The Post Office has recorded a record level of cash transactions in August 2022, with £3.45 billion in cash passing through its branches over the month.
Included in the reckoning were personal deposits and withdrawals from Post Office accounts, and business transactions. Personal cash withdrawals amounted to £805 million over the month, while deposits exceeded £1.4 billion for the first time on record.
The £3.45 billion figure was the largest on record since cash volumes started to be recorded in 2017 and Post Office leadership has said that it expects this to become a continuing trend amid cost-of-living pressures.
Martin Kearsley, the Post Office’s banking director, said: “We expect cash transactions to continue to exceed expectations in October and for the rest of the year.”
It has been suggested that consumers find it easier to keep track of their expenditure by withdrawing and spending cash as opposed to using electronic payments.
This contrasts to what was seen during the pandemic when contactless electronic transactions were encouraged.
Despite this, banking industry body UK Finance expects the move away from cash payments to persist over the long-term. It has projected that by 2031, six per cent of transactions will be made in cash, after the volume of cash transactions as a proportion of all payments dropped from 55 per cent to 15 per cent from 2011 to 2021.
The Post Office has also recorded a slight drop-off in the numbers during September, with £3.35 billion in cash being handled in its branches, but the reduction compared to the previous month has been attributed to the additional bank holiday following the passing of the Queen.
Elsewhere, part of the increased cash flow through the Post Office has been attributed to the closure of banks, with more people having to use Post Offices branches to access basic services.
Photo by sludgegulper on Wikimedia Commons
