[blurrybird]

FWIW I am Australian and we have a similar adoption rate of cashless payments.

If a merchant tries to promote cash options I immediately think they’re doing it for tax evasion reasons - not because of the touted reason that “card payments cost more to process” (they don’t once you factor in the cost of handling cash).

[tdeck]

I think the same thing in the US about small businesses that only take cash, but it's still pretty normal to use cash in the US.

[jhbadger]

People forget that the credit card companies charge businesses to process transactions. Some stores/restaurants even give discounts for paying in cash because of this.

[boringg]

And lets hope that never changes

[russelg]

If a tradie offers me a better price when I pay by cash, of course they're doing it to dodge tax. I'm still gonna take that discount.

[tossandthrow]

Here is likely not that much handling cost for an independent hairdresser just earning their own (quite meager) salary.

In the EU you can not charge a card fee on consumer transactions, so the merchant has the eat the cost.

If your revenue is - 2-3000 Eur a month, payment fees (and terminal subscription fees) can have a big impact.

[andrewaylett]

I, as a private individual, can accept card payments for 1.69%. I have a physical chip and pin reader (that pairs with my phone), it cost me £25, but I can take contactless payments using just my phone. If I didn't want to use my phone, I'd need the £75 reader that comes with a 4G connection (at no extra transaction or subscription cost).

If I were charging £3k/month, I'd be just above the threshold where paying £19.99/month to get a transaction fee of 0.99% saves money overall.

[swiftcoder]

I get the terminal directly from my bank here in Spain, it's something like €5/month + 0.02% of transaction. Is it much higher in other parts of the EU?

[xigoi]

0.2% of 3000€ is 6€. I’m not sure how big of an impact that is, considering the non-negligible costs of handling this much money in cash. If a business earns more money after accepting cash, it’s probably because they don’t pay taxes.

[Reason077]

> "FWIW I am Australian and we have a similar adoption rate of cashless payments. If a merchant tries to promote cash options I immediately think they’re doing it for tax evasion reasons"

I don't know about Australia, but in New Zealand many small retailers and restaurants add a card payment surcharge (typically 1.5%-2.5%) automatically when you pay by card. So you are somewhat penalised for the convenience of using a card. This never happens in Europe.

[inkyoto]

1.5%-2.5% card surcharges (both, debit and credit) are a commonplace in Australia as well.

Visa and Mastercard have successfully lobbied and conspired with local banks in both countries to bury EFTPOS, which were national debit card payment systems with a flat transaction fee ranging between 10 and 50 cents per transaction (depending on the bank).

A while back, Visa/MC realised that debit card transactions, being on the rise, were a highly lucrative market to tap into that they had been missing out on, so they set out on a war of attrition and conspired with the local big banks to phase out EFTPOS cards in favour of Visa/MC debit cards, where the cost of transaction was to be passed on to the card user. Tiered debit cards quickly followed (Platinum, etc.), that attracted higher fee percentages for Visa/MC – payment network commission fees are published on the respective payment network websites. Other than consumers, all parties involved (big banks, payment networks) became moist with excitement at getting a huge slice of the card transactions pie.

But there is the light at the end of the tunnel (other than the light of the oncoming train) – the RBA has moved to ban all card surcharges from July 2026.

[bobsmooth]

>I immediately think they’re doing it for tax evasion reasons

What's your opinion on that? In NA, for small businesses it's common to offer to pay in cash to avoid paying sales tax.

[normie3000]

Where is NA?