prepping for inconvenience

[Endtime Survivors]

I recently chatted with a friend who lives in Australia. Apparently, in Sydney, it is no longer possible to buy bus fare with cash, at all. They use something called the "opal" card, which is similar to the "oyster" card in the UK.

Apparently it's still possible to use cash for tickets on the train but the price for using cash has actually increased (I suspect as a means of herding people toward the cashless system). For example, a journey on the train which costs $2.50 with the Opal card costs $14.00 using cash!

I think something similar has happened in London, where it's no longer possible to use cash on the city buses themselves, but it is still possible to use cash for bus tickets at the stations.

He believes all this cashless society stuff will eventually lead to tap-and-pay microchips in the hand (or forehead) so he's made a personal decision to start preparing now by not using such services even though he doesn't see those things (like the Opal card) in themselves as the Mark. He's rejecting these systems now because he views it as a way of preparing for when the Mark does come, and the inconvenience that will come with rejecting it.

 

[MWood]

This is food for thought! Where do you live?

 

[Endtime Survivors]

I live in Africa, but I have Christian friends in several countries around the world. We try to keep each other updated on various cashless technologies or advances as they pop up.

For example, a 3rd world country like Kenya has been experimenting with cashless technology for more than a decade now. Back in 2006 they were actually leading the way. Now, poor families out in the rural areas can make payments with their phones though a system called "Mpesa". It's a mobile money brand promoted by a single telecoms company, but it took off like wild fire and a few years later all the other companies had similar systems set up.

The idea started as a simple money transfer system, so that if someone in Nairobi wanted to quickly transfer a small amount of money to someone in Mombasa without the hassle of banks, they could go to an Mpesa agent, give the cash, and the agent when then send notification to the agent in Mombasa and the receiver would go to that agent to collect the cash.

Now, people rarely bother to convert the electronic currency to cash anymore since they can use their Mpesa account to buy groceries, pay for their electricity, pay for fuel, pay for public transport, pay their taxes, pay their rent etc. All they need is even a simple phone and an mpesa account (which is free).