Symbolic image: More and more people are withdrawing money from retailers. picture alliance / pressefoto_korb | Micah Korb
According to a study by the EHI, the total volume of cash withdrawals in retail rose by 20 percent to 12.31 billion euros in 2021.
Companies like Rewe, Edeka, DM and Rossmann give out more than 13 percent of the cash they collect to customers.
However, increasing usage is leading to higher fees for retailers, who paid a total of €17.23 million to banks in 2021.
Have you ever withdrawn cash while shopping at the supermarket checkout or drugstore? In fact, this service is becoming increasingly popular. The total volume of payouts rose last year by a good 20 percent to 12.31 billion euros. This is shown by a study published on Wednesday by the Cologne retail research institute EHI.
The study author Horst Rüter comments: “It is convenient for customers because it saves them additional trips. Demand is also increasing due to the decreasing number of ATMs.
According to the study, companies that offer the service, including food retailers such as Rewe and Edeka, drugstores such as DM and Rossmann and hardware stores, give out more than 13 percent of the cash they collect back to their customers. But: As usage increases, the fees that companies have to pay to banks also increase.
According to EHI, these are between 0.1 and 0.2 percent of the paid out amount per transaction. As a result, last year retailers paid 17.23 million euros, 25.7 percent more than the previous year.
The cash payment option was introduced by the first retailers around 20 years ago. Since then, usage and distribution have increased rapidly. In 2019, the volume of cash payouts was 2.23 billion euros. The study includes data from around 420 companies with 100,000 businesses from 35 industries.
dpa/people