Never, might be your answer. Did you ever think that cheques could be done away with? No, maybe you better learn how to use touch cards and smartphones in addition to your plastic cards to make your payments with, for the time is coming when shops will start to refuse cash as payment for goods and services.

Don’t laugh, it is already happening overseas, not widespread yet, and in some countries is it illegal to not accept cash, but for how long?

Surveys overseas indicate that at this stage every tenth shopkeeper would like to say No to coins and notes and business organizations are working on it.

The reason for the reluctance is clear enough, cash increases the risk of robbery and also cash disappearing from tills, and not forgetting the higher cost to the retailer for handling cash, more than double the cost of card payments using debit cards.

One of the obvious businesses to refuse cash is the restaurant trade, and retail shops during the busy period of the day allowing only card payments.

Some Central Banks in Europe are investigating changes to their laws for what could become a truly cashless society, maybe not tomorrow, but not that far away either.

May be time to learn how to use your smartphone to pay for your daily essentials, how to use your swipe/touch card and how to transfer money by SMS, as well as checking out the best shopping deals on your tablet or laptop, and how to do your banking on line as well.

We never stop learning, there is always something new we need to master, mind you it keeps the little grey cells awake and gives the boys and girls at Kapiti SeniorNet something to do teaching us what we need to know to keep in touch and up-to-date. Never let it be said we refuse a challenge.

Happy Computing.