I’m 68 tomorrow, I don’t need cash ‘because I don’t get it’.
The BBC raised this? The BBC are the Pitts
Would that be a preset amount or donator controlled?
The RBL were making some noises about this for the Poppy Appeal for those who supposedly don’t carry money. But the notion of a preset amount like the charity phone ins and endless adverts for a couple of quid a month, didn’t sit easy in the branch, as it suggests a payment for goods, which then suggests a service as opposed to charitable donation . Even donator controlled it loses that spontaneity, would someone as they often do just stick a tenner in the tin if they were presented with a card reader and it takes more time than getting some money out and sticking in a tin/bucket. Our village school for years ‘charged’ 50p entrance to the annual fete a few years ago it went to donation with a bucket. They took more than they ever did doing 50p/adult.
The amount would need to be preset, the options are have a couple set at different amounts or have one set at £1 and if they want to donate more they just tap more than once.
The RAF & RBL at Westminster Station last November had 3 set up in a row £1 £5 and £10. I mentioned at the time that most people seemed to be hitting the middle one.
That’s a good bit of psychological persuasion… Nobody wants to be the cheapskate.
We once set up next to a broken parking meter (the only one in the carpark) for Wings Appeal… £££ Almost everyone just gave us their parking money instead.
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The RAF Museum at Hendon now has contactless donation stands. I couldn’t tell you what the take up is, but I did see quite a few people donate.
Schools have had a cashless canteen for a while . Parents or guardians etc top up an “account” via standing order or bank transfer etc, then cadets “Spend” against this via an ID card or simply a pin or account number. It gets around the issue of 12/13 yr old having debit cards etc
The system schools use is a cost of several hundred pounds a year and with a fee for each transaction. Schools use this to reduce theft and money based bullying, ie the old 'give us your dinner money, or else". In the school one of my mates work in they scan finger prints and kids and staff who use it, “spend” money like that. He’s said that just before he started staff who want food or school apparel have to have an account as well. He has said the number of staff who get things from the school canteen now, is much reduced, if staff want hot food they go to one of the cafes / take-aways or get a delivery.
I’m not sure if the cost could be justified, for a squadron for the amounts we are talking about and remember someone has to administer it and it can’t really be a member of staff, if we follow the financial rules of the ATC. Plus people talk about the admin burden in the ATC and that is what this is, pure admin.
Although very different environment RIAT uses iZettle as a cashless system.
there is a 1.75% transaction fee but for a £35 hoodie that only comes to an extra 62p
I confess it was used more on the higher end purchases (ie RIAT branded Merchandise) than the canteen level but seems to work well
There are card readers that you can buy for less than £100, where you only pay transaction fees of less than 2%. That’s less than 2p per pound spent in your canteen.
It sounds a lot, but as the use of cash decreases, then the cost of handling it will go up. And since bank’s are not charities, they will pass the cost onto us. IMO, it won’t be long before we start paying transaction fees on branch deposits, and perhaps even annual fees to enjoy benefits like cheque books.
I have a SumUp card reader (the same idea as iZettle) which is marginally cheaper at 1.69% per transaction.
The difficulty I see with that for a canteen system is that it would massively increase the transaction time.
Each transaction has to be entered in the phone app (so we also need a squadron smart phone with the app linked) and is then sent to the reader which takes a moment to pick it up. Then the card is presented, and there’s a further delay while the app talks back to the server to approve or deny the payment. Then you have to select ‘yes’ or ‘no’ as to whether the customer wants a receipt.
It’s not ideal for pushing 50 cadets through a 15 minute canteen break, when compared to a simple “£1.50 please…” Cash…done system.
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by going cashless and having a contact-payment the prices can reflect an transaction fee without the worry of needing lots of float
ie
can of pop 50p
chocolate bar 40p
this comes to 90p, and with a 2% transaction fee this costs 91.8p - call it 92p for ease.
now no one would be charging 92p for this transaction (or effectively adding 1p to every item) if this was using cash. the change required by buyer and seller would be a nightmare constantly handling coppers.
but by going cashless any transaction fee is so much easier to handle into the costs, and far less of a worry for the buyer - the physiological feeling of tapping a card isn’t the same feeling as spending money so although an extra 2p is charged (in the above example) it doesn’t feel like real money…
We avoid the difficulty of fiddly change by pricing everything at 50p.
The cost of canned drinks has risen some in the last year so we may have to revisit that in due course but it’s worked well enough so far.
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Same here.
50p no matter what.
Ok we were a school squadron back in my day, but we just totted up the canteen purchases over the course of a term and sent a note home to get payment.
What did you do if a cadet had left or parents refused to pay?
I think it was probably passed on to the school bursar…so less likely to work for a non-school squadron.