This is how my digital society looks today:
1. I go to Himalaya to stock up on some small necessities (shampoo, lotion, soap…), ensure that they will take my card, yes of course, the sales person swipes my card, rings up the bill, I put in my PIN, wait…,ERROR! She tries again, at the same time explaining that she had the problem with someone else, who had complained that he had the same problem in another shop and had been debited the amount, but it had not showed up in Himalaya’s accounts. We tried two times, failed, chatted a bit about PayTM, need for ‘smart’ phones and then I gave up and went away.
[An hour later, I get an SMS that SBI had debited 500/ from my account and back home I see the same thing online. Sigh I need to remember to follow this up on Tuesday, two more days, as Monday is a holiday.]
2. Go to my regular hair dresser, ask whether they will take a card, yes, but…the bill has to be more than 800/-. Sigh. Do I spend that 300/- of my precious stack of notes? Hmm. I really need that haircut before I get to Chennai (to avoid my mother’s recriminations). So I go for it–cash expenditure that I had not planned on.
3. For two days before that I’d been unable to make bank transactions online because I had no signal on the MTNL cell phone, the one that is linked to my bank transactions.
I’ve had no time to wait in line for cash, and don’t know how long I can last this out. I’m not a happy camper, as they say.