Blaise Tapp: Reasons why cash is king in my world

Last Friday was one of those occasions. We all saw the headlines: Shoppers across Europe left in a pickle after the Visa payment card system was plunged into chaos.

We were reassured by those very smart people at Visa, presumably none of whom wear a tie, that the afternoon of chaos was down to a hardware failure rather than the work of a 15-year-old computer hacker from the West Midlands.

The fallout affected so many people that it became the most exciting event of the week with sturdy folk at checkouts everywhere talking about it in hushed tones - as if the store manager had been caught in an uncompromising position in the walk-in freezer, rather than a continent wide malfunction of a highly sophisticated digital payment system.

The fun and games at the tills ensured that the socially challenged had something other than the weather to discuss at the weekend.

There were stories of red faced holiday makers abandoning their trollies, laden with half term treats such as strawberry-flavoured vodka and variety packs of breakfast cereal, because their cards had been declined.

Even though the problem was fixed within a matter of hours, the damage was done. It was the lead story on news programmes because it touched so much of the population - and, as we have since learned, an impressive £1 in every £3 spent here in the UK is done so via the Visa system.

Not everyone was affected though. If, like me, you prefer cash to plastic then you will have afforded yourself a wry smile on Friday evening.

Cash has always been my preferred method of payment, largely due to the fact that you really do know where you are with anything with the Queen’s head on it, especially during a night on the tiles.

I grew up in age when you were easily able to establish what sort of night you had endured simply by taking a peak in your wallet the morning after.

Another reason cash is king in my world is because pin numbers disappear from my mind as quickly as President Trump cancels then rearranges his summit with the North Koreans.

These personality quirks of mine mean that whenever technical disaster strikes financial institutions - last week was by no means the first incident of its kind - I am protected in a low tech bubble, along with little old ladies and fairground workers.

Although I am an avid user of social media and have a significant digital footprint, I am very much more at home with cold hard currency than I am with a skinny piece of plastic which can relieve me of up to £30 in one quick tap.

There are now so many ways that you can pay for goods that my fear is that are more ways that it can go wrong.

There are drawbacks to having a pocket full of cash - the risk of having it pinched being at the very top of that list.

I am sure there are pasty-faced boffins right now who are working on yet another ingenious way for us to spend our wages but I will stick with the cash if you don’t mind.