Then it was VRE then Amtrak and now MARC. No agents to be found (Ok there is one in Fredrick., Ticket machines don’t take cash. Now my next stop on my railfan trip is Philly SEPTA and I dont know if SEPTA takes cash either…Lets face it our national surveillance state hates cash and they want to track my every move even if I don’t have a cell or debit card. see-
A shopping street in Manchester has banned cash as part of an experiment to see if Brits will accept a cashless society, while all London buses will stop accepting cash payments from next month onwards.
Most ticket vending machines don’t take cash because of the proliferation of debit cards and credit cards in modern society and to avoid presenting a tempting target for thieves. The few that still accept cash require exact fare since they aren’t set up to make change.
In our Ridewithmehenry travels on MNRR, LIRR, NJT, SEPTA, PATH, PATCO, light rail, and subways, vending machines take cash and cards. But if there are several machines, there might be one or two which will take only cards. Cash us still the universal form of payment.
Climb down out of the paranoia tree for a minute and think it through rationally.
The average person doesn’t carry cash any more. It’s far more convenient and secure. They don’t have to plan ahead to figure out how much money they need to have and if you lose a twenty it’s gone. If I lose my card, I call the bank and get a new one and don’t lose any money. And if someone took it and used it, I can dispute all that and get my money back.
Secondly, it’s far, far harder to steal non-cash. In 2004, the DC Metro’s parking system went cashless after determining they had no control and no way to audit the cash system. Literally millions of dollars were stolen by parking employees. Cars would come in, there would be no way to count how many, and they’d pay to leave. Then the employees would steal money because there was no way to verify how many transactions should have taken place to cross-reference with the take.
There are $1 coins in circulation and you can buy them for a dollar at any bank. Or use a TVM machine on the MNRR, LIRR or MTA subway to buy your ticket and get $1 coins for change.
I haven’t been to a bank since… well, I was a kid. And I don’t need a vending machine to ride trains where I live, so they’re hard to come by. Even our candy machine will give you 45,000 quarters as change.
Be nice if they would actually get them out in circulation.
I’m with you here, Henry. For small purchases–under $10 certainly–I think cash makes the most sense. And if I have to use a credit card for a $5 ticket I know the transit authority has pay a commission. I would much rather give the transit authority my money than give it to the credit card company.
As you know, New Jersey TVM’s a pretty secure and as far I know there is no problem with stealing the fares on NJT buses. As a senior citizen a 1 zone bus fare for me is 70¢, Why would and sensible agency want me to use a credit card to pay that?
As far as NJT’s dollar coins, I prefer dollar bills but a dollar coin is not that big an issue for me. To the degree I get them from NJT I use them for transit fares.
I thought there was a law that if you offered U.S. currency to pay for any goods or services and the merchant refused to accept it, then you didn’t need pay at all but could take the goods or services anyway.
Only place I ever got dollar coins in change was from USPS stamp vending machines - then my Post Office removed the vending machines. At the time, other vending machines wouldn’t accept the dollar coins as they were larger than a quarter which was the largest coin they would accept.
At least the vending machines would not take the $1 coins as a quarter! [B)] When I was a kid, I accidently put a dime in a penny gumball machine and only got the 1 gumball and the druggist that ran the store would not refund me the 9 cents! [|(]
I still carry, and prefer using, cash most of the time. So does that make me above average? Or below? Never mind, some things are better left unknown.
I myself view the card issuers pushing the “cashless society” concept, not the Government. A lot of money to be made in fees by those issuers. Not only fees to card holders, but merchants, too. The convenience store we stop at on the way to the train at our AFHT won’t accept credit/debit cards unless the purchase is over $5 because of fees charged to merchants.