[lsc]

>I've only had issues twice in the last 12 months, and in both cases the vendor blamed their equipment for the failure rather than me.

that's... about what I'd expect, and personally, for a twice a year event, I'm carrying a backup. (for that matter, my credit card fails a lot less than that, and I still tend to carry backup cash or another card) it just seems like it would be super awkward to eat a meal and then not be able to pay.

[nl]

I can't imagine any circumstances where paying on a phone wouldn't work in a restaurant here (in Australia). It would be a complete disaster for the restaurant since probably 80% of people are paying on their phone.

The backup here is the "cash via phone" thing. I can use my phone to get cash out of ATM, which is not NFC based (it's an in-app thing with my banking app).

[lsc]

the comment I was responding to (from you?) said:

>I've only had issues twice in the last 12 months,

which is often enough, for me at least, to want to carry a backup, just 'cause it's super awkward to eat and not pay, regardless of who is responsible for the equipment failure.

(I've been using the atm-via-cellphone thing and it is pretty neat, though mine only lets me use atms branded with my bank, which diminishes the utility for emergency cash. I think mine (at least Bank of America and Chase) does involve some sort of NFC? I can start the process by waiving my phone over the ATM, which resulted in me looking like an idiot, waving my phone trying to get it to work on other bank's ATMs. Reminded me of how when I first got an electric car (not a Tesla) I pulled into a supercharger and it was... several minutes before I figured out that the supercharger was Tesla-only. )

re reading this, I'm beginning to wonder if I have a stronger than usual aversion to seeming like I don't know what I'm doing? it's not something I've really thought about before. Huh.