How do you pay for things in a shop? Perhaps you like the tangible1 reliability2 of hard cash? Maybe the financial flexibility3 of a credit card suits you better? Or perhaps you prefer the simple convenience of a smartphone?
Whatever you use today, experts believe all these methods could soon become outdated4. Instead, we will use our bodies: our eyes, our fingerprints5, even our mere6 presence in the store. In fact it's happening already. Amazon are trialling stores which have no checkouts7, where technology tracks the items you've taken from the shelves and deducts8 the total from your account when you leave the shop.
French supermarket Monoprix takes a different path: you choose your groceries and leave them with a human cashier. You then leave the shop while the cashier tallies9 up your bill, charges your account, and organises delivery to your home.
Amir Sajed, chief executive of Barclaycard, told the BBC that such new developments spell the end of the plastic credit card.
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