The cost of giving up the use of honest cash

SIR – Jon Levenson (Letters, March 16) is wrong to say that only criminals and tax cheats would lose out from a cashless society.

Honest people would see prices rise, as the cost to small business would be considerable. It would also require extensive broadband connectivity throughout the country, which we do not yet have. Ralph Anderson

Oxford

SIR – I am not a criminal or a tax cheat, but I still don’t want the Government to scrutinise my every action.

Paying for things with cash is the one last tiny snook we can cock against today’s Orwellian surveillance and control. Cynthia Harrod-eagles

Northwood, Middlesex

SIR – Mr Levenson, the director of Go Cashless, obviously has a cause to highlight but I object to him classing me as a tax evader or a criminal.

Using cash helps me to keep better control of my expenditure than contactless payments ever could. Minimising digital transactions also reduces my exposure to cyber-crime.

There are many good reasons to keep using cash and nearly all of them are honest. Roger Gentry

Sutton-at-hone, Kent

SIR – If society goes completely cashless we will be even more reliant on the internet. What will then happen when the system gets hacked or otherwise fatally compromised ?

It is essential that cash payments always remain an option. William Cook

Blandford, Dorset

SIR – Heather Owen (Letters, March 16) expresses concern about the future of the new £5 and £10 notes in a plastic-free society. It is, however, unlikely that you will find bank notes strewn along our beaches. Nigel Hodder

Milton Abbas, Dorset