There was recently a new science fiction book that came out that I really wanted to read. (“Gamechanger,” by L.X.Beckett. I did finally get it. It was great!)
But alas! My main client has been in the hospital, and there is no money in my bank account. So, no way to buy it online for my kindle. Bummer!
Then I had a brilliant idea! I had cash! And my best friend lives half a block from an actual brick-and-mortar Amazon store. So I could simply take my kindle on down to said store, buy the e-book with cash, and have them put it on my kindle!
“We don’t do that,” said the woman behind the counter, “and even if we did, we don’t take cash.”
They don’t take cash. At all. I left feeling like it’s this way: If they can’t sell you something by way of an electronic payment form, with all the corollary data attached that they of course are free to mine & use to exploit you, then they don’t want to sell you something at all.
If you’re buying something from Amazon, they already know who you are and what you buy from them, because you gave them that information freely by setting up an account. They don’t need to “mine” the data backwards through your payment method.
You can also go to any store that sells gift cards (a grocery store or Best Buy) and buy an Amazon gift card with cash, then use that gift card to buy something on Amazon.
I always do this for Amazon, though I use credit cards to buy the gift cards. I get around 30 gallons of gas for every $500 I spend (most major grocery stores in my area have gift cards attached to a fuel rewards and/or % discount on groceries for buying gift cards), plus the credit card rewards.
Also, there are many prepaid debit cards that allow cash loading, though often with fees.
Before the Amazon store, if you wanted to buy something from Amazon without going online, or by only using cash, they didn’t want to sell to you at all. How is it different that they want electronic payment online, or in the brick and mortar store?
I’ve heard that they exist, but I don’t know much about them. I don’t know what they sell, or why (or whether) they really don’t accept cash.
If they don’t take cash at all, I’m a bit surprised by that, but I’m not surprised that they won’t sell electronic content for cash. I’d think there would have to be some sort of special set-up for that, and that there wouldn’t be enough demand for it to be worthwhile.
As Lord Feldon notes, the concern about data mining seems a bit misplaced. They couldn’t sell you electronic content without knowing whose account to send it to, no matter how you paid for it.
It’s not a question of data mining, it’s a security issue. A store can’t be robbed if they don’t have cash on hand. It’s the same reason subway systems use pre-paid cards.
But the merchandise is still stealable. More store losses are due to theft of inventory than theft of cash by a large, large margin.
All transit systems I’ve been on lately still take cash at the station to buy/fill cards. I’ve done this in the 3 different cities I’ve traveled to in the past year.
Actually, at my store NONE of our staff take “money bags to the bank”. We hire people with bullet resistant vest, guns, and an armored vehicle to do that for us. But I can understand that businesses doing a bit less cash business than ours might view that as a prohibitive expense.
Cashless businesses were becoming a thing in San Francisco, until the city passed a law requiring businesses to accept cash.
Most people are aware of credit card processing fees businesses have to pay, but there are expenses involved with handling cash, too, such as the aforementioned expense to hire an armored car service to transport it to the bank. Or even if not using an armored car service having to pay an employee for the time to take it to the bank is an expense, too.
ETA: As another example, I don’t think any airline accepts cash for onboard purchases anymore. I imagine for them the logistics of having bags of cash flying all over the country or even the world made getting that money to the bank pretty complicated.
And no offense ------ they know their employee base. I know their employee base for reasons I won’t mention here. Even with loss prevention being a big part of the operation someone always thinks he/she can get away with it and its just a pain in the ass to teach them otherwise sometimes.
(Ever know someone to stuff closed packages in their tights hoping they have something valuable in them? I got one fired once who … )
Amazon is opening stores; they will have scanners at your cart; as something goes into your cart, it is scanned & added to your total. When you leave, your acct is charged. You won’t need to check out in the traditional manner of going up to a cashier or even a self-serve checkout.
The hell they can’t. Is there stuff in the store? Then the store can be robbed.
Hell, even if the building is empty is can still be robbed - around here we have a problem with folks breaking into empty buildings, smashing open the walls and stealing the copper in the plumbing and wiring.
The vast majority of theft out of the store where I work involves people taking stuff, not taking cash.
Even with loss prevention being a big part of the operation someone always thinks he/she can get away with it and its just a pain in the ass to teach them otherwise sometimes.