Cornwall bakery's plea for people to use cash as card processing fees hit £2.3k

A Cornish bakery is asking customers to use cash rather than card so it can avoid high fees. Credit: File image

A bakery in Cornwall is asking customers to pay with cash after forking out thousands in card payment processing fees. 

Martins Bakery in St Austell says that processing card payments has cost the business more than £2,300 in the past 12 months.

The firm says if those payments were made in cash, they would have only had to pay £400 in bank fees.

"Please, please, try and use cash when out and about," a spokesperson for the bakery said.

"The benefits for your local independent shops and the future are enormous."

It comes after cash payments in the UK fell by 25% in 2020, according to UK Finance. They fell again in 2021 - by 1.7% - but then increased by 7% in 2022.

Card processing fees UK businesses are an average of 1.5% to 3.5% - but can reach up to 6%. 

As a result, Martins Bakery is warning against a cashless society - and also rebuffed comments suggesting customers could absorb some of the costs.

“We just ask [you] to think about the true costs involved and keep cash in circulation," they said.