My wallet doesn’t run out of battery

A recurring discussion in one of my communities that really divides the group is whether people are using Apple/Google Wallet as their main driver or preferring physical cards. I’m personally strongly in the second group for one key reason: my wallet won’t run out of battery.

I used to be in the previous group but after way too many stressful late night subways home with 1% of battery life left, hoping that the battery lasts until the end of the trip or scrambling to get the phone charged somewhere in the evening so that I can buy a ticket home, I decided that stress was foolish stress.

Right now, I have a small wallet that contains:

• Debit/credit card
• Local transport card
• ID
• Library card
• Lunch benefit card
• Business cards
• Cash
• A fake credit card (to keep hotel room electricity on if I need to charge devices while I’m not there)
• Small index cards for quick notes

In general, after the enshittification of digital services has become faster and faster, I’ve started to be more careful about 3rd party dependencies. While to my understanding, you can use payment cards with Apple/Google Wallet without internet (and someone told me you can even make payments with default card when the battery is out), I don’t like to depend on my devices having power for such essential things.

It’s not about being against digital purchases, I do those all the time. And for temporary things like visiting another city, I use mobile apps to buy transport tickets and such. For the important things that I need to rely on on a daily basis though, I want a peace of mind of knowing that no matter what happens to my phone, I can still pay for things and I can get home.