6 Situations Where I Still Need Cash
Photo by Dplanet::
The time has finally come — for the first time in almost two months, tomorrow I will be visiting an ATM. My local ATM and I used to be much better friends, but it just does not serve the same role in my life which it once did. Using my credit card (responsibly) has enabled me to pay most of my expenses over the past few weeks without cash, with added budget tracking benefits. As part of my build-up to tomorrow’s ATM visit, however, I want to take a moment and reflect on some of the expenses that still keep me using cash every now and then.
1. Group Outings
This is probably one of the most important roles that cash will play going forward in my life — helping handle group expenses. I go out with a couple of my friends for a “cheap” dinner out once a week, and when I am at home I often am eating with a much larger group of people; cash is crucial to resolving these situations. While often times it is feasible to request separate checks at restaurants, sometimes you just can’t avoid a shared bill.
As a side note, I have managed to make this a “cash neutral” situation for me by often times collecting the group money and charging the total to my card if no one else minds. In addition to earning 5% back for restaurants on my Citi mtvU card, it gives me a fresh source of cash. Of course, that also means I am “cheating” a bit when I say that I have not been to an ATM in two months, but oh well.
2. The Vending Machine
I am well aware that the vending machine is not a very good deal — best case scenario you are only slightly being ripped off, and worst case, like at a movie theater I was at a few months ago, you’ll find yourself paying an outrageous $3.50 for a 20-ounce of Coke. Sometimes, however, a vending machine is just the best option for a quick fix, and its those kind of situations in which I am happy to have a few singles in my wallet.
3. Laundry
No, my laundry room is not coin operated. That would be a nightmare. It is, however, based on a card system that requires cash to load money on the card — accepting $5, $10, or $20 bills. Once every couple of weeks, then, I find myself feeding more money in to the machine. I can understand that it is likely not feasible to install credit-accepting machines in all of these laundry rooms, but it would be nice to have the option, at least, of adding value by credit.
4. Tipping
With the exception of restaurants, most tipping situations require cash — at the end of a cab ride, at a bar, at the airport skycap, bellhop at the hotel, etc. Even if you could charge a tip, the recipient will appreciate cash much more (they won’t lose any of their tip to credit card processing), so I always try to tip in cash if possible. I find traveling to be particularly tipping-heavy, so I carry a bunch of singles in my travel wallet for the inevitable tipping situations that require cash.
5. The Bar
This is a little bit of a different situation — most bars are more than happy to accept credit cards (although some, like the one I was at last night, do not). However, as much as I would love to take advantage of the 5% back my credit card offers at bars, I fully recognize that when I “open a tab,” despite my best efforts, I am far more likely to spend more than I had planned. Cash keeps me in a limited situation and helps me stay aware of how much I have spent. Now, I am not one to go crazy, but cash seems like the best bet in any sort of bar situation.
6. The Convenience Store Next Door
This one annoys me simply because it shouldn’t be a reason to carry cash — the convenience store next door has a minimum credit charge of $10. They aren’t supposed to do this — the merchant agreements with both Visa and MasterCard say there shouldn’t be a minimum charge — but clearly they don’t care. I don’t often find myself spending more than $10 at a time (usually just grabbing something like orange juice), so cash is a must.
Those are some of the places I find myself still using cash — where do you find yourself using cash?
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yeah, i use cash for most of those too. the only other things i can think of are:
1- cab rides! although most i’ve seen lately have c/c swipies.
2- when paying back a friend for loaning you a few dollars for lunch after forgetting your wallet at home. but i’m not being specific
3- my daily 97cent bananas.
Not specific at all!
The cab situation is an interesting one — I, too, have mostly ridden in credit card cabs lately, but I definitely have felt both explicit and implicit pressure from cabbies to pay with some other form than cash.
My friend the other day was telling me about a cabbie that actually drove him to a Bank of America ATM so that he could withdraw cash rather than pay with a credit card…. crazy.
um… cash… The very occaisional vending machine dollar. Umm…. I don’t really know when else I use cash, I guess for paying other poeple back, but usually I can send em money via ING if we split cost on something, but for dinners and such.
However, if I do have cash on me, I seem to find ways that it ends up getting used, but not tracked at all, maybe sometimes when I grab food or something like that I use it because it is there.
@philip — and I think that is definitely one of the biggest problems with cash — its so easy to spend. One of the nice things about (responsible) credit card use, in addition to rewards, is that it makes it very easy to track where your money is going.
I use cash at the convenience store in my building. They have a charge if you use debit if its under $5.00. For credit, the minimum is something like $20.00. Most delivery places now accept credit cards; but some don’t so I’m stuck paying cash. The last one is to pay back roommates or get paid back at the end of the month for the split on bills. Both my roommates don’t feel comfortable with online money transfers.