3 ms·

It’s at least a 30 seconds difference. You need to read the amount, extract your wallet, check if you have the exact amount of money to avoid filling your walle

It’s at least a 30 seconds difference. You need to read the amount, extract your wallet, check if you have the exact amount of money to avoid filling your wallet with useless coins, 90% of the time you realise that you don’t have it and you start fumbling between your notes to find the correct amount that can give you a reasonable change. At that point you can start to have fun fighting with the machine that won’t accept some of your notes because are too old/crumpled. Even in the unlikely case that it accepts all your notes now you still need to wait for the change and retrieve all of it, with some coin that will invariably be stuck somewhere. Or instead of paying with your sweat and your blood using cash you can simply put your hand in your pocket, retrieve the phone and tap it on the sensor.

AnthonyMouse 9y ago
You don't need to do any of that. It's a machine that makes exact change. Is your purchase $52.27 but in your wallet you have 39 cents in coins and $64 in bills? Counting is for computers. Just dump the contents of your wallet into the machine and let it figure it out. And you can't count processing failures on one side but not the other. The machine can't read your card. The network is down. Some jerk at the bank fat fingered something and now you have to spend six hours on the phone sorting it out.
- notahacker 9y ago
  Have you not used a modern contactless payment system before? They're fast enough to be used on the barriers of underground railway systems which see thousands of passengers pass through at peak times. Even the time taken to empty the contents of your wallet into the appropriate slot of a cash system takes longer than those machines, never mind time taken to process the notes and coins, dispense change and allow you to put that change back in the appropriate compartments of your wallet. And change-dispensing machines with their scanning software, moving parts and need to be fully stocked with change break down at least as often as networks for card based payments.
  - AnthonyMouse 9y ago
    > Have you not used a modern contactless payment system before? They're fast enough to be used on the barriers of underground railway systems which see thousands of passengers pass through at peak times. That isn't that impressive when you consider the equivalent traffic was handled in cash before electronic payment systems even existed. > Even the time taken to empty the contents of your wallet into the appropriate slot of a cash system takes longer than those machines, never mind time taken to process the notes and coins, dispense change and allow you to put that change back in the appropriate compartments of your wallet. Describing all the steps in detail doesn't make the total any longer. And half of that stuff can be done in parallel with other stuff. You can get out your money while you're waiting in line. You can put it away while you're walking out of the store. It doesn't add any real latency. > And change-dispensing machines with their scanning software, moving parts and need to be fully stocked with change break down at least as often as networks for card based payments. Stores typically have more than one checkout machine to handle the volume during peak traffic times, so one can be down and there is not even any consequence outside of peak hours, and only a minor delay even then. If a network is down, it's down. Retail stores typically don't have redundant internet connections.
    - tigershark 9y ago
      Seriously just admit that you never used a contactless system and stop here. It is becoming quite ridiculous and surreal if you are saying that using cash is as fast as tapping with a contactless to enter the underground. I would really be curious how could Waterloo handle over 100 million passengers per year with cash.
      - AnthonyMouse 9y ago
        NYC used subway tokens until the 1980s, which are effectively cash. So did pretty much everything else up to that point, since not long before that electronic payment systems didn't exist. The obvious solution for extremely high volume systems is to have the fares come out to even numbers so there is no need to make change. How long are you imagining it takes to drop a coin or two into a turnstile?

AnthonyMouse 9y ago

You don't need to do any of that. It's a machine that makes exact change. Is your purchase $52.27 but in your wallet you have 39 cents in coins and $64 in bills? Counting is for computers. Just dump the contents of your wallet into the machine and let it figure it out. And you can't count processing failures on one side but not the other. The machine can't read your card. The network is down. Some jerk at the bank fat fingered something and now you have to spend six hours on the phone sorting it out.

notahacker 9y ago
Have you not used a modern contactless payment system before? They're fast enough to be used on the barriers of underground railway systems which see thousands of passengers pass through at peak times. Even the time taken to empty the contents of your wallet into the appropriate slot of a cash system takes longer than those machines, never mind time taken to process the notes and coins, dispense change and allow you to put that change back in the appropriate compartments of your wallet. And change-dispensing machines with their scanning software, moving parts and need to be fully stocked with change break down at least as often as networks for card based payments.
- AnthonyMouse 9y ago
  > Have you not used a modern contactless payment system before? They're fast enough to be used on the barriers of underground railway systems which see thousands of passengers pass through at peak times. That isn't that impressive when you consider the equivalent traffic was handled in cash before electronic payment systems even existed. > Even the time taken to empty the contents of your wallet into the appropriate slot of a cash system takes longer than those machines, never mind time taken to process the notes and coins, dispense change and allow you to put that change back in the appropriate compartments of your wallet. Describing all the steps in detail doesn't make the total any longer. And half of that stuff can be done in parallel with other stuff. You can get out your money while you're waiting in line. You can put it away while you're walking out of the store. It doesn't add any real latency. > And change-dispensing machines with their scanning software, moving parts and need to be fully stocked with change break down at least as often as networks for card based payments. Stores typically have more than one checkout machine to handle the volume during peak traffic times, so one can be down and there is not even any consequence outside of peak hours, and only a minor delay even then. If a network is down, it's down. Retail stores typically don't have redundant internet connections.
  - tigershark 9y ago
    Seriously just admit that you never used a contactless system and stop here. It is becoming quite ridiculous and surreal if you are saying that using cash is as fast as tapping with a contactless to enter the underground. I would really be curious how could Waterloo handle over 100 million passengers per year with cash.
    - AnthonyMouse 9y ago
      NYC used subway tokens until the 1980s, which are effectively cash. So did pretty much everything else up to that point, since not long before that electronic payment systems didn't exist. The obvious solution for extremely high volume systems is to have the fares come out to even numbers so there is no need to make change. How long are you imagining it takes to drop a coin or two into a turnstile?