No Cash and Digital Transactions
So today I was planning to travel in a van to a metro station and then in metro, go to the metro station near my house and then walk to my house which is close by
Unfortunately my van didn’t come. I then walked to a bus station and got a bus to the metro station. Now I had to pay, in cash for the bus fare. And I realized that I might not have cash in my wallet. I check the wallet in my bag and I find that I only have a few coins and no bills. And the coins weren’t enough. For a second I panicked about the situation. At first I planned to get down at the next bus station after telling I don’t have cash. Later I thought I could get money from someone. But then, I’m usually the guy who hardly asks for help from others. I do rely a lot on my family, especially my parents. But other than that, I don’t think I have relied much on my friends or strangers for anything at all. So I was sitting and thinking about this idea and in a few moments, I thought I could ask for money and give them back immediately by paying them online! A very simple and basic idea that I took a minute or so to realize :p So I asked this guy, who was sitting near me, if he had cash and he said yes and I said I needed some and that I would pay him online. Let’s call him Mr. V. Mr. V said he had a single bill worth 500 bucks and that he used all his change to pay the bus fare. I was happy he had money but I wasn’t sure if the bus conductor would give me change for 500 bucks. I knew the fare was around 25 bucks or so. I told Mr. V to wait so that I could ask the bus conductor if he would give change. My plan B was to ask money from someone else and pay them online. Bus conductor was collecting fare from others, so I was waiting. While I was waiting, I thought, well, for starters, I can still get 500 bucks bill and may be get change from someone else if conductor doesn’t have it. But it’s not easy. Not everyone has lots of change and lots of money. But at some point I was like, I should just get the money from Mr. V just to at least have some money immediately! I told Mr. V that I’ll pay him and Mr V asked me to wait for the conductor and told that that’s all the money he has. I realized Mr V can’t give me all his money and can only give me some. Finally the bus conductor came to my seat and I asked him if he had change for 500 bucks. Thankfully he shook his head and said he had it! The fare was 22 bucks. I got 2 bucks change from my wallet and Mr V gave his 500 bucks. Conductor finally gave change to Mr V and I paid Mr V 20 bucks online through UPI through the PhonePe app which is used a lot in India
I was finally happy at how I managed the situation even though I felt quite stupid for not having cash and for getting on the bus without thinking about cash. But thankfully India has a lot of smart phone users and a lot of them transact money online and I was able to easily transfer cash to their bank accounts directly! I wish government buses had some form of digital payment too. I hardly have cash in my wallet. I use the metro, for which I use a metro card which I pay using my debit card, and they support online payments too. And then the van that I travel in, is accompanied by an App called Office Ride which accepts all kinds of digital payments and I use UPI.
When I go to shops for groceries and other things, many of the shops I go to support card when bill is above a threshold amount which is 100 or 200 bucks or so. And they also have some online payment options based on e-wallet or UPI. I have used UPI payment for less than 100 bucks. It’s like crazy. :P
I’m happy to be in India, with digital payments being quite easy. And I’m expecting more. Almost to the point where almost everyone supports and uses digital payments