Twenty two days after the demonetisation of Rs. 500 and Rs. 1,000 notes, it appears people are slowly coming around to adopting cashless transactions, beginning with households.
Making purchases using debit and credit cards in big retail stores may have become a norm for the middle and the salaried class, but for daily transactions and payments of wages to domestic help, suppliers of milk, newspapers, etc., it was cash that ruled. Not any more!
The first week of a month is used to make payments in almost every household. With the rush at banks and ATMS unlikely to ease any time soon, the salaried class, which have their emoluments credited into their accounts, are repeating the ‘favour’ to their domestic help too.
For Tirupathamma and her daughter-in-law, Upendramma, who work as domestic help in Gachibowli, taking wages in any mode other than cash was unthinkable till a day before. When the lady of the house said she would pay part of their salary in cash and the rest through cheque or credit the amount into the maid’s account online, they giggled, thinking it was a joke. But when it dawned on them, the lady indeed meant what she said.
Ms. Tirupathamma called her son and asked him to share his bank account number with her employer. Having already been aware of online transactions, her son also sent the IFSC code. In half-an-hour, the money was transferred.
Lavanya, a cook, found it amusing too when her employer told her she would write her a cheque or transfer her wage online into her account. She said she only has a zero balance account in a branch located far away. Ms. Lavanya’s husband, who works as a driver, requested the lady to take his account number and IFSC code and transfer the amount into the bank account. It would be easy for his wife to withdraw the amount from the nearby branch, he said.
The comfort of dealing with cash is not confined to those working in the informal sector; even educated women preferred to pay their domestic help, milk man, newspaper vendor, etc., in cash. “I learnt to make cash transfers online to pay my maid, cook, and driver. It took a few minutes keying in their account numbers, wait for the One Time Password (OTP) to ensure secure transfer, and transfer the amount. From next month onwards, I can transfer wages online into their accounts now that I have registered their bank accounts,” said Deepika, a working professional.
