> I'm talking about customers, not merchants. It's interesting how enthusiastically some on HN push cashlessness, as if they have some vested interest. Why is it so important.

It’s not important to me, but I did take exception to your rhetoric:

1. That people on HN can’t figure out cash.

2. That it can’t just be about convenience. (This also just sounds conspiratorial.)

I have no vested interest in telling people not to use cash because I don’t spend my time telling people not to use cash. I no longer work in jobs where I have to handle it either, but what you have up there is an explanation as to why one person out in meatspace would just go cashless, and I don’t think I’m the exception here.

Apple Pay (and it’s related services) is just such a massive QoL improvement for those who choose to adopt it that for most that try it (I know at least one person that doesn’t like it), it does not take much convincing. I recently had the strange experience of my own mother thanking me for setting her phone up to use Apple Pay for her cards when previously she was against it (doesn’t trust new technology, thinks it’s spying on her, probably wouldn’t have the phone if I didn’t buy it and put her on my plan).

My experience mirrors yours. It's interesting to me that the details you give about being very familiar with cash handling seem to just get ignored. At one point in my life I would regularly have two or three hundred dollars in cash on my person at all times, would pay rent in cash, repeated things like 'cash is king'. Now, I haven't touched cash consistently in years. I tap a card to pay for things. It is much more convenient, no coins, no worries that I've exposed money on my person to some one who will act on that knowledge.

I dunno. Feels like an electric kettle. I didn't forget how to boil water on the stove but pressing a button is more convenient and now I cannot forget to turn a heating element off.

> a massive QoL improvement

There's no argument or reason here, just an emotional outlet. I start to think there is no reason ...

> I did take exception to your rhetoric

This is really intense!

In the last decade in the UK my family have lost their wallets/purses twice and credit card fraud once. I got my credit card fraud taken care off but was out of pocket for the cash in wallet/purse.

Win for cashless. (I’m not anti-cash but I certainly favour using cashless options wherever possible. Safer, plus you get loyalty points and in the UK there is no cash discount price so if you aren’t getting loyalty points on your card you are throwing money away / paying a premium for the privacy of cash)