> You might be living in a bubble, fifty quid is much less than $100 and I see those notes all the time.

In nearly 40 years I can't think I've ever seen a £50 note, let alone spent one. €50 notes, sure, but Europe is backwards - I saw a €200 note once when buying a ferry ticket

> Getting currency exchanged before a trip? They give huge bills.

1990 called and wants its features back. I haven't been to an airport yet that didn't have an ATM. With the exception of the U.S. I rarely spend cash when I travel anyway.

> Buying a used phone or furniture from Craigslist? Are you going to pay with 100 twenties?

I can't imagine ever wanting to spend $2000 in cash. I had a builder do some work and it was about £800, a simple bank transfer and job done.

> New ATMs even ask you the breakdown of bill sizes you are want.

Do they? I haven't used an ATM since May (and that was in Hong Kong). Now that is unusual - most people do use cash, but then most people are more likely to want £5 notes from an ATM than £50.

Now the UK isn't as cashless as say China, but Cash is certainly not the norm - especially for anyone under the age of 60

Builders and other trades might want cash and even offer a slight discount for it, for some reason or other (cough tax cough).

I still like to use cash in a pub and I play pool every weds. This enables me to keep a pool of pocket cash which is handy. Cash is still king in some transactions and I'll miss it when it finally vanishes.

I blew a €200 in a bar in Switzerland once. A cash machine spat several out at me when I got my ickeys (forex) in ready for a week up a mountain with the boys. The barman didn't bat an eyelid when it was my turn to get a round in and I presented that beast to him. Mind you given the price for a beer which was roughly €10 for the local equivalent of the metric version of one pint, I was doing them a favour by keeping the paperwork to a minimum! That was about 15 years ago - God knows what they charge now.

I am under the age of 60 ...

> €50 notes, sure, but Europe is backwards - I saw a €200 note once when buying a ferry ticket

To add to your anecdote, on the Europe part, in a few years in Europe I've seen a few 500€ and 200€ notes (the last one a few days ago, used to pay a 1€20 coffee), and lots of 100€ notes.

> I haven't been to an airport yet that didn't have an ATM.

Those have terrible exchange rates. I’ve used an airport ATM once, and even then that was only because I realised too late that Switzerland wasn’t in the Eurozone.

An ATM gives the exchange rate my bank gives, which is better than pretty much any bureau d' change.

The ones in British airports give terrible rates for Swiss Francs. My bank also had a terrible rate at the time. I got a better bank-like-entity since then.

I'm sure they do, why would I use an ATM in the UK to get Swiss Francs? You get Swiss Francs in Switzerland, so use one at arrivals in Zurich!

On that occasion, I didn’t want to risk my (Halifax bank) card not working when I arrived — that particular card has been somewhat unreliable in the USA, and I still don’t know why, so I cannot be sure it won’t be denied elsewhere.

I have since gotten some better cards for international travels.

Heh, I think you might be trapped in the bubble of a country without free easy ways to transfer money electronically. Essentially every UK bank account offers free, instant transfers to any other account.

The only time I’ve personally had £50s in the past decade is when I was paid in cash for a software job by a somewhat dodgy client; that’s the association they have generally.

The bubble in this case encapsulates the entire UK but thanks for your perspective from a different country.

Are you just speculating, or do you live in the UK?

From what I’ve heard, £50 notes are used more rarely than $100 bills are here in the US.

I assume speculating, based on "bills", "ATM" and possibly "Craigslist".

Can afirm. I'm a Brit with 48 years under my belt. A £50 note is a very rare beast and is almost never seen in the wild.

If it wasn't for the fact that I bought a car for about £1400 in fifties in about 1996, I have spent more $100 bills than £50 notes in my life. I have only visited the US on a few occasions for holidays.

£20s are more than enough for most things. They are not too big or thick so even £1000 is just about manageable in a wallet for a short time. Larger than say £200 at most is bank transfer stuff. We have had near instant bank transfers for years. To be honest I keep a cash float of about £100 but I am an older bloke and like to use cash sometimes. I could easily operate cashless for about 99.5% of the time. The number of transactions that I can't do with pay by bonk (NFC) or mobile banking is absolutely minimal. I only use cash in a pub out of habit to be honest.

I'd say it's about the same. With 10+ years in each country I see both about as frequently. Maybe 50 quid more often since atms give them out but can't recall a non casino USA atm ever doing hundreds

> can't recall a non casino USA atm ever doing hundreds

I've gotten them before when pulling out a few hundred dollars, but since most ATMs have a limit between $400-800, I guess it makes more sense to just stock them with small bills. I've gotten them before, but if I need more than $100 or so, I'll go into the branch so I can get exactly the denominations I want (e.g. I wanted $100s when I bought my car or for gifts, but I want $1s, $5s, and $10s for baby sitters and tips).

> You might be living in a bubble, fifty quid is much less than $100 and I see those notes all the time.

In 30 years, I don't think I've _ever_ seen a fifty pound note in person.

The Treasury noted in October 2018 that they rarely used for routine transactions[1]. You can see this difference in the value of notes in circulation. In the US, the vast majority (80.3%) of currency in circulation is in the form of $100 bills[2]. In the UK, there is double the value in circulation in £20s compared to £50s[3]. £50s only make up 24.6% of the value of notes in circulation.

[1] https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-45850135

[2] https://www.federalreserve.gov/paymentsystems/coin_currcircv...

[3] https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/statistics/banknote