South China Morning PostAn argument between staff at a cashless supermarket in northern China and an elderly man who did not know how to use his smartphone to buy a bunch of grapes has revived calls for help for those left behind in the digital economy.
The 67-year-old man, identified only by his surname Xie, tried to use cash to buy the fruit at a supermarket in Jixi, Heilongjiang province, on Sunday, video news site Pear Video reported.
Checkout workers rejected the money and insisted that he use his phone to pay via either WeChat Pay or Alipay, prompting the argument, according to the video.
Alipay is owned by Alibaba, which owns the South China Morning Post.
Ill leave if you dont take the cash, Xie said in the clip.
Well, leave if you can, the cashier replied.
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Xie took the grapes and approached the door but was stopped by security guards.
I know its not right to leave without paying, Xie said. But I have real yuan in my hands. Its not fake money. Why are you humiliating this old man for not knowing how to use WeChat?
A security guard later helped Xie process the payment with cash, the report said.
This problem will continue until overbearing cashiers are not trained on the right way to do things. I don't expect that a policy on cash would be that total and would receive blanket application without considering the payment of something so small as fruits. Government at times in the process of trying to do the right thing end up causing more problem for the citizens they promise to serve and if the country should have been practicing a transparent democratic government, the voice of the people would have been heard. The youth are the ones that would be more convenient using electronic money to meet their payment but for the elders who have served the country and built it to the extent it is not granted some slack to get basic things with their cash, then such policy is nothing short of inhumane and that is why government needs to as a matter of urgency review the policy and mandate everyone in charge of collection of payment to ensure that the Yuan has never ceased to be a legal tender.