GUWonder

The Swedish government is changing its currency design and implementing it in a staggered way in 2016 and 2017 so as to thereafter phase out the existing notes and coins.

Something to keep in mind: either to exchange the remaining SEK notes/coins before or soon after the change; or to use them up. This won't be like with the USD where old notes and coins retain their value in the eyes of the government and are maintained as legal tender.

jpatokal

The Riksbank will continue to exchange "invalid" notes indefinitely though, for a flat fee of 100 SEK regardless of quantity.

http://www.riksbank.se/en/Notes--coi...lid-banknotes/

GUWonder

Thanks for that info. They don't exchange the notes in cash and insist on electronic fund transfers? That means even more of a loss than 100SEK for those of us who only bank outside of Europe. And they also reserve the possibility of refusing the exchange/currency transfer contingent upon answering whatever questions they may have of the person/party submitting the cash for exchange/refund.

For a country that is so hostile to cash, this kind of governmental shenanigan is not entirely unexpected by me.

fassy

For a small nominal fee I'm happy to take your cash and bring it to bank I guess I can beat the Swedish bank fees for foreign transactions

Probably just a disclaimer to make sure they can legally dig into and act on it if they supsect money laundering.

Originating from a country which hates credit cards the option to avoid cash is one of the things which I really appreciate living here. I think I haven't taken a single SEK cash out of the bank in the last five years.

Fredrik74

I sometimes do but very rarely and I don't foresee any need to do so in the future but who knows. With Swish there is little need to have cash even for those small informal purchases/payments.

Cash will only exist for 20 more years or so until the current old people die.

GUWonder

The current and future young people then will be in a world of hurt.

Cash (or other non-electronic cash substitutes) as a store of value and medium of transaction will exist longer than that, if only: because not everyone wants their entire financial and related personal electronic history to be available to hackers of various sorts and to government surveillance (if different); and because electronic fraud is going to do anything but disappear; and because electronic-only payment regime sets up things for extreme systematic meltdowns due to fraud or other factors; and because some countries won't want to wipe out (or see wiped out) all physical elements of legal tender, be that their own legal tender or that of other issuers.

Sure, governments and banks will try to increasingly crack down on cash holding and cash use; and, sure, merchants being concerned with various kinds of costs related to cash handling may increasingly move toward non-cash payment systems under some circumstance; but even cash or a non-electronic cash substitute will re-emerge from time to time.

I still encounter small stores in Sweden which refuse to take cards for purchases of less than 20 and/or 50 SEK.

fassy

Really? Never had that happen... Although I understand they want to dodge the merchant fees for the card transaction.

Just once at the hairdressers, they didn't refused but just didn't even had a machine. They let me pay via wire transfer into their bankgirot account though, again no cash needed.

GUWonder

Really. And this is at some of the same stores that are more than happy to have consumers withdraw cash when buying things, if only because the retailers' cash handling costs have been hiked up (if you are even allowed to deposit cash at your bank's nearest Swedish branch).

And I'm talking about stores of the sort that may even be affiliated with something like the BergendahlsGruppen.

Oh, the things you learn when paying for ice cream from GB Glace or SIA.

Would the hairdresser take cash? Wiring money from the U.S. to settle a Swedish retail bill for a personal haircut/styling isn't really as good an option as paying cash and using some of those random SEK notes I find from time to time. Given the tax and other social benefits situation, getting rid of cash would be great for tax collection and reducing social benefits fraud; I say that because it shows there is a market for cash use still.

fassy

Yeas, they do but I never have any

GUWonder

Perhaps if you paid in cash, then the hair-care provider would provide a bit better/more timely service? Cash in hand just has a different feel than a number on a screen.

Fredrik74

I have tried to argue this point with the privacy activists but to no avail.

For the most part this is driven by people who desperately want to be modern and thus cannot use physical money. The typical 40-something middleclass person do not touch cash.

I also know some of these places but typically that would be seen as not wanting my business. For right or wrong.

fassy

No cash in the world will make me handsome

Building secure (more or less ) Electronic payment systems finances my living... so yes, please get rid of cash NOW!

EDIT:// I do not carry cash just because I'm lazy (and for the disclaimer, not yet in my 40s). And to be honest I couldn't care less if AMEX knows where I had my last dinner. Most people give away much more information on Facebook for free. Also the whole loyalty point game is a much better source for data mining customer behavior than most people would think off (and funny enough not even the airlines and hotel chains...). Sure, there is risk of getting profiles by both companies and the governments as well as identify theft, but only a very small portion of that has to do with cash payments vs credit card payment. I think it is much more critical that in a lot of countries like e.g. in Sweden nothing works without your person number and your whole being is linked to that single number... which is by the way not that hard to guess if you know the name, birthday and gender... Hello facebook

GUWonder

You don't want to get me started on how Sweden is a paradise for stalkers, "identity theft" thieves and for the home-break-in thieves once more of them wise up to the ways of Sweden and what the lousy privacy protections enable them to do in the country.

And then the Swedish police crime investigators cry to me about American encryption or still even TOR getting in their way.

You don't want to even know what a bunch of my Swedish lawyer acquaintances thought of me when I said the only way I'm ever holding immovable property in Sweden -- of the residential sort too -- is if done via a corporate holding of the properties, and that they should consider the same.

I know plenty of 40-something middle-class people in Sweden who still use cash for somethings like paying cleaning/repair/gardening/babysitting staff or settling a quick, small bill with a neighbor or friend. And I would like to think that I'm no Luddite and that I am not hanging out just with modern incarnations of Luddites.

Also, there seems to be enough cash in Swedish houses of even 40-something middle class types, that the home break-ins do commonly involve searches for not only portable electronics and old school silverware but also specifically for cash given how the home thieves' searches are frequently being done in Sweden.

It's the sexting-here-are-my-naked-"private"-parts-with-the-photo-taken-by-my-newest-iPhone/Samsung generation of young adults that seems to not have cash as much as the 40-year-olds. Privacy is an afterthought for those characters.

Fredrik74

I beg to differ about your acquaintances.

But yes, it's somewhere in that agegroup that we see the generational rift. Above a certain age I heard people subscribe to physical newspapers too.

My father recently told me an absurd story that his local paper wanted him to use their internet site. He couldn't believe why paper wasn't sufficient anymore. In fact he became quite angry when I tried to explain the way of younger people.

GUWonder

Last day to use those gray/silver-color 1 and 5 SEK coins is today.

How many millions of (US) dollars worth of these coins will be wasted by this move?

Swish to buy lemonade from the kids' lemonade corner stand on a cloudy/rainy Swedish summer day?