I live in the US, in Arizona in all places, which isn’t exactly the epitome of tech. I haven’t used cash in over 10 years. I don’t have any cash in my wallet.
The only time I touch cash is when people give me cash for various reasons like Christmas and Birthdays. Even this is stopping with people giving me Visa gift cards or even just texting me the money.
The US is pretty much already cashless for people who don’t carry any cash like myself. I guess a lot of this is due to Square. Most street vendors in the US have Square or similar devices to accept cards/Apple Pay. And rental bikes (Chinese companies at that!) etc accept cards in the US.
The hate with QR codes is that it isn’t well integrated. You have to hunt for an app, find the app, open the app, go through steps to pay. And then the whole direct access to the bank account think without a card as a middle man with consumer protections.
If Asia had a “Square” (Japan does have Square but their not china), I bet WeChat and those other companies with QR code wouldn’t have been as popular.
The processing fee is too high for a lot of the small stores or booths, their normal daily profit margin likely cannot cover that processing fee.
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This is just my experience but here in Arizona I have been able to tap at most places I go to, about 90% of stores. 10% pretty much being sit in restaurants and Walmart. For Walmart I do use Walmart Pay (QR code based!). There is no tap limit that I know of in the US, I’ve tapped for $1k+ car down payments at the dealership, I’ve tapped at the court house to pay $500 court fees, and of course at Apple to buy a new Mac. If I walk into a store without tap, I do carry only one card with me in a simple card holder with my ID, a Costco card (going away on Jul 22 as Costco finally will have a digital card), and a backup card for places without tap.
A lot of small restaurants and small grocery stores in the US don't accept card payments for amount lower than $20. And, there are always places like flea market, farmers market and garage sales.
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