referendum, and while the people said no, it shows how front of mind this issue has become. Indeed, Australia has a university-sponsored programme to research income security.

And the Parliament of Australia published this comprehensive yet concise policy paper by Don Henry, for those who want to find out more.

The media went on a feeding frenzy recently after the end of the first year of Finland’s two-year trial to dole out a subsistence amount (no strings attached) to 2,000 unemployed Finns. The Finnish government (wisely) is letting the experiment run and will only look at it the results when the trial ends.

I would not pretend to understand the complexities of financing a universal basic income and the social engineering required to make it work.

An OECD report in 2017 said that despite well-publicised campaigns for a Basic Income, no country has put a BI in place as a pillar of income support for the working age population.

“The recent upsurge in attention to BI proposals in OECD countries, including those with long-standing traditions of providing comprehensive social protection, is therefore remarkable,” the report says.

It’s not so remarkable when one looks into the growing inequality that is being spawned by job losses as a result of automation and digital disruption. As Oxfam said last week, 42 people hold as much wealth as the 3.7 billion people in the poorest half of the world’s population.

This is clearly not sustainable.

From where I sit, the domination of the contract or ‘gig economy’ and a part-time, casual workforce has left the welfare system behind. Moreover, the welfare bureaucracy is unrealistically punitive, in that it forces the unemployed to prove they are pursuing fast-disappearing jobs to qualify for support.

Mainstream conservative publications including The Economist and the Financial Times have canvassed the UBI debate. As the FT said, it “strengthens a sense that the traditional welfare state is no longer fit for purpose”.

The advances in artificial intelligence (AI) are threatening many jobs around the world, the FT said, adding that most workers have come to accept that the job for life has gone for good.

But if the intent of a UBI is to lift people out of poverty and ensure wealthier people pay their fair share of tax, it’s not that simple.

The OECD report concludes that introducing a UBI in countries with strong social support systems would not solve poverty and would lead to higher taxes. Others warn against dismantling welfare systems, which, however flawed, are at least a safety net for the poor and disadvantaged.

George Zarkadakis, an AI engineer and writer, outlined some of the flaws in an article for Huffington Post. Zarkadakis dismissed talk of taxing the cash reserves of fully automated companies, saying this would affect their ability to invest and innovate; they would lose their competitive position to low-tax or zero tax regimes. Likewise, he was sceptical about the hi-tech and energy companies that are lobbying for (and prepared to help fund) a UBI, arguing that this would give them undue political influence.

The ancient ideal of a UBI (Thomas More’s social satire, Utopia, published in 1516), frees creative people and artisans around the fringes of the commercial world to develop their skills without financial pressure. The ‘shall we tell Centrelink?’ poser goes into the dustbin of history, along with the often inaccurate stereotype of the ‘goddamn, long-haired hippy dole bludger’. People on disability pensions would no longer have to get stressed about the fluctuating cycles of their illnesses. For example, a person receiving the blind pension (which is not means tested), can lose it if they recover some sight. There is also the travesty where workers made redundant find out that 30 years of paying tax counts for nothing. Unless their payout is locked up in super, they’ll have to spend every cent of it before dipping into the public purse.

Even a theoretical discussion about a UBI should alert us to many of the anomalies in our welfare system, which arise from outdated legislation and an institutionalised idea that people are out to rort the system.

As for my Kingly privileges for a day (you can tell how far along we are with ‘The Crown’), I was so busy hunting grouse, inspecting broodmares, dallying with ladies-in-waiting and whatnot, I never got around to doing anything. Terribly sorry.