Credit card alternative for cash free airport travels
March 11, 2024 9:08 AM   Subscribe

What can I use instead of cash in airports if I don't have a credit card to use?

I haven't traveled for a couple of years. I have (with my family) a multi-airport trip coming up in the next months. I hear that in many airports, at least in the USA, businesses will not take cash. I would like to ensure that I can get coffees and lunches etc. Because of crazy financial rules where I live, I do not want to use my local currency debit/credit card abroad. I do not have a foreign country credit or debit card.
I had thought that I could use Venmo, but it isn't available to download in my country of residence. I'm not even sure that it's accepted widely (I live in a very rural area).
Then I thought I could use Google Pay, but that's being shut down in June.
Ideas?
posted by conifer to Work & Money (18 answers total)
 
Google Pay is just being merged into Google Wallet, which will still be running and available to use.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:18 AM on March 11, 2024 [1 favorite]


If you have a Samsung phone, Samsung Pay is also accepted but not as much as Google Wallet or Apple Pay.

Would Wise be an option for you? This would get you a separate account, with its own tap-enabled Visa card, just for non-local transactions with (potentially) relatively easy transfer to/from your local accounts. In my experience it's been pretty easy and safe to use, with the caveat that this is mostly going USD to JPY and occasionally USD to CAD (and the one time for payment for stuff that was in GBP). (It is available in your locale.) There are fees to move money around but they're not (necessarily) terrible (as far as Wise itself is concerned).
posted by mrg at 9:32 AM on March 11, 2024 [1 favorite]


Google Wallet is just a wallet app which lets you pay with your existing debit and credit cards by tapping your phone (NFC). It hides your card number behind a virtual card number. But that's all it does, it's still your own card being charged. At least, this is true in the UK.

Venmo is mainly for transferring money to other individuals. A few stores accept it as payment, but most don't.

Are whole airports really going cash-free? I'm sure airlines are, you can't just buy a plane ticket with a stack of notes any more. But that's not the same as saying you won't be able to find a single coffee or lunch place which takes cash.
posted by Klipspringer at 9:34 AM on March 11, 2024 [3 favorites]


Some airports have kiosks that sell prepaid VISA cards for cash.
posted by BungaDunga at 9:39 AM on March 11, 2024 [7 favorites]


Note that you can also buy those prepaid debit cards at most drug stores/Targets/other big box stores, so if they're not available at the first airport you land at, you can still hopefully get them elsewhere and use them at the next airports on your trip. You can also use them for most online purchases as long as the business you're paying is within the US. Some kinds are reloadable, while others are only loaded once, when you buy them.

I feel like I've used cash at US airports recently, at least at the snack shops, but maybe it depends on the airport. I'd recommend looking up the specific ones on your itinerary so you get a sense of whether you need to worry about it or not.
posted by trig at 10:06 AM on March 11, 2024 [1 favorite]


Best answer: I hear that in many airports, at least in the USA, businesses will not take cash.

This is not my experience. I always pay cash, usually buy some airport food (and postcards, if still available) and fly every month or two. In just the past few weeks I've done this in Sacramento, BWI, Chicago, San Francisco and Denver. In fact I can only recall one time that my cash was rejected, and that was at a local bakery still clinging to their hands-free Covid protocols.
posted by Rash at 10:09 AM on March 11, 2024 [2 favorites]


This is not my experience.

Mine, either. I wouldn't worry about this right now. There might be one or two idiosyncratic businesses that don't take cash, but you should not have problems finding plenty that will.
posted by praemunire at 10:13 AM on March 11, 2024 [1 favorite]


Best answer: There are several states where it is outright illegal for retailers to refuse cash as a method of payment: Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Idaho, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Mississippi, New York, North Dakota, Oklahoma and Pennsylvania, as well as New Jersey, and Rhode Island. In addition to these statewide laws, it is unlawful for retailers to refuse cash in certain cities as well: Washington D.C., Berkley, Chicago, New York City, Philadelphia, and San Francisco.
posted by MiraK at 10:16 AM on March 11, 2024 [5 favorites]


And yet Fenway Park got a waiver in Massachusetts, provided that they have kiosks to spit out Visa cards with no fee to the customer.
posted by Melismata at 10:19 AM on March 11, 2024


Airport transactions aside, many US air carriers no longer accept cash as payment for in-flight drinks and snacks, and United, I believe, no longer accepts physical cards - you have to add the cc to your reservation for use in-flight.
posted by mercredi at 11:01 AM on March 11, 2024 [1 favorite]


Best answer: I don’t have a technical answer for you, but I think because this is such a locally-variable thing in the USA (which you may or may not be passing through — I couldn’t tell from your question) and because cashless bans mean different things in different places, I wonder if the best thing to do is to contact the airports you’re passing through and ask them directly.

For example, let’s imagine you're going to New York City. Here is the text of NYC’s cashless ban. The law does not include an exception for airports (which New Jersey’s does, something to note if your flight is going via Newark Airport, right next to New York City). So if you fly through JFK or LaGuardia (LGA), can you expect to be fine with cash at any “food store or retail establishment”, as the law states? Yes — but the NYC law does allow those same establishments refuse to accept bills over $20 or choose to provide access to cash-paying customers only through the use of a cash-to-card machine, something that the law places a number of rules on, like not charging you a fee for the card.

It’s also not clear to me which services you might buy from the airport directly that could be paid for in cash, like parking: is the airport’s on-site parking garage a “retail establishment”? The text of the NYC law says a “retail establishment” is defined as “an establishment wherein consumer commodities are sold, displayed or offered for sale, or where services are provided to consumers at retail.” To me this means parking is a service covered by the law, but does the airport see it differently? JFK’s parking lots do not accept cash according to their own page here; at LaGuardia, this page says Terminal A parking cannot be paid for in cash, but does not make a similar statement about Terminal B and C parking. Both airports are owned by the same entity, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, so the difference in policy here is hard to explain.

Contacting the airports you’re passing through (or even just searching for “cash” on the airports’ websites) might help you plan your itinerary so it’s not a hassle to use cash. Enjoy your trip!
posted by mdonley at 11:14 AM on March 11, 2024


Are you comfortable sharing the airports in question or at least their type*? I would be very surprised if in a given U.S. airport, no food vendor will accept cash. Like maybe in a teeny tiny regional airport? But those airports aren't going to have many food options in the first place. In other words, I wouldn't surprised to hear about the existence of some "cash free" vendors in airports, but I would expect you to be able to buy food at a competing vendor with cash.

*e.g. international, domestic, large, small, regional.
posted by oceano at 12:04 PM on March 11, 2024 [1 favorite]


Yes — but the NYC law does allow those same establishments refuse to accept bills over $20 or choose to provide access to cash-paying customers only through the use of a cash-to-card machine, something that the law places a number of rules on, like not charging you a fee for the card.

Yes, but who does this at the airport? (Maybe some places don't take $100s, but for whom is that an issue, really?) It's weird that this question is being answered as though it's some theoretical unknowable we have to piece together from, like, statutes and otherwise valid grudges against corporations instead of something that the members of this website must have vast and recent experience with. Has anyone recently flown through a U.S. airport where the vendors didn't take cash? Because I sure haven't, and if there is such an airport, I'd like to be forewarned.
posted by praemunire at 12:57 PM on March 11, 2024 [4 favorites]


I recently flew through Phoenix T4, and the grab-and-go type places were all unmanned and cashless. It was like self checkout in the grocery store. They did have sit-down restaurants where presumably cash would be ok.
posted by basalganglia at 2:52 PM on March 11, 2024


My first thought is to get yourself a Greenlight card, which is basically a debit card meant for kids/teens, but I don't see any reason it wouldn't work for an adult. In our situation, the card is attached to my bank account, and I can put money on the card instantly for my daughter. So you could get one, hook it up to your bank account, and essentially be the "parent" giving "the kid" money as often as you need. Maybe that would get around your concerns about using your own debit card?
posted by Molasses808 at 5:48 PM on March 11, 2024


I fly regularly in the US, and I have never even heard of businesses in an airport not taking cash. The only exception might be those self-check-out stores that don't have attendants, and you do have to swipe a credit card, but there are tons of other places you can go to.
posted by virve at 7:39 PM on March 11, 2024


Many airlines only take credit cards for in-flight snack purchases, but I've never seen that be the case on the ground in an airport (excepting maybe a vending machine or self-checkout store).
posted by so fucking future at 7:59 AM on March 12, 2024


Cash person here. It depends on what you want at the airport and in the end laws don’t matter. If you need a SIM card and nothing accepts cash you’re not going to be helped. Your answer is the contactless cash prepaid cards. Some places don’t like accepting those but not at the airport. At the very worst case if you need a water or coffee you an go to a bar and offer cash up front. I doubt someone will deny you.

Be warned those prepaid cards have limitations. If you need a hotel for a week they might deny you after $500 no matter how much is on the card. That’s probably going to be your biggest expense without knowing more.
posted by geoff. at 6:30 PM on March 12, 2024


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