More Americans are going “cashless” these days, meaning they’re ditching dollars and coins in favor of other payment options.
A Pew Research Center survey from 2022 found 41% of adults don’t use cash for any of their purchases during a typical week.
For some businesses, that’s ideal — for convenience, because they’d rather not have money lying around, or for other reasons.
But, can a business refuse to accept cash altogether, even as customer payment preferences shift?
Is there a federal law requiring businesses to accept cash?
Federal law doesn’t require businesses to accept cash.
U.S. coins and paper money are “valid and legal” tender, but there’s “no federal statute mandating that a private business, a person, or an organization must accept currency or coins as payment for goods o