I put myself on a cash allowance for all non important purchases. $60 a week. Eating out, beer, convenience store, impulse buys ect... are cash. Groceries, gas, electric bill, and necessary purchases on the card. I was using my cards for all purchases out of convenience and to get the points. At the end of the month I was like wow what did I buy? It is way to easy swipe and go. The bad part is more and more places are becoming card only. Now depending on what it is if I don't have the cash, i don't need it, or save up for it.
Always carry cash (learned that from "The Smuggler's Blues"), $20's only (can't always get change for a 100). Use it if necessary, sometimes it is. Plastic Man for everything else.
I avoid cash like the plague. Only thing I use it for regularly is the yard people, who are cash only.
I pay for everything with pennies. I love to while away the hours counting and stacking pennies up and stuffing them into penny rolls 50 at a time. For big purchases I load my penny rolls into my trusty Flexible Flyer and pull them to the cash register
But now some places charge an extra percentage if you use a credit card. I haven’t written a check in years.
Yeah, they're charging you back the same % that the CC companies charge them. 3+ percent. There's several around here who do that.
Granny owned the laundromat in JC, I remember unloading the machines and the coin converters. Then going back to her place and sitting at her kitchen table and rolling coins for a couple of hours. Great fun!
I avoid using cash and debit cards. I use apps and credit cards (mostly credit cards). I don't really use tap-to-pay except once when I left my wallet in DFW when I went down to Houston. That was the only time I think I turned NFC on, too. lol. In case of emergency, I do have cash in my wallet that I haven't used in probably 5-10 years.
You ever go to a Mexican breakfast joint who doesn't take cash? Or a donut/kolache shop? Cash is good to have.
You laugh, but : My mom is in her 80s and asked me to take her to the grocery store to buy some groceries. I was like "I'll go get it for you - just tell me what you need". She insisted she go, so... fine. We get there and she goes and buys something like 4 apples and a sweet potato. I'm like "really? I couldn't have just got this for you?" They ring it up and I said I'll pay. She said "No! I'll pay!" She proceeds to open her purse and start clawing out pennies onto the conveyor belt to pay for it. I was like "mom, wth?!" The girl at the cash register starts laughing. My mom is having issues "counting that high in pennies", so I say just keep it, this is embarrassing, and that I'll pay. She insists and continues trying to count up to 500 in pennies (I'm exaggerating) on the conveyor belt. I'm getting frustrated telling my mom to stop, my mom is saying I'm interrupting her counting, the girl at the register is starting to get tears coming out of her eyes she's laughing so hard, but luckily nobody was behind us in line. About 4 minutes later, I'm going at it with my mom who probably hasn't gotten past 5 cents in her counting because she keeps having to start over, and the girl at the register is about to black out so I finally said "here's my card - I'll pay for it". That girl is still laughing and helping my mom gather up her pile of pennies the size of a small pet. As we're leaving, my mom's whining and complaining, "I have to get rid of all that change!". Jesus Christ.
No. I made my views on Mexican food clear in another thread and never go to breakfast joints. I carry a small amount of cash but almost never use it. Cash is trash and credit cards are getting there fast. Apple Pay, CashApp and Zelle FTW baby!
Man I miss my mother and father too...don't mean to derail the thread. I used to go shopping as a kid with her and she would have me look out for my loud mouth aunt and warn her when she was near so she could bolt to the checkout line without being hounded. Keep enjoying that time my friend...