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Digital currency for rail fares?
- Thread starter RussellFM
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ForTheLoveOf
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It's not yet possible to directly pay by any foreign currency, so I don't think there's a very high likelihood of bitcoin being accepted any time soon. If you have a card which enables payment in bitcoin by debiting your bitcoin account with the requisite amount according to the instantaneous exchange rate - I suppose that would work. But it's not really something I see taking off.
PermitToTravel
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You've been able to buy UK train tickets with Bitcoin for a few years now. Very authentic ones...
philthetube
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probably around the same time as you can pay for ice creams or chips.
Puffing Devil
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Totally legal. Look it up.
Thank you for this - I was not aware of this site before hand.
Some btc debit cards do this I believe. Worth looking into. Thanks!
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I should think never.
Not many people understand Bitcoin, where to get them from or what it's all about.
While it's great for international payments (no exchange rates), domestic will skip this and move to pay as you go cards I should think.
Saying that, I guess you "exchange" pounds when buying Bitcoin.
I think it's jus a fad.
Not many people understand Bitcoin, where to get them from or what it's all about.
While it's great for international payments (no exchange rates), domestic will skip this and move to pay as you go cards I should think.
Saying that, I guess you "exchange" pounds when buying Bitcoin.
I think it's jus a fad.
But more and more companies/vendors are accepting digital currency payment, online and in store. You just think its a fad or something...
Yes, I think it’s a fad that will be nixed by various governments who don’t like the vast opportunities for money laundering and concealment of assets that digital currencies offer.
It's legal in the sense that a few places are using it as a USP, but as Alter Ego says, it is a fad and is not recognised as a currency by official bodies for payment, - it very unstable and likely as not will collapse in a few years. It will not be allowed to get big enough to affect national economies.
There is already some evidence of fraudulent activities hijaking online resources to generate virtual currencies. This could mean the ownership of units generated could be disputed as there is no absolute proof of ownership in the blockchain. Many 'ordinary' holders jumping on the bandwagon will get their fingers severely burnt, - those who got in very early will be cleaning up and moving on to their next enterprise, not unlike some pyramid and ponzi frauds have done.
Old Yard Dog
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Bitcoin does not make any logical sense. Why should the solution to an arbitrary software puzzle have any monetary value?
PermitToTravel
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Because people agree it does. Much the same as the reason these weird pieces of metal have monetary value...
You do realise there's more to cryptocurrency than Bitcoin? Ripple in particular is being used *by banks* for settlement purposes.
3D was built into TVs by more and more manufacturers.
Now it's difficult to get a TV with 3D capability....
Asda, Tesco, Sainsburys, Amazon, PayPal, eBay, all TOC websites, Disney, all UK airlines (as far as I am aware), the AA, the RAC, my local chip shop - none of them accept Bitcoin.
Yes, more and more companies that not many people use might be accepting it but doesn't mean it'll ever be widly accepted.
Look at the rollout of contactless (specifically Apple Pay and Google Pay) - that isn't a fad as anywhere with contactless can accept the variations of... apart from either B&Q or Wickes (I can't remember which!).
But that's not really how money works.
The physical coin represents the value and a way of exchanging that value for goods.
I would think many people don't think a train should cost £1 million per carriage, but it does.
Someone has made up the rules for Bitcoin (IE, how you get it), and because it's fairly complicated to get any, most people will never understand it. If it was solving cancer or whatever during the mining process, I see merit in it. But it's not. I don't even know what it's doing when mining.
You'll either need ££ to exchange, which then there's no point, or it needs to be freely available. No company is going to pay people in Bitcoin.
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The 'if they're feeling brave enough' bit and the limit of $88 doesn't exactly inspire confidence!
bb21
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When/If the black market collapses, the value of cryptocurrency would probably follow, but then the world have been fighting a war against the black market for yonks, evidently with little success. Obviously the reasons behind it are extremely complex, and I guess no time soon would this happen.
Yep, and what other countries decide to do isn't my concern.
I mean, in many they drive on the wrong side of the road, but that doesn't mean we will do so here in the UK... :P
It's very interesting but until it is more mainstream, I have other things in life to think about.
Why would you want to buy something as trackable as train tickets with BTC. You basically render your entire wallet completely trackable
The idea of using something so fundamentally inefficient, slow and volatile as a general currency is absolutely crazy. That is why literally nobody is doing that. If you don't see prices in bitcoin on the shelves then people aren't selling stuff in bitcoin.
You might be able to pay with bitcoin at the counter, but that is pretty much exactly the same as paying using a non-sterling credit card. The retailer is making an arrangement with a third party to get the purchase price in sterling. The third party is taking on the exchange rate fluctuation risk, the transaction default risk, and transaction costs. Obviously, the third party is not a philanthropic organization dedicated to letting fully-grown babies make poor decisions without consequences, so they pass that cost on to the purchaser in the form of transaction charges. It's difficult to see the size of those charges right now because of the volatility, but the high transaction costs, slow completion and significant default risk of crypto mean that they are vastly higher than for other payment options.
If the current price of bitcoin/crypto was driven by its use in the black market I'd agree, but it's still overwhelmingly being driven by a hype cycle. The collapse back to the actual utility value is going to be really painful for the people who've been suckered in.
The idea of using something so fundamentally inefficient, slow and volatile as a general currency is absolutely crazy. That is why literally nobody is doing that. If you don't see prices in bitcoin on the shelves then people aren't selling stuff in bitcoin.
You might be able to pay with bitcoin at the counter, but that is pretty much exactly the same as paying using a non-sterling credit card. The retailer is making an arrangement with a third party to get the purchase price in sterling. The third party is taking on the exchange rate fluctuation risk, the transaction default risk, and transaction costs. Obviously, the third party is not a philanthropic organization dedicated to letting fully-grown babies make poor decisions without consequences, so they pass that cost on to the purchaser in the form of transaction charges. It's difficult to see the size of those charges right now because of the volatility, but the high transaction costs, slow completion and significant default risk of crypto mean that they are vastly higher than for other payment options.
gazthomas
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Exactly
PermitToTravel
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Like the bitcoin?
You get them through trade, like you get regular coins. There's also a process through which you can create them, but you can ignore this - it's not required that people understand this, just as it's not required that people can mint their own pound coins...
So Bitcoin allows people to make their own Bitcoins?
PermitToTravel
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Kinda sorta... the mining/"minting" process is open to everybody; but there are only a fixed number that will ever circulate, and once these have all been mined, the only way to acquire bitcoins will be through trade
Unless you are the Royal Mint, Minting your own pound coins is illegal, aka forgery. There's no law against creating new bit coins (within the initial allocated quantity).
PermitToTravel
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Yeah, that's how it works. Pound coins are made by the Royal Mint, whereas Bitcoins are made through a widely distributed process anyone can take part in - though once that's over (we're about 80% of the way through it), that'll be that and no more will ever be made.
The phrase 'moving goalposts' springs to mind for some reason.
bb21
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I won't even pretend that I know much about Bitcoins, but can someone explain to me please how a similar system cannot be set up for more availability of virtual currency, say, called "Biscoin", then if that is possible, a third one called "Bidcoin", and so on...?
Nothing. Bitcoin is far from the only game in town - as I noted above Ripple is used by banks for settlement purposes.
But, just like any other precious commodity, a Biscoin is only worth what people value it as. So your Biscoin won't be worth anything until people decide that it is.
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