Remember cash? It’s what we used to buy things before the world went contactless

'If I play several cash gigs over a short period, I can end up with quite a lot of the green stuff,' says Vladimir McTavish'If I play several cash gigs over a short period, I can end up with quite a lot of the green stuff,' says Vladimir McTavish
'If I play several cash gigs over a short period, I can end up with quite a lot of the green stuff,' says Vladimir McTavish
Talking about King Charles, I’ve got quite a few pictures of him in my back pocket. I haven’t suddenly become an ardent fan of the royal family, it’s just that have quite a large wad of new £20 notes in my wallet at the moment.

Although most comedy promoters now pay performers by BACS, I do still earn quite a lot in cash. Remember cash? It’s what we used to buy things before the world went contactless.

Believe it or not, one club in central London even pays the comedians by cheque.

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The first time I played there, he’d made the cheque out to Vladimir McTavish, which is not the name on my bank account so he had to issue another.

I tried to pay it into the bank using one of their smart automatic deposit machines but the guy’s handwriting was so bad, it kept being rejected, so I had to queue up to pay it in over the counter.

Anyway, if I play several cash gigs over a short period, I can end up with quite a lot of the green stuff. As we all know, cash is not as easy to spend as it used to be. But it’s not as easy to pay into the bank any more either.

I tried paying £200 into my account at the Bank Of Scotland branch in St James Quarter last Friday afternoon.

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It spewed out a Clydesdale Bank 20 and kept the rest, but issued a message that it had been unable to complete the transaction.

This meant I had to get hold of a member of staff who had to fetch the manager who then opened the back of the machine to retrieve the rest of my money. When she then suggested I tried paying in to the machine again, I asked if it was possible to get a human being to do it over the counter.

She said I would have to go to George Street. It was two minutes to five o’clock closing time, so I had to go back to the George Street branch on Saturday to eventually get the money into my account.

Well done to the Bank Of Scotland for keeping branches open on Saturdays. I just wish their smart machines were a wee bit smarter.

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