Questions have been raised over the legality of shops in the European Union refusing to accept anything other than digital payment methods, with the European Commission having been publicly asked whether such a move is in line with European law.
A number of outlets across the bloc have opted to move away from cash payments for a wide variety of reasons, putting up notices informing customers that only card and phone payments are accepted.
Writing to the EC, Irish MEP Chris MacManus queried whether such a practice is actually legal.
“Recently, the Minister for Finance in Ireland [Michael McGrath] stated in a reply to a parliamentary question that: ‘If a business specifies payment must be in a form other than cash, the customer cannot subsequently claim a legal right to pay in cash,'” the Socialist Sinn Féin party member said.
“This seems to fly in the face of EU policy … and statements made by the European Central Bank,” he added, before requesting the EC to give its view on whether his assessment was “accurate and legally sound”.
In response to the MEP’s questions, EU Economy Commissioner Paolo Gentiloni said that while both banknotes and coins are given the status of “legal tender”, European law was ultimately not clear on exactly what that status actually entails.
As such, he added, it remains unclear whether shops rejecting cash and coin payments are acting legally or not.
Gentiloni said that the final interpretation of what “legal tender” means must be applied uniformly throughout the EU, citing a ruling by the European Court of Justice in 2021.
He further said that the EC is looking to agree a legislative proposal on banknotes and coins that may resolve the issue as part of its push for a “digital Euro”.
“The Commission has adopted a legislative proposal on the scope and effects of the legal tender of Euro banknotes and coins entailing, in principle, the mandatory acceptance of cash, at full face-value, with the power to discharge from a payment obligation,” he wrote.
He added that the proposal would also mean Member States would have to monitor the use of physical cash within their territories and would require governments “to take measures if cash non-acceptance levels are deemed to undermine the mandatory acceptance of Euro banknotes and coins.”
