Cashless payments ‘discriminate’ against elderly, says Donegal councillor

The Fianna Fáil politician believes the move towards contactless payments is “discrimination.”

Older people are “dependent on cash,” he said.

“The younger generation are not even tipping now with cards, they’re using their mobile phones.”

Cllr Naughton is worried that the elderly will be left behind by new changes in technology.

"It’s discrimination, basically, against our older generation and people in low income families.”

He added that the move towards ‘tap’ payments “basically gives all control to the bank.”

The Donegal politician worries that such a big reliance on online banking leaves society vulnerable to systems that can fail.

"If the system goes down, what happens?” he asked.

"If you’ve no other option only to pay by card, they can cut you off at any time.”

Speaking to Newstalk Breakfast, Councillor Naughton said the move towards a cashless society is also impacting how people are budgeting.

"Years ago, you would always have a certain amount of money in your pocket – when that was gone, it was gone.”

The changes mean you can “spend anything up in a night”.”

An average of €49 million of contactless payments were made every day in the three months between April and June 2022.

It is a record high for the new banking technology.

Over half of all card payments made in that time period were contactless according to the Banking and Payments Federation Ireland.