Kevin is going out for the evening with some friends. While he is out, he will need to pay for things, such as drinks in the pub, cinema tickets, a meal and a taxi home. In some places he can pay with a credit card or debit card. At the cinema, for example, he can give the cashier his debit card. The cashier will put the card into a card reader and ask Kevin to type in his PIN, or personal identity number. The cost of the cinema tickets will then automatically be taken from Kevin’s bank account. In Britain, when we use a credit or debit card, we now must use a PIN. We used to be able to sign the credit or debit card voucher but that is not normally possible now. The banks say that using PINs instead of signatures will reduce the number of fraudulent transactions.

　　But for some things, like paying for the taxi, Kevin will not be able to use a card. He will need cash – that is, notes and coins. So he goes to a cash machine. (The banks call these Automatic Teller Machines (ATMs), but everyone else calls them cash machines.) He inserts his card into the machine and types in his PIN. He also types in the amount of money he wants to withdraw from his bank account, and a few seconds later the machine issues the money and a receipt which says how much he has withdrawn and how much he has left in his account. Another way of withdrawing cash is called “cashback”. In some shops, such as supermarkets, if you pay with a debit card you can ask for some cash as well.

　　Can Kevin use cheques to pay for things? Maybe, if he has a cheque guarentee card. (Often a debit card is also a cheque guarentee card). But in Britain nowdays we rarely pay by cheque in shops or restaurants, and the number of cheques used each year has fallen sharply.