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Just last week my brother in law (in the US) wanted to send an Uber Eats gift card to my girlfriend (his sister, in Mexico) because she is staying home recoveri
by gomox 3y ago
Just last week my brother in law (in the US) wanted to send an Uber Eats gift card to my girlfriend (his sister, in Mexico) because she is staying home recovering from a minor surgery.
He is not able to purchase such a gift card from the US site (gift cards are country specific). He is also not able to purchase such a gift card from the Mexico site (which demands a Mexican national ID to process the payment). He asks for my help. I try to use the same Mexican site, which refuses to take any of the 4 cards I try. I then use the website's option to "pay at OXXO" (a low tech system to pay for bills, in cash, through a large network of convenience stores owned by the local Coca Cola distributor).
Cash saves the day.
Next up he wants to pay me back. Cashapp/Venmo/Zelle are only for US residents. Local wires within the US are a pain. International wires are worse, and cost half of the amount he borrowed.
Solution? Pay me back in cash next time im in town.
The more suprising bit is that in this random anecdote cash ends up being superior to "cashless" even for one of its worse use cases (cross border transactions).
- t0bia_s 3y agoYou cannot pay Uber by crypto?
- theragra 3y agoBecause current electronic money are too centralized and gated. I have the same issue with payment from USA. I don't want PayPal, and my sister says ACH payment is expensive for her. So, I tell her to give cash to my parents when they visit. But when I needed to transfer cryptocurrency to her, it was easy and quick.
- jjav 3y ago> Because current electronic money are too centralized and gated. Electronic payments are by definition centralized and gated, because someone has to operate them. That someone(s) is the gate. (Sure, blockchain.. I don't see that happening.)