[yladiz]

Ah, interesting, and I realize now I was conflating credit cards with other kinds of cards like Maestro or Girocard (which is a German specific debit card).

In my experience some places do take either cash or debit, but I think that it's becoming more uncommon that you'll find this arrangement outside of somewhere like a government office or the post office now, and either you'll wind up with cash only or a place that takes any kind of card. A few places do not take cash but that's very rare. I can't speak for other countries as well as Germany and so you're right it does seem different in the Netherlands (although leading to the same outcome for the OP, that a credit card can't be used).