Older and lower paid hardest hit by bank and ATM closures

Lower income households and older people will be hardest hit as bank branch and ATM closures threaten to prevent them from vital access to cash, a consumer group has warned.
By The Newsroom
Published 3rd Oct 2018, 06:00 BST
Resistance to growing trendResistance to growing trend
Resistance to growing trend

Which? found more than three quarters (78%) of consumers in the two lowest household income groups rely on cash the most, while a quarter of them (26%) never use card payments.

Some four in five retirees (80%) are reliant on cash, using it at least two to three times a week, the watchdog found.

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However, 98% of the general population used cash, with 73% saying they used it frequently and just 5% saying they rarely used it.

While just over half of people (54%) said they were not worried about moving towards a cashless society, more than two in five (41%) said they did have concerns.

Of those who were concerned, more than half (54%) were worried about greater scope for scams with credit and debit cards and 46% had concerns about the reliability of electronic payment systems.

The survey also found 57% had experienced a time when they could only pay by cash in the last three months, with 82% saying cash was the only method of payment accepted by the vendor.