CD&V believes that every (neighborhood) store should be an ATM
Not that there will soon be a bar mate at the local butcher, next to the beef eye. « We argue for the so-called Cashback service, » explains CD&V MP Leentje Grillaert. Specifically: when you buy a bread, a few pistolets and coffee cakes from your local baker for, for example, 25 euros, ask if you can pay with your bank card for a total of 50 euros. The baker then gives you the remaining 25 euros in cash money. You get cash ‘back’.
« The number of terrace machines is declining visibly, » Grillaert explains the reason for the initiative. « Which, certainly in rural areas, is becoming increasingly difficult to collect cash. By encouraging local traders to offer the so-called Cashback system, people get cash again much more easily. »
Read too. Instant transfer from now on at every bank for free
According to Grillaert, it is also a piece of service for the shopkeeper. « That will undoubtedly attract a number of customers. And at the same time the system ensures that retailers do not have too much cash in their cash register. As a result, they save themselves a daily movement to the bank, to bring the excess cash away. »
“At the same time, the system ensures that retailers do not have too much cash in their cash register”
Leentje Grillaert
CD&V MP
Nowhere so bad
CD&V refers to countries such as Germany. « But also Great Britain, where today you can collect cash with a lot of local traders. The stores involved are clearly recognizable via a logo on the shop window. » The Cashback system was so far especially in vogue at department stores. CD&V now asks the government to create a clear framework so that local traders can easily offer this. « We also ask for consultations with the providers of electronic payments, to lower the transaction costs for the Cashback system. »
CD&V MP Leentje Grillaert is the driving force behind the initiative. – © If
The difficulty of getting cash in our country has been sighing for years. According to a survey by the European Central Bank, there is not even any more in Europe complaining about the poor availability of ATMs than in Belgium. The previous government therefore obliged the banks to provide a minimum of 4,000 -eaters. Whether the banks respect that agreement will only be apparent early next year when there will be an evaluation.
In a response, the consumer organization Testaankkoop does not say to the cashback system among local traders. « But the solution for the fact that you get more and more difficult to cash with us, is that the banks in our country are once again placing enough terrace machines that they are placed for their responsibility. »
Entrepreneurial organization UNIZO has been won for the proposal: « This allows the shopkeeper to attract more customers, and at the same time avoid too much cash in his cash register, » said spokesman Gerrit Budts. « We do set two conditions: that it happens on a voluntary basis. That retailers are not obliged to make cashback payments. And that it costs the trader nothing. For example, because the government is indeed putting pressure on payment services, to reduce the transaction costs for such a cashback payment. »
Government will again want ATMs in department stores
The De Wever government also puts its teeth into a better availability of cash money. For example, early next year there will be a thorough evaluation of the agreement between the previous government and the banking sector, in which the latter had to place considerably more terrace machines than the banks initially had in mind. Various political parties would like to impose even stricter rules on the banks than is currently the case.
A second slope is that there will again be a bargains in department stores. Almost all of them disappeared after it turned out that department stores are not allowed to top up those vending machines with money from the shopping boxes. According to the letter of the law, a private security company had to be engaged, a major additional cost. The government will now adjust the Private Safety Act on that point, so that « ATMs in Businesses will be possible again soon ». (WER)
