My wife and I arranged a ski trip in Colorado a few weekends ago with ourselves and 29 out-of-town friends. A month before the trip we dropped almost three grand on a VRBO chalet reservation for four nights and decided we'd ask everyone to pay us back later. Come Saturday night when all 31 of us were at the chalet and before the party really got started we calculated the per person cost and asked that everyone pay us back as soon as was convenient. Within a few hours we already had over half of the reimbursements and by Monday we were only missing two. This is a far cry from the "old days" when you had to harrass your friends until they finally got to an ATM or dropped a check in the mail. This is the final breakdown of the reimbursement methods:
Google Wallet: 1
Paypal: 2
Cash: 4
Check: 4
Venmo: 18
Venmo nearly doubled the rest of the payment methods combined, including other person-to-person money transfer sites such as Paypal and Google Wallet. Until Venmo starts charging small fees for personal transactions and bank account transfers, I can't see this trend slowing anytime soon (at least with millenials) - it's just too damn easy, convenient, and fun even.
So cash is doomed, certainly. And so are checks. (Although my mother-in-law still totes her checkbook around religiously.) But I specifically wonder about the lagging popularity of Google Wallet too: is Wallet to Venmo what Google+ is to Facebook? This hand-picked example is clearly a small sample size but based on other recent fiduciary experiences too my initial inclination is a resounding yes. I'll be excited to see the situation develop.
Side note: I'm still taking over/under bets on 2020 being the Year of the Demise of the Penny (YDP).
