Sir Kier Fuerher said, at Davos, that the Bank of England will adopt Digital Currency.
I warned you guys what would happen, under his guise, yet was dismissed.
People are too easily influenced.
Sir Kier Fuerher said, at Davos, that the Bank of England will adopt Digital Currency.
I warned you guys what would happen, under his guise, yet was dismissed.
People are too easily influenced.
I've tried for years to get to grips with tech, people have tried to teach me and then given up and gone off in a huff, because something random and unexpected has happened, this has been both friends trying to informally help me to teachers. There's a woman in the library who's job it is to teach peope about tech and she's the ASC unfriendly person I've come across in a long time.
When I was at uni and got a special needs equipment package, it included a laptop and a guy to come and teach me how to use it. The first thing he did when he came round for the first lesson was to tell me how disapointed he was that I'd got a laptop instead of a desk top and how I should of spoken to him before getting a computer, despite this never being an option and how difficult it would all be. He had me doing things I already knew, things I didn't need to know, but wouldn't teach me to do the things I did need to know, like how to insert quotation accreditations, things that my lecturers were asking me to do and were affecting my marks. He told me those things would come months later in his teaching program, a friend had the same guy for the same reasons and found him equally unhelpful over script writing software. We both dispensed with his services after a few weeks.
It's very disheartening when people laugh at me, or insist that I'm doing stuff on purpose or just refusing to learn and it's counterproductive in my efforts to learn as I don't feel heard or understood. You might have been teaching people to use tech for years, but you are not physically here to teach me, are you, so your input from afar is mearly adding to my feelings of not being heard or understood and increasing technophobia. Over the years I've become scared of touching stuff in case it goes wrong, 'here press a few buttons, nothing can go wrong' said an ex handing me a digital egg timer, so I did press a few buttons and it crashed, had to have its batteries taken out and put back in again. Needless to say, he never tried to teach me anything techy again, just complained about my lack of knowledge and got a bit nasty about it. When you've had 30 years or more of this sort of attitude, being ridiculed, laughed at, told off, being on the recieving end of other peoples frustration, disbelief and anger, I suspect you'd become wary and a bit fearful too.
I'm pretty sure she had a chance to make a lot of money on selling a product that is free to produce and has no intrinsic value other than what what someone else is willing to pay to own it.
This sort of grift seems core to the family values based on previous events.
I imagine that Melania is required to make the greater loss in this instance.
I don’t know much about digital currency but in the past I have used Revolut Banking for foreign travel and I had several different wallets with euros, pounds, dollars etc within the one app. I can’t remember if the card was only for the sterling account or not. There was also a facility to buy crypto currency, so I bought a tiny amount of about two pounds worth because I was curious. It devalued fairly quickly.
I now use Chase banking for day to day spending and foreign travel and my card payments go through immediately. Other banks such as First Direct have a delay. I don’t know if crypto will free up charges and delays or not. Sorry about all the don’t knows.
It's so easy for people like you but you never seem to understand how hard it is for people like me who are quite frankly crap with tech
Please remember I have spent 4 decades helping people use tech, fix their issues and educate them in how to use it effectively.
When it comes to learning difficulties I have helped more people with these than I care to remember. The trick is to find a way of seeing the phone / software / computer that resonates with the person and find approaches they can understand so they can have more confidence in using it.
Where I have had the odd case of refusal to try to learn then they remain without their tech and this has typically resulted in them not being able to do their job in some way and they ended up losing their job over it.
I found this only ever was the case of those who refused to try to find ways to address the problem. They were causing problems for themselves by not trying when advice was offered by someone with experience in helping with their ways of thinking.
I'm not saying you are in the "too stubborn to try" group but have a think if this is the case - it may help if you consider if this is the case so you can find someone who will help you.
When you think about the tech you use now compared to 20 years ago, you have learned to use it so you clearly can adapt, learn and progress - remembering this may also give you the motivation to continue to learn.
I've had my fair share of tech disasters too but working out what went wrong and looking for ways to rectify them and not do it again are the most effective way to deal with it.
The learning curve with tech only stops when you are no longer able to ineract with it any more or just give up and become a hermit. You got this far so treat it as just another thing to learn and you will be fine.
It is a benefit to have a techie on hand to give advice if you ask so use the forums here if you like - there are other technical people on here who can give advice as well as me and even some in your own time zone.
I don’t know all the ins and outs of digital currency but for some time I have heard that this was going to happen. Newspapers and websites of left and right leaning persuasion, plus news programmes have reported this and commentators have said that Britain will have to follow suit in order to remain part of a global competitive market. It would have happened around now even if the elected government had been Reform or Conservative. I am going to do some reading on the subject in order to try to better understand the impact.
Businesses round here all take cash, some don't accept cards at all and have cash only notices on their windows.
Well, you say I could learn how to use a smart phone and remote banking, but given that I've just lost an email I was writing 3 times in a row, when trying to correct a spelling mistake, you'll have to excuse my scepticism. If I an do that with an email, what could I do with the worlds banking system, or even my account balance for that matter?
As I'm sure you know I have learning difficulties as well as ASC, we've talked about my memory problems before, seeing as I still can't remember how to C&P, despite remember that I've done it before, I don't see how using a smart phone would be any better or using such things as banking apps. I did have a smart phone, but gave it up as I couldn't get on with it, I could make calls but not answer them and the screen just kept going black and wouldn't stop being black then I'd have to go through the whole unlocking process all over again and just about find the thing I wanted before it would lock me out again. It's so easy for people like you but you never seem to understand how hard it is for people like me who are quite frankly crap with tech, if you like I'll post a the whole list of my tech disasters and see what you tink then?
There are some shops that only take cash or require cash for purchases under £5.
Although I don't use cash for many transactions, I would not want it to go altogether. Personally I don't like the idea of banking via a phone. The more digital things go, the more concern there is over getting scammed or hacked, using up a lot of energy.
I think that using physical money when I was younger helped me to understand the value of money. (Due to my age I even remember having to practise using 'the new money' at school before decimal currency came in).
In my opinion I think it is easier to get into debt when using cards as it is harder to picture the balance of your money reducing.
I'm glad that other forms of payment will continue for the forseeable future.
The government don't seem to be talking amongst themselves:
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c20gevkx8gyo
Some countries, such as Australia, are planning rules that would force essential services to accept cash.
But Ms Reynolds (the new economic secretary to the Treasury) effectively ruled out such a move in the UK.
It sounds like they are leaving it up to individual businesses on whether to continue allowing cash to be used and given the pain it is to have to handle cash as a business (carrying change, forged notes, time to take it to the bank, robberies etc) I can see why they are doing this.
Reading between the lines it looks like they are saying they will keep it but just leave it up to the businesses as to whether they want to use it as a means of payment.
The elderly and disabled do not seem to be groups the government (of either flavour) are going out of they way to protect (think benefits cuts, attacks on pensions, winter fuel payments etc) and it is these groups most likely to suffer.
You may not like it or want to do it but there is a lot to be gained by learning how to do it. It is of course your choice not to get a smart phone (they are very affordable now) and learn to do the basics on it for payments (you are clearly intelligent so I'm sure you could learn how to use it with some help).
It is all a matter of choice - but choices have consequences.
Hopefully, I'll be dead before anything like this happens, being someone who can't work a smart phone, I'm glad that other forms of payment will continue for the forseeable future. I think as more and more stuff is online then digital curency is inevitable. I'm sure people felt equally worried at the idea of paper money, promisory notes and coins with a set value that had nothing to do with thier metal value. Whilst some of us might be glad to go back to the days of hack silver and cutting bits off coins for change, I'm glad everybody agrees whats whats when it comes to money or we'd have chaos.
It's pretty early days for the digital pound idea so there are no definitive answers about how exactly it would work. The link Iain posted to the Bank of England statement is the best source for info. It will definitely be separate from your bank account though and operate via a digital wallet - smartphones are the existing tech for those wallets but there are/may be different options in the future.
I've tried to find out what this would mean and it appears that it would change the payments system to be immediate - at the moment if you make a card payment it takes a couple of days to go through the banking system. Also the charges for taking card payments made to businesses are a burden for small traders, and I believe that digital payments would be free. It would work on the principle of a digital wallet, but I'm not sure if you would have to use a smartphone for that or if you could still use a chip & pin card. My preference would be to still use a card.
Does anyone know if what I think is correct? Also does anyone know if money in a digital wallet is separate funds to your bank account, like cash?
For reassurance on the current cash status quo:
The Financial Conduct Authority is an independent public body funded by levies from regulated firms. It is accountable to the Treasury but is not controlled by them or by government.
FCA have clearly stated they are committed to ensuring people retain access to cash. The latest rules are explained here: www.fca.org.uk/.../access-to-cash
These rules only came into force last year.
As Iain points out the Bank of England have also issued a clarifying statement on digital currency.
Given multiple IT issues and outages in recent years, increased concern over cyber attacks and the continued reliance on cash by a small but significant % of the population (6% of the general population and 9% of vulnerable people) it's safe to say that cash will be around for many many years to come.
What happens in the more distant future is unknowable. Potentially cash will eventually be phased out. Potentially it will be with us forever.
They have an article on the BoE website about it:
https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/report/2025/digital-pound-progress-update%20
The Bank and HM Treasury are exploring the possibility of a digital pound – a digital complement to banknotes.
...
No decision has been made on whether to proceed with a digital pound.
I'm guessing that Trumps statement about his support of digital currencies is behind the push to this so the UK is not left behind.
It is going to happen so like online banking it will be better to get onboard or risk being left with limited functionality.
The age of physical cash in fading out fast. I cannot remember the last time I paid for anything with banknotes - it must have been months ago and I spend a LOT with the property renovations work I do.
All my workers are paid electronically, all suppliers and all property purchases / sales so the banks already have full visibility of everything in my finances.
Resisting is only likely to cause me pain so if I want to do anything naughty that involves payment then I need to use crypto currency although that is looking less secure as time goes on. Maybe I shouldn't do anything naughty then.
