Surreal Entrepreneur

This is a topic that many small businesses struggle with. We have to consider this from the consumer standpoint as well as the pros and cons for the business owner to truly figure out if it would be more beneficial for a business owner to accept cards or not.

First, what benefits can the business owner see from only using cash. There is certainly a lot less headache associated with cash transactions. Simply one receipt is all the paperwork necessary after the transaction is made. Also there is no transaction fee being charged in order to put that money in the owner’s hands. Adversely the customers that don’t have cash will either have to choose to leave without purchasing anything, or they will have to visit the closest ATM and make a withdraw. We’ve all been in the situation where we’re in the store after picking up some small knickknack and then we spot the sign at the register that says “CASH ONLY”. We then proceed to set the item back where we got it, peruse a little on the way out the door and never look back. This and issue that is hard to overcome when a store owner refuses to make the jump to credit card acceptance. Now on the adverse side, the business owner loses around 3% of every purchase made by card, so if a store isn’t making very many card sales, or the transaction average is really low, this could be a detrimental loss to profit margin.

Another one of the risks of accepting cards is that you will have to figure out how to keep all of that customer information secure. If you are keeping customer information locked up and waiting to bill on a certain day, this could provide a pretty easy target for people who know how to use credit cards for malicious personal gain. Cash only makes you liable for yourself.

We shouldn’t have to discuss online sales, there is no question, you must accept cards.

In my opinion I believe that every business should accept credit and debit cards simply because of convenience, we have to work hard to not only keep customers but also to attract new customers. When a customer is able to walk next door and pick up the same items but they accept credit cards, they will walk next door instead of to the ATM.