Sweden's Riksbank is threatening banks with the propect of regulation to ensure business access to cash services.
In a written communication to an inquiry on cash by Sweden's Ministry of Finance, the central bank states: "Regulation is needed to ensure that operators, who are legally obliged to accept cash, have access to functioning services for daily takings and petty cash."
Famed as the world's first near-cashless society, banks in Sweden have largely stopped providing cash services to businesses. Instead functional services for daily takings and petty cash are currently offered almost exclusively by the cash-in-transit company Loomis AB and entirely on a commercial basis. In the Riksbank's opinion, banks need to take greater responsibility to ensure long-term access to services, which provide a backstop in the event of a breakdown in digital payment systems.
There is already a legal requirement for some banks to ensure that companies and public authorities can deposit daily takings to an adequate extent. According to the Riksbank, the legal requirement needs to be tightened and clarified as the services offered by the banks are "inadequate".
Banks have chosen to fulfil these requirements by providing deposit machines with limits that are too low for many businesses, says the central bank. The Riksbank would also like to see urgent measures to ensure access to petty cash, saying that this service has deteriorated significantly as more and more banks have closed their manual cash services.
“The measures we propose in our written communication are necessary to enable people who need to use cash to do so, but also to strengthen our civil preparedness regarding payments," says Christina Wejshammar, head of the payments department at the Riksbank. "Many businesses continue to accept cash, but without these services they would not be able to do so in practice. In addition, if there are new obligations to accept cash for operators selling essential goods, services for daily takings and petty cash will have to be maintained throughout the country. In this way, the banks contribute to a cash chain that functions under normal conditions, and thus also in crisis situations."